Knitting Through the Year - February

If there is one fact on which all grandmothers agree, it is that no daughter-in-law knows how to wash wool. This may be true, but it is no reason for the grandmas to stop knitting. Do they expect their handmade offerings to be carefully preserved in layers of tissue paper and never worn? They have perhaps forgotten how often baby things have to be washed. The baby surely doesn't mind if they do become a little shrunken and yellowed. Let the grandmas keep up the supply of soft woolies and avert their mind's eye from the ultimate fate of their knitting - at least it is being used. ~ Knitter's Almanac, by Elizabeth Zimmermann

Knitting for babies is delightful even when you don't have a baby to knit for, which I currently don't. When I find a pattern I like I just knit away and stash it for future use. I generally try to knit at least a 12 month size, if not larger, which insures that my sweater will probably be worn more than once.

In true EZ fashion, I set aside her very good instructions and attempted to make the arms and chest at the same time, with extra stitches to make into steeks later on. (Steeks are where you take scissors to your knitting, cut it into pieces and then sew it back up again. It's crazytown, but a very useful technique.)

My reasons were very good. The yarn I was using (Crazy Yarn left over from the kids' Baby Surprise Sweaters) has uneven stripes, and it would be very difficult to make the stripes the same on the sleeves and the body because there are different numbers of stitches in each.

I used the crochet method of securing the steek edges, which was very easy if you are already familiar with crochet. You can also use a sewing machine if you prefer.

I think that somewhere in the process I misplaced some stitches or ignored something crucial because the sleeves are a lot skinnier than I was intending. Knitting stretches, which is good, but this might be recast as a full length infant sweater instead of a waist-length toddler sweater.

Ah well, I'll be more careful next time.