It's a boy!

This past week, my boyfriend and I heard from some friends who are expecting their second child. They just found out that they will be having a beautiful baby boy!

I don't know about you, but I have the hardest time coming up with ideas for guy gifts. It takes me all of a few seconds to think of things to make for the girls I know, but when it's time to make for a guy...I just hope that I can come up with something before the special occasion comes. It surprises me a little, since there's not quite as many patterns out there for guys as there are girls.

Well last Thursday and Friday I spent most of my spare time browing the patterns in Ravelry's database, looking for non-girlie baby projects. As usual, Ravelry came to the rescue! I really don't know what I would do without the pattern database and the pictures of the FOs! Thanks to all of that, I have found quite a few perfect projects to make for their baby boy!

• Chuck Taylor baby booties (a must for any baby boy)
• Baby Skater hat (baby version of the Half Pipe hat)
• Baby mittens
• Yet to be determined baby toy

As you can see, my "To Knit" list is starting to get back to normal. I've even been adding a few little gifts for the soon-to-be big sister.

I dusted off my hooks this weekend to get started on my list, and I've got to say that the baby booties are some of the most precious things I've seen! They are super fast, and absolutely adorable! Once my boyfriend builds his new lightbox I'll have him take some pictures to post (he loves any excuse for him to work on making a better DIY lightbox).

Well I better get back to the needles, have an ever-growing list of things to make! Ahhhh, it feels so good to be back into the crafting swing of things!

Dusting off the crochet hooks

As you have probably figured out, most of the crafting I do right now is knitting. It's very relaxing, and with everything being made of 2 different stitches it's easy to do when you have so much on your mind (Thanksgiving preparations, Christmas gifts to make, Christmas decorating to do, etc.). Every now and then, I like to use my crochet skills on some project that really catches my eye.

Crocheting is a little bit harder to memorize than knitting, with all the different stitches to make the different patterns...I usually forget them by the time I do another crochet project and have to pull out my handy-dandy Crochet Answer book. Well, I've decided that now is the time for me to dust off my hooks and books and work on Lidsville from the Son of Stitch 'n Bitch book as a gift for my uncle. I absolutely love flat hats, and when I was looking through my books and patterns for men this was the one that won out for my Uncle Joel.

I don't know what it is, but for some reason I love to crochet hats. The projects seem to go so much faster, and usually look so seamless. This hat is a little different, but so far I'm loving working on it. It's crocheted in many pieces and then you slip stitch the pieces together, but that makes it a perfect crochet-on-the-go project. I've got my yarn (Shamrock by Knit Picks) in a small project bag, along with the pieces that I've already finished.

I started working on some of the pieces Monday night while watching Heroes, and with a little bit of crochet time here and there I've already got about half of the hat pieces complete. This is definitely the type of encouragement I needed with my Christmas gift list, because I was starting to wonder how I could get hats, scarves, gloves, dolls and needle felting all done before Christmas day. If things keep going at this rate, I could have it done by the weekend and ready to show off on the blog and Ravelry!

Well I better head back to the hooks and books!

Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!

Well it seems like winter is coming early in my neck of the woods, well sorta. We didn't get inches and inches of snow, just a few flurries here and there that left pretty snowflakes on my car this chilly morning. I know some people are dreading the thought of winter starting so soon, but it was just what I needed to really get back into my Christmas knitting.

Not only am I a knitter, I enjoy video games too. This past week was the release of the new expansion to World of Warcraft (yes, I play that game), so this past weekend was filled with playing video games and seeing some of the new things in the expansion. I even scheduled a day off from work to stay at home and play, but after all the anti-knitting mobile happenings of last week...let's just say I really needed a stay-at-home day.

I was a little worried that my gaming might get in the way of my knitting time, and possibly cause some gifts to not be ready on time. But then yesterday it was freezing outside and there were some snow flurries, and that's just what I needed to get me in the knitting mindset.

