Mama's got a brand new bag

I finished it, yah!  The pretty in pink knitting bag is complete and actually came out just as I expected it. 

Bag

I would like to report that I finished the knitting bag, sadly that is not the case.  Progress continues, but oh so slowly.

 I did some light, wavy quilting across the bottom to keep the layers together; I am still loving this explosion of girly, pink flowers!










I also just cast on for a light weight wrap type sweater, the pattern is called Odelia.  I bought the pattern and the yarn at the Stitches event this year.  The yarn came from a company called A Verb For Keeping Warm and it feels so nice, it's got a little cashmere in the blend.  The pattern is Odelia from Cocoknits. Below is my knitting swatch (the little practice piece to measure how many stitches per inch and row, this allows each person to size their own garment based on their actual yarn and needles), which shows that I am getting 5.5 stitches/inch using size 7 needles.

Crafty projects old & new

I just finished my first ever Baby Surprise Jacket, a gift for a friend at work having her first baby in June.  The surprise part of this jacket is the amazing construction, designed by the famous, Elizabeth Zimmerman, okay so maybe she's not famous in a Bruce Springsteen/Lady Gaga kind of way, but definately a Rock Star in the knitting world. 

It's knit as a single piece, when done it sort of looks like a giant knitted tortilla chip, below is an example of what the finished jacket looks like before seaming (in my excitement to put it together I forgot to take a picture of my actual jacket in progress).

 after folding it together and seaming just across the shoulders, voila, the cutest little baby jacket ever!

and Craig helped me pick out the best buttons for it at the local fabric store

 

And now, onward to a new project, a bag for holding knitting projects in progress (yes, I have still have many more knitting projects in the queue).  I picked up this great pattern from the GillianBags booth at the Stitches event in February and just now got around to getting the fabric and other supplies.

 I just couldn't resist the pretty pink flowers

this is what the finished bag should look like.  I really liked the way it opens all the way up, sometimes when I am happily knitting away the yarn gets hung up on the sides of my current bag, which totally breaks me out of the zen stitching zone, I don't think that will happen with this design.