Bonus!

Since I finished Owen's blanket in the middle of all that snow excitement, I had a few days before I was going to get it out in the mail. I also had some extra yarn. On an earlier project this winter, I had decided that Comfy might make a good toy yarn. Do you see where this is going?

A bonus for Owen! Before he was born, Owen's parents were keeping his name a surprise so he was "Monkey" to those of us not in the know.

Pattern: Alfonso the Monkey by Cara Key (Rav Link)

Yarn: Knit Picks Comfy Worsted in Honey Dew, Creme Brulee and Ivory

Needles: US 3 (3.25 mm)

Notes: Let me just start by saying that Cara's pattern is fantastic and completely adorable. I couldn't resist making this money the moment I saw him.

I made one alteration and really it was based in a silly misconception. I thought that I was getting smarter, and the next step for me as a knitter was to start adjusting patterns to make them fit my fit my needs and preferences. So, while I was reading though Cara's pattern I read how the body and belly of the monkey were knit separately, then the monkey was stuffed though the belly and pieces were seamed together. I, of course, thought I was super cool and could skip the seaming. Instead of waiting to seam the two together I picked up the belly piece as I knit up the body by using some SSKs and P2togs. When I got to the neck, I stuffed the body before closing it up. This worked just fine, except my monkey has a pot belly that Cara's doesn't. There's no need to be polite, you can tell he's got a bit of a pooch. I think it is kinda cute on the monkey, but when I make Cara's otter, (Rav Link) I want it to be perfect. I will be extremely obedient with that pattern.

Owen's Blanket: Part 3

The Photo Shoot

I finished the blanket just in time for NYC's last big snow. For the first day of our winter wonderland, Hubby and I went to Prospect Park and met the snowmen. For the second day, we took the blanket to Central Park to see just how many statues we could keep warm.

I think my favorite was the Mad Hatter. Not only was he knee deep in snow and in need of some warmth, but I think the blanket made a dashing cape.

Interruption

This morning I downloaded Picasa to help me get ready for my next blog post. So far I haven't really gotten to play with much of it, but I have been excited about tagging all the people in my pictures. It has been pulling up all sorts of faces and asking me who they are, but just a moment ago I got a little surprise.

From Drop Box

Do you see it? Let's get a closer look.

From Pictures

What is Zach Galifinankis doing in my photos?

From Drop Box

Turns out he was in Australia with me. Who can blame him; Australia was awesome.

Owen's Blanket: Part 2

Process

Pattern: Mitered Blanket by Kay Gardiner and Ann Shayne

Yarn: Knit Picks Comfy Worsted in Creme Brulee, Honey Dew, and Ivory

Needles: US 5 (3.75 m) and US 7 (4.5 mm)

Notes: I have to admit, I am pretty proud of myself. I seamed up each square and wove in all the ends as I went along with this project. I am so glad that I did because it was daunting to just cut off all of the ends when I finished. These little squares made for great subway knitting, so it knit up relatively quickly.

As far as modifications go, I decreased the number of stripes in each square. The meant that I couldn't carry the yarn up the side, so I had to cut the yarn for each stripe. This of course meant more ends to weave in. It also made it difficult to judge how much yarn I needed. I ended up determining how much yarn was needed per square, what percentage of the square each color made up and calculating the yardage from that. My calculations were far from perfect, but fortunately I have a bit of extra yarn instead of running out.

It is not in these pictures, but I also put an I-cord border on the blanket. It wasn't as fun as the I-cord border on my Op-Art, but I still love the look of it.

Owen's Blanket: Part 1

The Plan

When I decide I want to give a hand knit gift to someone, Hubby gets involved in the planning stage. Usually this means helping pick out the pattern or choosing colors. This time he had a much bigger job.

We had a starting point though: colors. I was a bridesmaid in my friend's wedding. When I saw my beautiful mint green dress with golden sash, I just thought about how great it was going to look with my red hair. It wasn't until we were tossing around a football outside the Packer hall of fame in our formal wear that it really sunk in that I was wearing green and gold. Since they had decided to theme their big day with the wedding versions of Packer colors, I decided that this blanket needed the baby version.

So, Hubby and I sat down with Ravelry and looked for some blanket patterns that would work well with two (green and yellow) or three (green, yellow, and white) colors. Our honorable mentions were: Curve of Pursuit, Ribbons Baby Blanket, Carseat Blanket, Baby Shane Blanket, Mirbeau Slip Stitch Baby Blanket, Pathways Blanket (Rav Link), Apple Core Blanket (Rav Link), Amazement and Spinning a Yarn. The winner was Mitered Square Blanket (Rav Link) from Mason Dixon Knitting. It was the beautiful blankets made by ShinKitten (Rav Link) and Fuzzynoddleknits that really inspired our final decision.

We had a pattern and colors picked out; now it was time for the design. The plan was for Hubby to design the blanket, but I wanted to set him up so it would be as easy as possible for him to both create the design and convey the design to me. I made him some little tiles that looked like the squares I could make and asked him to have at it.

We both felt it was too busy, so Hubby decided to do things his way and hopped on the computer. Doing what he does best, he came up with these designs.