Pink Moments of the Week

soo much flowery goodness!

the first rose in our garden

rhododendron abound

some purples

lilac in our garden

making flower essences 

from lilac and rhododendron

clematis

and other little pink flowers

chestnut candles:

a Maypole:

... and a little discovery inside a tree hole:

Repeater

Yes, I confess myself guilty of sewing another hat. Quick gratification, even despite the fiddly edge. Same klimperklein pattern like here. Habitual sewing criminal. But I have an apology (actually two...). It got colder again, too cold for a simple jersey hat. 

This hat needed warming fleece inside.

The shape of the hat is just perfectly designed to warm 

some beloved little ears.

You just never know what kind of adventures await you outside 

this late fall.

PS: Justification number 2: Trying out a newly-discovered fabric store.

At Very Long Last

In my book of 2012 some things can wait until next year - ambition, resolutions, laundry. But some things just needed to get finished this year. Like knitted things. Like the Easy Lace Stole.

Or better known now as the Six-Months-Stole, as it took me exactly six months to knit it.

* From winding the yarn into a ball on June 28, while better not watching the German soccer team lose against Italy in the Euro Cup.
* The words Easy and Lace sounded like a good summer knitting project, for leisurely moments in the garden or on vacation
* But the yarn went on and on... and didn't seem to end... fall came and the need for warmer knitties... and the first snow... and more warming stuff
* Until the lazy days Christmas couch days with Downton Abbey on TV
* I could cast off on December 28 and block it

Lace yarn bought in Kiel. My Ravelry notes here.

And it is long. Very long. 2 meters and 20 centimeters (my calculator says 86.6141732 inches).

All rolled up - like the year we are leaving behind very soon. I will wrap it around my neck and party (just a little tiny bit). I even intend to jump from a chair into the New Year like they do in Scandinavia.

Hope to see you in 2013. Happy, healthy and hand making.

Funny Thing

I still carry my now-one-year-old-baby in the sling now and then. When Carolina is tired and fuzzy. Or for a short hop outside the house to pick up Clara from school. Cold temperatures at the end of last week made me realize that I might have a good baby carrier coat and Carolina and I snuggle up to each other warmly, but there is still one small area of my body that gets cold. As Carolina is used to nursing while in the sling (always!), I need to wear open-collared shirts and dresses. A scarf doesn't cover it all and my chest area gets cold.

The solution came to me just in time - while browsing Elisabeth Zimmermann's Knitting Around. I totally enjoy reading her digressions-memoirs and looking at the photos from her life right now. And one pattern in the book puts an end to a mama's cold chest - the Dickey (my Ravelry notes here).

Cast on Thursday night after my Kundalini Yoga class I made nice progress over the weekend and could weave in the ends on Sunday evening - and put it to the cold test this morning.

Waaaaaaaaaaarm! A cool knitting pattern by EZ, knitted with the first wool I could grap that kind of matched the required gauge. And it dawned on me while knitting, that this is the third EZ pattern I knitted with this wool actually (also Baby Leggings and Baby Bonnet). It is neither my favourite colour nor yarn patterning and Clara said this morning that it looked "funny" on me. But hey, Dickey does his job to my full warmth. It's a Mama Bib!

The Little Feet

... in first little shoes!

 

Just too cute.

Pink Moment of the Week

... today together with purple.

Clara came back from a school friend's home with this star she made. The mother of her friend is an avid paper crafter - it seems that Christmas crafting is just round the corner.

New Additions

... to the circle/flower theme!



Sacred geometry: Flower of Life



New functions for my embroidery loops

Glassware:



IKEA's Yngaren



tea-light holder gone stitching

Pink & Purple Glitzy & Healthy

After a springtime-second-hand-shopping-spree.

Special food love of the moment: red radicchio.
The sophisticated side of bitter.



Simply roasted with some olive oil and salt in the oven or as an elegant radicchio lasagna (similar to this one here). Something we first enjoyed at our favourite Venetian restaurant and at a family dinner with Italian friends in Follina (Veneto) seven years ago. I am just stunned how something so simple with so little effort can taste so sophisticated. And vegan. In my case.

Absolutely Great Beginner

In the absence of my own finished knitting objects I am very pleased to show you something knitted by a yoga friend of mine - Monika. She started knitting at the beginning of this year - a mere two months ago! Aftert the inevitable garter stitch scarf she jumped bravely into knitting a dress for her daughter's first birthday.



The pattern is by DROPS Design, the German written version you can find here. All patterns come in 14 languages at www.garnstudio.com!

Congratulations, what a beautiful result! And it gives me hope, knitting minutes will come back later this year, also for me.

Baby Surprises

This post is about a certain sadness and how you can’t hang on to things, how time passes and how sentimental you can get all along. About first and last times and about NOW, not then.

Last week I had to say goodbye to the baby surprise jacket Carolina had been wearing since she was born.

She started looking too tight in it. Within these six weeks Carolina had turned from delicate newborn into a chubby baby girl.

Well, well, I thought, give it a good last wash, put it on her for the last time, take one last picture – and put the jacket away for further (grand)children, together with some exquisite memories (or had I promised Clara to give it to her doll Lilly?).

Anyway, it went into the washing machine with some cloth diapers and Clara’s big sister dress (a machine first-timer, too). I had softly hand-washed the jacket for the last weeks, but after checking the kept wool label I was assured that machine-wash would be fine. So I thought.

When the laundry came out of the machine, the cloth diapers looked as always. Fine. So did Clara’s dress. But the baby surprise felt different... it had slightly felted! Oh no, I felt a sinking feeling in my heart, I will never be able to put it on my granddaughter...

But should I be sad about a jacket I was about to put away for the next who-knows-how-many-years and that might be moth-eaten and forgotten by then, if I could enjoy my life and my baby now? No.

While Carolina was growing in and out of the baby surprise jacket, I worked on another item of the Zimmermann surprise series – the baby bonnet, like she wrote in “The Opinionated Knitter”: „in the same idiom, but not quite so surprising“.

Stitch by stitch I knitted, row by row, sometimes only a few stitches a day and sometimes my mama brain struggled with EZ’s “pithy instructions”, especially when I had to pick up and knit the back of the bonnet. My Ravelry notes here.

And as the baby surprise jacket is too small now, the baby bonnet is still way too big, probably something for the next fall/winter season. I will pack away the jacket now, pink witness of Carolina’s first smiles. And when the times comes round for the bonnet, which first times will it see – first tooth, first word, first step? Surprises.

My Lifeline

The yoga mat doesn't get rolled up these days. It just stays on the floor - a constant invitation to find some rest and some gentle "cat streching". When the baby doesn't need my attention, when the household doesn't need my attention (or I decide to pay no attention), when the rest of the family can get by without my attention for a while or when my body and mind just NEED some attention. And then there is some knitting, too... aaaah... exhale...

Baby La La Land

What I enjoy:



***Baby nursing and nap times are great mama reading or reading-to-Clara-times (I had to accept that knitting while breastfeeding is too uncomfortable...)***



***The Carolina-and-Clara-sticking-out-tongue-contest - who wins the crown?***



***The Rishikesh Blanket is perfectly sized for our newly acquired second-hand baby playpen (a.k.a. baby jail).*** EDIT: We gave the playpen back, because Carolina didn't like it and it didn't feel right either



***With Clara - making wool hedgehogs from the ends of the ends of the blanket.***



***Baby knitting that fits, like the baby leggings.***

Clara's Little Lambs

I couldn't help myself - I made another dress for Clara. Inspired by Katharina's sheep jacket, I got the girl's version of the loden fabric.



Like I said, you just can't have enough of those.