After weeks of re-thinking Christmas gifts, I finally have something to make for everyone on my list! I even finished one of my dad's Christmas gifts yesterday, so I'm feeling good about my gift list again. Sorry, there are no pictures quite yet, because I was in such a crafting zone I immediately started another project on the list before taking time to snap some photos. Maybe once I get a few more completed, I'll post another visual progress report.

So here's the list of what I'm making for those hard to craft for guys:

• Papa Bear - Scarf and Slippers
• Eugene - Scarf in a neutral color
• Josh - Link doll and 1-up mushroom mitts
• Russell - Fingerless gloves

And here's a list of what is on my needles:

• Knitted Fairy doll (I really need to work on that some more) - 15% complete
  
• Lidsville (crocheted) - 5% complete

While I will still be cutting it close with the gifts, this cold weather will definitely get me on the right track. There's nothing better than a pile of yarn keeping you warm on a cold day!

Well, I better get back to work...I've got quite a few projects ahead of me.

P.S. - Sorry that I've been a little scarce recently, with the car problems and trying to get some progress made in knitting, it's been hard to focus on blogging. Once things get back on track I will definitely be posting more regularly, and I hope to get more pictures up of my completed projects.

Knit (or Crochet) One, Save One

Looking for a way to give back to the world? Looking for a way to do something special for children and families? Wanting to put those crafty hands to use?

For me, the holiday season always inspires me to do more for others...and it gets those crafty juices flowing. When I was looking at some of the blogs I frequent, I found Vickie Howell's post on Knit One, Save One. I had seen something in my email about this last week, but being without a printer at home I saved the information to look at later on. If it wasn't for Vickie's post, I might have forgotten about it until it was too late to send it in.

I got to thinking about all the things I have to knit/crochet between now and December 31st, but then I realized...it doesn't take hardly any time or yarn to make a hat for a newborn. Please check out the site, and if you feel inspired, take 30 minutes to create a beautiful hat for a newborn.

How to: Crocheted Towel Bathmat

Ok, so I promised to show you how to make your very own crocheted towel bathmat...and here it is!

First, gather all the towels you want to use for your project. Try to get some pretty colors if you can, but don't use brand new towels (unless you bought some specifically to make this project). If you want a regular size bathmat, I would suggest having at least 5 towels available. For my crocheted towel bathmat, I used 3 regular size towels. Make sure to take the end seams out of all your towels. For me, some of the towels seams had already come out.

Once you have all your towels together, decide if you want a specific design or look. For me, I wanted to have a big stripe in the middle and smaller stripes on the sides. To do this, I folded my blue and green towels in half and pinned the ends. Then I took my scissors and cut right down the middle. I didn't care if it was exactly perfect, but I didn't want it too lop-sided so the stripes on the sides could be as close to the same width as possible.

I wanted to cut my towels in a continuous piece so that I didn't have any huge bulky spots from where pieces were sewn or just overlapped. Here's is a picture of how I cut up the towels:

You'll have to excuse the bad Paintbrush skills, but I figured it would be easier to see how to cut the towels like this instead of cutting an actual towels and posting pictures. Depending on your crochet hook, you'll want to cut between 1/2-1" wide strips (I used an "S" crochet hook). Now these don't have to be perfect, so you don't have to measure the width along the way...just eyeball it. When I cut my towels, I left about 1/2-3/4" at the end so it was still connected to the next cut.

Now all you have left to do is crochet your bathmat. Make a crochet chain for as long as you want. I wanted something just a little bigger than my foot, so I just chained until I got the length I wanted. I didn't do anything fancy for a stitch design, partly because it was hard dealing with this bulky "yarn" and also I wanted to keep things sturdy so that it would soak up most the moisture and not leave holes for water to go through. Basically all I did was use a slip stitch (in the back loop) for the row below, and then a chain stitch at the end of the row to help it turn so you could go on to the next row.

Hopefully this is clear to you all, but if it isn't please ask questions! I would love to see any pictures of your finished bathmats!

Happy Crafting!