March - The Month Of...

Knitting!

 

Or, to make it sound more manly, "yarn stabbing".

 

It all started with this book: First Steps in Knitting.

 

Well, let me back up. My grandma taught me how to knit when I was younger, but I never work on it. I've picked it back up on and off again over the years, but never really made anything substantial.

 

When I was pregnant with Katherine, I REALLY wanted to knit her a blanket, but I never did it. This month was going to be my chance. And since Jon had never knit before, we decided to make this one of our months of exploration!

 

My goal for Kate's afghan was to be 3 colors - orange, brown and green. I also picked large needles because I wanted the stitches to be chunky.

 

We kicked off our knitting projects with Breanna!

 (her hubs was out of town)

Katherine thoroughly enjoyed laughing at the Baker's dog, Nelope, as we watched James and the Giant Peach.

It's so fun when Jon dresses her for church. All blue, athletic socks, and her sparkly Christmas shoes :) Love it.

Jon decided to tackle a manageable project; knitting a scarf for Kate.

He did start over once at the beginning, but his stitches were nice and even and looked great for his first project! He also learned quickly the importance of COUNTING your stitches.

We did some knitting at Summer and Riley's place too. All the while I was practicing different stitches, knitting and purling so that I could read the pattern I wanted to use.

As of today, Jon's scarf looks like this!

 

All done with some beautiful green fringe on the end :) He made it extra long so that she can continue to grow with it and wear it for a few years.

 

My project?

 

 

Looks like this...

 

I was getting a little thrown off with the giant needles, so I decided to use smaller needles to practice on until I really feel comfortable with the stitches. It's nowhere close to being a blanket yet, but I do feel good about my practicing. Good thing it's a skill I can continue to develop :)