Knitting for the Knursery

While KZog undertakes the necessary repairs and renovations to the nursery, my fewer-than-8-weeks-to-go belly and I have logged some serious couch time, indulging in various iterations of BBC/PBS Mystery! as I knit cute and likely unnecessary items for LZog.

If knitting anything in Texas, especially during the hottest part of the year, strikes you as knutty, bear in mind that I haven't quite figured out a practical way to haul all of my sewing accoutrements into the living area and run a machine while kicking my feet up. Knitting, in other words, proves far more mobile than sewing machine projects.

Sometime last year I first attempted knitting animals, which I found more difficult than first imagined. Hence taking a year to finish them. Knitting up the separate pieces - arms, legs, head, ears, body - took little time. Piecing them together on the other hand . . . Eh. One ear would end up on top of the head and the other on the side. Or, the legs looked like the bear would have a pronounced limp if it could walk. Charming? Perhaps, though the mismatches aggravated me more than anything. Finally I evened the bits up enough to present a passable bear.

LZog's First Bear

Since I needed practice putting them together, LZog's bear has a twin in Louisiana that lives with his cousin, EMit, who turned one year old in June.

EMit's Blue-Eyed Bear

Yes I have made leg warmers. And yes, if LZog is a boy, he will wear them. Even the mauve-ish pair.

Ready for Flashdance

In theory, I suppose it matters on which side one places the buttons and buttonholes depending on whether the article of clothing will be worn by a boy or a girl. When looking at the piece, a "boy" sweater should/would have buttons on the left; a "girl"sweater, on the right. A cursory search gave me little to go on, though the response offered from website Stupid Questions Answered seems at least plausible. Several of women's fashion cycles have favored styles that required others - servants/slaves/relatives to dress them. Think corsets, cage/hooped skirt, and tight bodices (and no knit fabrics!). To fully dress, women's clothing had buttons on the left, as those dressing them would likely have been right-handed; whereas, men dressed themselves. Now, I've watched enough period dramas to know that this doesn't totally jive with the portrayals of, say, the English upper class, but it satisfies my curiosity for now. Unwittingly I have made this sweater for a boy, but I don't know that I would put any stock in this accident as somehow psychic. I have only to finish the sleeves and find some little silver buttons so that I may put it away until the weather cools enough for LZog to wear it, sometime in November if we are lucky.

Girl Sweater? Boy Sweater? How About Just a Cute Sweater?

I found all of the patterns used on Ravelry.com, a fantastic site for knitters and crocheters that boasts thousands of free patterns and many reasonably priced ones as well. The bears I based on Theodore the Teddy Bear; the leg warmers, Free-Range Baby Legwarmers; and the sweater, the Sunnyside Cardigan.

Here's to distracting myself over these last weeks!

XO,
JZog
For LZog's BabyList, Click Here