Warm Set for Tadpole

I've started knitting a set of clothing to keep the little Tadpole warm when it comes out i February. I was allowed to use some gorgeous yarn from my sister's stash, Blue Sky Alpacas Alpaca & Silk. I know, the Tadpole will probably puke on it immediately and it's handwash only. But it's so soft. A entirely decent thing to wear when you have never been encumbered with clothing before.

The pattern is from Drops, here it is in English og her er det på dansk. The Danish version actually says it will look good on a little girl, but I think it is unisex enough when knitted in green:


The legs are knitted separately in the round, which probably makes good sense, I'm sure the pattern would look bad sewn together. But it is quite problematic to put the legs together. OK, the pattern says to knit 2 cm back and forth to make it easier, but it doesn't make it easy. Also, a circular needle that would be small enough for this number of stitches would be annoyingly short to knit with, so I had to continue with dpn's after putting the legs together. But because the legs were pulling in each opposite directions, there are some ugly transitions although I pulled all stitches really tight. Oh well, here's to hoping it goes away when washed.

Cardigan for Tadpole

This project is a quick little knit that wasn't really that quick, as it involved some finishing. The pattern for this little cardigan is from "Simple Knits for Cherished Babies" by Erika Knight. I was seduced by the wonderful photography throughout the book, but I guess I should have researched the case a bit more before buying. The book is filled with errors, so beginners definately can't knit most of the projects. Advanced knitters can probably reconstruct most of it from the photos. The pattern for this little cardigan did not have any errors, possibly the only error-free pattern in the entire book! Earlier, I tried making a little garter stitch wrap top, but had to give up because the pattern was so unclear. Well, also ran out of yarn, and didn't want to buy more for such a dubious project.

But this little cardigan turned out very nice - from the front:


and from the back:


It's made of Rowan wool cotton, knitted on 3 mm needles though the pattern recommends 3 3/4 mm. But I think garter stitch needs to be tight to look good. I made a couple of modifications:
- added 5 stitches to the sleeve length
- knitted on edge around neck-fronts-back in the round with alternating purled/knitted rows

Aeolian

I've been working on Aeolian for a while... for some reason I got really bored in the middle, and put it away for a while. But then it came back with a vengeance, and I finished it in no time. Here it is:



For some reason I can't capture the beauty of this shawl in a photo at all, but I guess everybody knows what it looks like.

But the result is what I hoped for, soft and with good stitch definition. It is the shawlette size, but big enough by far - i used a 4 mm needle, so that gave some size too. I hated working the pearls, and they don't even show that much. So this may be my last beaded project as well as my first.