Globalized Yarn

Behold, a hat and scarf made from yarn that's traveled the world! This lovely wool/acrylic blend originated in Italy, was purchased as a gift for me in New Zealand by my colleague and cat sitter extraordinaire Carolyn, brought to New York, where I've fashioned this hat and scarf to send as a pick-me-up to my friend Susan in Colorado. I could make a complex political argument about global consumerism here, but instead I'll direct your attention to Pietra Rivoli's book, The Travels of a T-Shirt in the Global Economy: An Economist Examines the Markets, Power, and Politics of World Trade.


Me, modeling hat and scarf in my husband's lair, uh, I mean, office. And in case you're wondering, yes, that is an official lightsaber replica on the shelf above my head, along with a luchador, a Darth Maul figure, and a Homer doll.

Cuteness Overload

Meet Vonn James! My wonderful friend Andrea recently had a little baby boy. I blogged a while ago about the sweater and blanket I made to welcome little Vonn into the world. Here he is, modeling the goods. In the photo above he's wearing a yellow angora sweater. Below he's sleeping on the green fleece blanket I made, and in the final photo he's sporting a red and yellow angora hat (which he'll hopefully grow into further as the winter progresses!) and the yellow angora sweater. The final photo also features his Grandpa James, after whom Vonn James is named. FYI, Vonn means "bright" in German and knowing Andrea as I do, I'm sure he will be bright in all senses of the word.

Babies in Hats

Ophelia doesn't look happy about being hatted! My friend Becky sent me a picture of her beautiful twin girls in the little baby caps I knitted for them. As you can probably infer, Ophelia is on the right and her sister Isobel is on the left. Below are a couple of individual pictures of the girls. Since they're Chicago babies, I think warm winter hats are very much in order!

Another Baby Hat

I made this little cotton baby hat for my friend John's impending arrival in Manila. I made it from cotton because frankly, being from Buffalo, I know little about head covering practices for tropical babies! Does anyone out there know what kinds of hats (if any) babies wear in tropical weather? Up here in the cold climes, we definitely are a hat-donning culture. But what about the Philippines?

Super Easy Baby Hat

Radical Cross Stitch has a tutorial for an easy-to-make baby hat using an old knit dress (though you could use anything knit, really).

One Reason Why I Am A Pacifist

At our wedding, my husband's brother announced to all that he would prefer to be referred to as my "brother by another brother" (BYAB) rather than brother-in-law, reflecting the quirkiness of the day as a whole.

Here are my two attempts to satisfy my BYAB Matt's recent request for a knitted camouflage hat. I made the hat on the bottom first-- it's not bad but the brim is enormous. That's what I get for going patternless and roughly estimating the size of Matt's head. (No, Matt, I don't really think your head is that big.) I used size 4 needles to make it, so I really didn't want to rip the whole thing apart. I toyed with the idea of sewing in a seam, but then I decided to use a different yarn and crochet another hat. Which I thought looked better, until my BYAB's brother (also known as my husband) weighed in with the opinion that it looked kinda granny-ish.

So, gentle reader, I look to you for your opinion: which hat should I send to Matt? The modified one or the granny camo one? I've got half a mind to send both and let him decide, but I'd love your feedback!

Bottom line: Camo and I just don't get along. I guess that's why I was in the Peace Corps.