I’ve been spending a lot of time lately knitting hats. The weather turned colder, the knitting needles came out, and I haven’t really stopped since. A while back I ran across a hat pattern called the “Holly Hat” over at A Suburban Hippie’s Knitting Blog. It’s a very basic knitted hat pattern with options for completing several different styles. If you want a basic hat pattern to go off of, this is it.  I saved it to my iPhone so that I always have it with me if the mood to knit strikes.

My favorite is the rolled brim hat because it is super simple and quick to knit up.  Plus, it’s super cute (especially on little girls, which I happen to have one of!).  I’ve been knitting a ton of these lately – some for gifts and some specially requested by friends after seeing mine.

Next up I have to find some sort of simple scarf pattern. I had a request for a matching hat/scarf set and I’m stumped on how to do the scarf. Simple stockinette won’t work as it rolls. I could do a k1, p1, ribbing, but that would get a little boring after a while. I need it to be a quick knit as I have a stack of Christmas gifts planned that I haven’t started on yet, but I don’t want it to be boring either. If anyone has any suggestions, I’d be happy to take it!

**If you’re reading through a feed reader, I’d love it if you’d click through and check out the new site layout! I finally switched Getting Crafty over to Thesis theme (one of the best WordPress themes in my opinion) and would love to hear what you think. There’s still a few quirky spacing issues I have to figure out in the sidebar and I may add a few more things there, but it’s mostly ready for viewing.

My cousin and his wife are expecting their first baby at the end of June so I decided I wanted to make them a little something. I normally would throw together a little fleece tie blanket, but since he’ll be a summer baby I thought I should do something a little less warm. This is what I came up with.

The top side of the blanket is a soft knit fabric with a cute animal print. The bottom side is a fuzzy fleece backing. All I did was cut the two pieces of fabric, sew around the edge with right sides together (leaving a small opening), turn right side out, then topseam around the edge. It turned out really great. In fact, I think I’ll be making these again when I need another baby gift.

I couldn’t resist knitting up a little hat to go along with it as well. I packaged it all up, along with two cute little rompers I picked up and shipped it off to my cousin last week.

Now I’m just trying to figure out who’s having the next baby so I have an excuse to make more!

Two more Chunky Knit Beanies, in the adult size this time.  One is for me, the other for my mother-in-law.  I’m working on one more for my sister and then I think I’ll have most of this lovely lemongrass chunky wool used up.  I really am loving this pattern as well.  It is just so easy!

I’m not sure what has gotten into me over the last couple of weeks, but I have been in such a knitting mood.  I suppose I pushed myself into it by vowing to finish my mom’s scarf that I promised her for her birthday last year.  Her birthday is in 3 days and I just finally finished the scarf last week!  I didn’t really expect it to take me a year to finish but I guess I got a little distracted.

Then over the weekend I made three more hats. I made two adorable pink and brown Chunky Knit Beanies, one for Evie and one for my niece Caitlin. I also knit up another Hot Hedd in camouflage for Zach, although with the stretch of the ribbing, it also fits me pretty well.

I love knitting hats because they knit up so fast. To speed things up even more, I decided to try knitting continental style again. I’ve done it before but never could quite get comfortable with it. I never could figure out how to purl continental style. I decided to give it another go this weekend (with some video tutorials at KnittingHelp.com) and I have now been converted. Once I got over the awkwardness and figured out how to hold my hands, I fell in love with it and I’ll never go back.

Next up, I think it is about time I knit something for myself. I have a few ideas in mind, but I can’t decide which one to start on first!

This weekend I decided I needed a quick project, something that I could start and finish in a couple of hours.  I have several unfinished projects hanging over me but I couldn’t motivate myself to work on any of them.  I needed something new and fresh that I could get excited about.  A hat is a perfect quick project.  I love knitting hats, especially baby hats so I decided to whip one up for Evie.

I used Alex Zorn’s Hot Hedd pattern from Stitch ‘N Bitch: The Knitter’s Handbook and adapted it a bit. Unfortunately, I didn’t measure and the hat ended up smaller than I intended. It is a little bit too short for Evie’s head. I’ll either end up giving it away or saving it for Evie’s baby doll to play dress up with. I guess that means I need to make another one because it turned out really cute and Evie still needs a hat.

Here I am again feeling the need to apologize for not updating. I’m not sure why I feel that way really. It’s my blog, I should be able to update (or not update as the case may be) when I please. That said, I’m going to make an effort to catch up on what I’ve done the last couple of months.

As far as knitting goes, I seem to have lost my drive a bit. I want to knit. It just feels so time consuming these days. I suppose that’s why I have about five unfinished projects going. I’ll start something and then lose the drive to finish it. I guess that’s why I prefer hats, scarfs, and other quick projects as opposed to knitting sweaters.

