Nautical Stitches

When my son turned 2, it was time for him to graduate out of his crib to a big boy bed. Now that he is almost 4, I still have baby decorations in his room that went with his nursery. I am finding it difficult to find stuff for his age to decorate with. I can find things for babies and things for teens but not a lot of stuff in between. So I thought I would try my hand at making things. When I got the Spring/Summer issue of the Debbie Bliss Magazine, I found a chart for an anchor for an intarsia knitted pillow and thought that I could use it for a cross stitch pattern. I check out the blog Feeling Stitchy sometimes and I am a big fan of all of the creative embroidery I see on there and I got a little bit inspired. Although I have never cross stitched before, I found it easy, quick, and fun.

So I decided on a Nautical theme, which I think is totally cute for a little boy. I had to modify the pattern a little bit so that it would translate better into cross stitch. The anchor needed to be shortened and widened a bit.

I also added "Ahoy Matey" under the anchor. Let me tell you - there are a lot of cross stitch alphabets out there. I had to look at a lot before I found the right one for this project.

I found those cute little buoys at The Shell Shop in Provincetown when we went to the Cape earlier in the summer. His room is still a work in progress - I have a few more crafty ideas so there will be more to come!

FO: Gray Lace Scarf

Ever since my sister saw my Lace Ribbon Scarf that I knit for myself last year, she has been asking me to knit a gray scarf for her also. I didn't really want to knit her the same scarf that I had so I was looking for something unique to make for her birthday this year. This past spring I purchased the new St-Denis Magazine and I really liked the Bright Stripes Lace Scarf and decided to make it in a simple gray.

Pattern: Bright Stripes Lace Scarf by Kat Coyle from St-Denis Spring/Summer 2010
Yarn: St-Denis Nordique in Silver
Needles: Size US 7

I must confess, I was a little bit frustrated with this when I first started. I felt like mine didn't look anything like the picture of it in the magazine - I am a tight knitter but seriously, the one in the magazine looks like it was knit on size 1 needles. I was also making mistakes and because I was giving this as a gift, I wanted it to be close to perfect. Needless to say, it looks so much better after a good blocking, of course.

I really liked the yarn. This was the first time I used Nordique and it reminded me of an old fashioned wool, kind of like something my grandmother would use. I was surprised that it wasn't particularly soft when I first felt it, but when I was knitting with it it was very lofty and it blocked out beautifully and softened up a bit. And I absolutely love the color. I really like the way this scarf turned out - and my sister was so happy that I finally knit her a gray scarf!!

An impromptu hug from my son.