Handmade Christmas ~ My Brother's Family

 I already wrote about the rag rug I made my brother for Christmas.  We don't actually exchange adult presents in our family (except we all get or do something for my parents, and them for us) so I technically could have given him the rug at anytime.  I was going to give it to him a few weeks ago, when I finished it, but then my mom was all, "No!  Give it to him for Christmas!" and I was all....okay.  Besides, I had found an online sale on good bath towels and got him and my sister-in-law (not through him, through my other brother) a half-dozen towels each.  So there you go.  Together, they made a very practical present.

Anyway, my brother has two of my favorite girls and I like to make them things.

I made Kaziah this totally adorable corduroy skirt that has running horses embroidered on it.  I could die.  I want this so badly in my size!  It could not have been simpler to make, using the Oliver + S Lazy Days skirt tutorial (or, more to the point, what I remember of it from when I made the skirt before) and with no measurements and no pattern at all, I managed to nail it in both length and width.  High fives, all around.  She also loved the skirt, and wore it on Christmas Day after she opened it.  Love!  I also made her this sweet, slouchy, cap which I knitted.  (The pattern is free, if you sign up at their website.) 

 

 She put that one on right away, too, and as I predicted, it looks awesome on her!    It's exhausting being right all the time.

 Her entire prize package also included her own pointy scissors (which may or may not have been immediately confiscated by her mother) and Emily Martin's new paper doll book. 

 

 For my brother's ex-wife, I crocheted this rasta-inspired hat.  I've made this hat for her in several colors, and she loves them and they look adorable on her.  She had asked me for one in these colors, and I'm glad I finally made it.  When I got to my mom's, Monica was already wearing a gray one I had made for her last year!

  

And for sweet-girl Giannah, who is just as sweet and sassy as my brother was when he was growing up, I made this little gnome village.  This was easily my favorite thing to make this holiday season.  It involved a jigsaw and a drill, for one thing.  Plus, I am totally in love with these gnomes and their gnome-y kids from Wee Folk Art.

I also loved making the accessories; sleeping bags and a bushel of apples and a basket of eggs, and I even put in a Christmas tree with presents underneath.  I crocheted a rug for the bottom floor and had little tables and a flower pot with a rose bush.  *swoon*

I can't tell if Giannah actually liked it...I also gave her a Melissa and Doug wooden pizza party play set, and she loved that, but gave no attention at all to the gnome village or anything in it.  It may be something that she re-discovers in the quiet of her home;  I left lots of room for her to be creative, and to find rocks and wood to use as furniture, so she may end up liking it more when she's made it her own.  Or it may have been a (oh-so-fun-to-make) miss.  Either way, it's so cute!

Cat in the Hat

I knit two hats last weekend, as I had gift exchanges on Monday and Tuesday. It's so hard to figure out if a handmade gift is going to be appreciated! In both cases, the hats were stolen twice (the "legal limit") and so that's the ultimate confirmation of acceptance, under the circumstances!

I don't have pictures of the hats, because I wrapped them before I photographed them. Now it's like it never happened. Anyway, I knitted them. (for the crafty inclined: cast on 38 to size 11 needles, knit in garter stitch for 21 inches. One was made from jiffy yarn in light brown and I finished it by seaming the short ends and running a piece of yarn through the loops in the top-round and pulling tight to close off the top. The second was made from wool-ease thick and quick in a very sweet spice/brick orange-y color. This one I finished the same way, but instead of pulling the yarn tight through the top-round loops, I moved down just over an inch and when I pulled tight it was so cute, it had a little "top knot". )

The whole point of this is to tell you that knitting? It takes a long time. The jiffy hat worked up in about 5 hours, and the top-knot took about 4 hours.

For a frame of reference, I also crocheted these two hats this week.*** The pink one took about 40 minutes. The fuzzy sherbert one took less than one and a half hours. Seriously.

(Look at my sick baby! And I'm making him wear hats for a photo shoot. What a trooper!)

One could legitimately ask the question: why knit at all? I have no answer for that. Just to say, knitting is kind of fun anyway. And there's something to be said, in my humble opinion, for taking your time with something you're making by hand. I mean, if I wanted to stop at Target on the way to the party, and buy a hat for 10 bucks, I could. The point about handmade is to embrace the slower pace, to be purposeful and mindful. Some could say that knitting, by it's nature, forces you to do that.

Still, I'm a working mom with two young kids. There's got to be a compromise! So far, my compromise is to do both...hmmm, could be I'm missing the point entirely.

*** These hats are going to the daughters of my friend. Pattern for the pink calls for wool-ease thick and quick and can be found here. (registration required, but it's free) Pattern for the cloche calls for bulky weight homespun, but I used sensations angel-hair that was gifted to me. Pattern can be found here. (registration required, but it's free)