Just before Christmas, I decided I wanted to give some handmade gifts. I was a little too ambitious with my plans and didn’t get them all finished, but I did actually complete a couple of knitted items. Hubby’s mom had requested a pink scarf a while back when she saw me knitting the pink Grace Beanie last summer. So, I pulled out my leftover yarn and knitted her up a quick scarf. Then, for lack of any better ideas, I found some camo colored Red Heart yarn at Michael’s and decided to knit my father-in-law a hat to keep his noggin warm. He’s big on hunting so I thought the camo colors would be perfect for him. (Yes, I’m aware the picture quality totally sucks and you can’t really make out the colors.)

With all of the holiday rush, I barely finished those items in time to get them mailed out. Instead of fooling myself into thinking I could actually get anything else knitted in time, I decided to do a little sewing for the third gift.

My sister-in-law was due to give birth to my niece about a week after Christmas, so I wanted to make her a nice tote bag for all that baby stuff she would soon be carrying around.  With my procrastinating, I ended up staying up until about 4:00 Christmas morning finishing the bag up.  The pattern was actually very easy, but apparently sleep deprivation is not very helpful when you are trying to follow even an easy pattern.  I love how the bag turned out am hoping to find the time to make myself one soon.

Projects that I will hopefully finish soon:
Baby blanket started nearly a year ago! (um, baby will be here hopefully in 7 weeks or less!)
Baby bib started last summer sometime (not really sure what the holdup is on this one, just bored with it)
Baby hat (should seriously have finished this one already)
Birthday gift for a birthday that has already passed (started, um, yesterday)
Scarf for myself (not yet started)

And if I can ever get all of those done, I picked up some really cute chunky yarn (Yarn Bee Mosaic in Sunrise – for $.99 a skein!) last night at Hobby Lobby that I’m just dying to play with.  I’m thinking it would make some cute hats and/or ponchos for my baby girl and my two new nieces.

I’m a little embarrassed at how long it has been since I’ve posted here.  My goal is to post a minimum of once a week and I’m not really keeping up with that.  I did go on vacation for a week though, so at least I have an excuse.

While I was on vacation, I successfully completed the Grace Beanie!  I made both of the hats to the left while riding in a car and they both turned out well.  The pink one on the right is the gorgeous Grace Beanie.  I used Red Hearts Baby Clouds for both hats.  Now I just have to figure out which lucky babies on my list are going to be the recipients.  I’ve got another Grace Beanie on the needles now in a lighter weight yarn and it is turning out really well so far.

Speaking of babies, I found out last week that I am expecting again.  We are very excited to bring another little monster angel into our family.  I also found out that a good friend of mine is expecting as well.  She’s just a few weeks ahead of me, so we’ll get to experience everything together.  How fun is that?

I’m guessing that I’m going to be knitting a whole lot of baby stuff in the near future.  I might even try a baby cardigan if I start feeling really brave.

I’ve been sitting around patiently waiting for an invite to Ravelry for a while now.  I kept thinking surely my turn would come up soon.  Lo and behold, during a quick e-mail check last night I saw the invite sitting in my inbox.  I signed up right away, but I don’t have much time to play there just yet.  I have a feeling I could get sucked in for hours before I notice.

I’m really impressed with the site after getting just a quick look around.  I think it will definitely be a great resource for me as I learn my way through the knitting basics.

Speaking of learning, I’m still working on that darn Grace beanie.  I started (and actually finished) another one during a car trip this weekend.  It was coming out perfect until I got distracted by a toddler and let my stitch count get off.  I went ahead and finished it out anyway as it was just a test with some spare yarn.  I’ll be starting another one soon to go with the blanket I recently finished.

I also knitted up another quickie infant hat over the weekend that I have yet to take pictures of.  It may be a while before I’m able to post pictures though as we are heading out of town on vacation on Friday.  I’ll have a very limited internet connection while we are gone unless I can find some free wi-fi somewhere.

Technorati Tags: ravelry, grace beanie, baby, hats, knitting

Things have been a little busy around here this week, thanks to the birth of my newest nephew. He was born via a scheduled c-section on Tuesday morning so I’ve been spending every free moment I have up at the hospital with his Momma. Last night I got to hold him for the first time and it was amazing. I am SO in love with that little guy already. I took advantage of the opportunity to wrap him up in the hat and blanket I made him and take a few hundred or so pictures of him. Here he is all snuggled up.

I also started yet another baby blanket while I was at the hospital waiting for him to arrive. I now have two of them going at once. I wonder which one I will finish first?