Flannel is awesome.

Getting ready for Christmas this year, I realized that my sister and I got our sewing machines from our parents last Christmas and we've had some good times over the last year. I wish I could say my sewing has advanced as much as my knitting did in Year 1 (when it was a full on, all-encompassing obsession), but I have made a few things I've been pretty happy with.

The newest is this little gift set I made for a February baby. I got some really great deals on flannel from Joann, so I looked up ideas for things to do with it. Chickpea Sewing Studio has this great tutorial for a blanket, changing pad, and washcloths and this tutorial for bibs, which were both awesome. I combined the directions from both and just kind of ran with it.



The whole little set contains a huge receiving blanket (flannel on both sides), two washcloths, a changing pad, and a bib (all flannel/terrycloth). I bought 3 yards of fabric and one yard of terrycloth. Even with my super-slow sewing skills, I finished it in an afternoon.





There was a fleece remnant at Joann that matched the green frogs in the flannel, so I decided to make a frog plushie to look like the frog head in the pattern. I free-handed a pattern on tracing paper to look like the frog head, then cut that out, pinned it to the fleece, and cut out two identical fleece pieces. I sewed them together right sides together leaving a small opening for stuffing, flipped it inside out, stuffed it, then ladder stitched the opening closed. Using felt from the craft store that is sticky on one side, I cut out shapes for the facial features and stuck them on the head. Ta da! Frog head plushie!



I gave it to the parents at a baby shower a few weekends back and they were pleased. They were even more pleased with the knitting I did for the little one, though- more on that later.

Hope your last minute holiday knitting is going well and is not stressing you out too much. I have one last project to finish up knitting-wise, but I think I have plenty of time to do it. Now just to wrap all the presents and clean the house and dang it I want to bake some sugar cookies too.

Quick Stuff

I've been MIA lately, but there actually is a little knitting going on. At least some knitting for little people. On the car ride to Nashville for Thanksgiving, I started working on a hat for a baby girl who is coming in January. I wanted to give a little gift to her Mom during the trip, so I was knitting fast.



Pattern: 10 Cable Baby Hat, my favorite newborn hat
Yarn: baby-pink Plymouth Encore Worsted
Needles: Size 8

I got the hat done in record time, so the night before Thanksgiving I started on some booties to match. I borrowed some antique buttons from Mema (grandmother-in-law extraordinaire) and had a little set ready to go. I made super-girly Mary Janes, which I've made before and love.



Pattern: Mary Jane Baby Booties
Needles: I think size 4s?

There is seaming involved in these booties, but it's not too bad. I think the back turned out pretty well- you can tell they are seamed, but it's not too noticeable.



Pretty cute set together, huh? I think everything together took about 5 hours or so.



It's that unfortunate time of year in the knitting world when the blogs are blank because no one wants to show off their holiday knitting too soon. I'm no different- I'm exclusively working on holiday knitting now, but I do have a few FOs waiting. I'll try to get those blogged soon!