Oh Baby!

Here is baby Allison, my new niece, born September 10. She's sleeping.

Aaaaawwwww!

Don'tcha just love a sleeping baby? Me, I'm not too crazy about the loud, squalling babies. It kind of hurts my feelings when you pick a baby up and they scream like it's some kind of hell to be in your arms. But how can you not love a sleeping, peaceful baby?

Aaaaawwwww!

My bro and sis-in-law did a good job. And they even had the baby on my dad's birthday. (Remember, he passed away earlier this year.) I think he'd be pleased by that.

And Aunt Patwoman always comes to visit bearing gifts:

You knew it would be a baby sweater. Don't act so surprised.

So this is Holly's Jacket (by Jacki Kelly) with a crapload of mods. First, I like black. But you've got to break it up a little on babies. So I added the pink trim, in seed stitch.

Ruffles on the bottom are as written, but I added another increase row to the sleeve ruffles to really... uh... ruffle them. Speaking of sleeves, I just picked up the sleeve stitches and knit down in the round because, you know, I hate to seam. Oh, and I knit them straight, with no decreases and they turned out looking a little like bell sleeves.

I added the skull insignia, just for fun. That was actually the hardest part--just because I wasn't satisfied with the results. First, I did it in duplicate stitch, but that just didn't look right. (Probably because Patwoman needs new glasses and can't distinguish between the black stitches, even with an Ott light.)


Then, I tried cross stitch. But I wasn't happy with that, either. It gave it a too primitive look. I finally settled on basic satin stitch embroidery. And I was pretty pleased with the result.

One last mod: I crocheted (yes, I can crochet) a chain closure.

I only used about half a skein of Bernat Satin in Ebony and maybe an ounce of Lion Brand Baby Soft in Bubblegum. Size 5 needles.

Oh, and I modified the # of stitches cast on and the number of rows to the armholes and overall length, because the original pattern was for a size 1 year. This, I'm guessing is a 3-6 month size.