A Crab Among Perls: Knitting for Kiddos

It seems as though almost everyone I know is pregnant or just had a baby. This means I have been knitting some baby gifts. I love baby gifts, because they allow me to knit something small that goes quickly, and they usually allow me to try something new.

I found a pattern a few years back for a baby buddy inchworm pillow that looked adorable. I figured it was knit in the round, based on the picture, and that it would be a quick project. The pattern even says you can make it in a day.

Well, it was a LONG day.

This was one of the more challenging projects I've taken on in quite a while. It turns out, you knit the top from the middle out, with a lot of shaping to get the curve right, and then you knit the bottom, reversing the shaping so it matches. I never use the right gauge, and while I adjusted the length correctly, I didn't adjust the width, so mine looks a lot more like a classic neck pillow than the original. Then the pattern says to sew the two halves together using mattress stitch. I had to find a demo on YouTube, which was extremely helpful, and it looked like a pretty straightforward stitch. Until I realized that it is designed to match up two pieces of knitting side-by side, and going around the perimeter of the pillow I was mostly joining at a diagonal, or end-to-end. I did my best, but it took FOREVER to do all the sewing correctly. Once that was done and he was stuffed, I still had to knit a two-yard-long I-cord and sew IT in place -- once the cord was done, at least the sewing went quickly. And then I embroidered on the face and added the antennae. Fortunately, when he was done, he was cute enough for all of the hassle to be worth it!

See how many angles I had to deal with?

But such a cute face when he's done!

I have another friend who has two daughters, E who is three, and A who is almost a year old. I missed the little one's birth, and I decided to send presents to both of them, so I made each of them a hat and a toy.

The first hat was for E, and it was made with a terrycloth yarn that was extremely difficult to work with, only because I couldn't see any of my stitches. I have made enough hats that I usually whip one out without a pattern, but I couldn't see my gauge, couldn't see my decreases -- couldn't see anything! I still think it came out pretty cute, with a pointed tip.

Then I made another pattern I found a while back, Spud and Chloe's Ribbit. This pattern didn't have a specified gauge, and I must have chosen yarn that was thinner than recommended, because mine came out smaller than theirs. You are supposed to be able to insert a tennis ball into the body so that he can bounce, but I don't think mine was big enough to fit one. So I just filled him with stuffing, which is another option. I also did the hands and feet differently than the pattern suggests. They have you make a large pocket at the end of the arms, then knit individual bobbles for the fingers and toes. I decided to stuff the pocket, and then, since I had 12 stitches to work with, I did three 4-stitch I-cords for the fingers and toes. I like the look of them, even though they don't really mimic webbed feet. I also took some of the remaining terrycloth yarn and made him a hat to match the one I'd knit for E.

Ribbit in his hat

And next to the hat he matches

For A, I decided to use some super soft and silky yarn that I've had on hand for quite a while. As usual, I just got started on the hat with ribbing, and kept going. Halfway up, I decided to do a version of the two pompom hat that is so adorable, but I put tassels on the tips instead of pompoms. I think it came out quite well. I just hope it fits! That's part of why I stuck with the ribbing all the way to the top, actually -- so the hat would be a bit expandable, if necessary.

A's tassel hat

Rather than making another character with a matching hat, I decided to use one of the patterns from a new book I just got from my wonderful boss at the herp society. It's called Toys to Knit by Tracy Chapman, and the patterns are really unbelievably adorable. The finger puppets looked like a good idea, so I made those for A. The patterns are for a mouse and an octopus, but I think I might try to make some other critters in the future. It would be a great way to use up all the little odds and ends of scrap yarn I have in my stash. The patterns call for fingering yarn, but I did just fine using worsted weight. Strangely, these weren't knit in the round either, so I got to use my mattress stitch again to do the seams, which worked very well in the right context. For the octopus's arms, because I was using a heavier cotton yarn, I went with 4 stitches wide instead of 5, which I think was a good choice, since the arms just barely fit. But I think the mouse's huge, curly ears are adorable.