Great Title, Catchy Subtitle!

This is a very late post. I made this for my mother-in-law for Christmas, with some Brilliant that I got on a big smileysyarns.com binge. It's not a warm scarf but she lives in Houston so she doesn't really need a warm one. The pattern is the same as the body of the pineapple-edged baby blanket, mirrored on the other side of the foundation chain as well, which gives it a completely different look. It was very simple but I thought it turned out well enough.





Here's my mother-in-law actually wearing the scarf. It is unfortunate that her eyes are closed. Luckily, chances are good that she'll never see this picture.

Well, I wouldn't say that I'm getting better at stuffed toys but I'm getting more forgiving of my own mistakes. The blue bear is for my daughter who was jealous of my husband's Totoro and requested a bear. What we learn from this project is that Simply Soft is a rotten yarn for amigirumi-style crochet, even if it's the only yarn in the house. He's from Dina's pattern at Crochetville. His feet aren't as misshapen as they are in the picture. Pretend he's strolling with his little avian friend.

The Baby Torchic is from Bizzy Crochet's great pattern. It's a Baby Torchic because the only orange yarn in the house is a really pale tangerine color. The body and feet are directly from the pattern, the neck feathers are slightly different (another row to make them stick out further), and the head feathers and beak are a completely different pattern because the kid wanted them to look more like this one; I still didn't get the spread on the beak right. The eyes are a no-yarn-in-the-house disaster: I have no worsted-weight black yarn, just thread (didn't work) and Shetland Chunky (didn't work) and I ended up making them in Patons Brilliant and they're just not right but they're for my kid's Youtube video and I am working on just letting this stuff go because I'm not trying to sell it and I have an idea what fate awaits this poor Torchic when he has to go into battle.

I finished this Little Maiden sundress (from Crochet Garden) last fall, but it was too chilly for the kid to wear it. It's made in Aunt Lydia's Baby Denim, which is 100% cotton worsted, which seemed like a good idea at the time but turns out to be really heavy. Oh, well; at least it's really soft. I have it tied with a ribbon through the shells part of the skirt instead of in the upper bodice like the pattern calls for because it looked better when the skirt was gathered up. Overall, though, I'm happy with the way it turned out and the kid willingly wears it without being prompted, so I guess it's a success. After reading a Crochetville discussion of Cotton-Ease (50/50 cotton-acrylic), I may try that next time.

I believe that I ordered the yarn from knitting-warehouse.com and it was the only time I've had a dye lot problem--I got five balls of the blue, and the order was split among two different dye lots which I didn't notice until after I'd finished the bodice of my first attempt. Now I've got the top and a few rows of the shell-pattern skirt to use as a tank top for the kid and I had to start again from scratch. Another rookie mistake to not check the dye lot. I'd like to say it won't happen again, but I don't tend to learn from my mistakes.