On occasion, I knit for people that don’t live within a 10 mile radius of the house. Shocking I know. But on these occasions it provides me with an opportunity to acquire more yarn than I actually need under the pretense of Indecision. Below, we have the color choices for the May Day Sock Swap.

Shi Bui in Rapids and Wasabi, Socks That Shine in Turkey Red

I am going to make the Raindrop Lace Socks from Fiber Trends. I was committed to this pattern for this swap months ago (”April Showers Bring May Flowers” get it?) and have just crossed my fingers that my Sock Pal wouldn’t have an aversion to lacy socks. I just have to decide which of the delicious (and the Shi Bui really does look like it is going to be delicious to work with) yarns to use.

There are several projects in the finished and ready for the mailbox category.

A 6″ square dish rag for Larissa’s latest project.

It’s a “cropped” version of the Wheatfields Dishcloth.

A baby present for one of Michael’s co-workers - I used a crochet hook to knit the eyes and vest buttons into the fabric. They should be almost as secure as safety eyes - I would say “as secure as safety eyes,” but the buttons have a smaller shank so they might break more easily.

The pattern is from Fuzzy Mitten, of course.

A hat for my Darling Sister. I forgot to give it to her when she was down here holding her Darling Niece (to be fair, I was in the hospital, and didn’t think to tell her to get it off of the table when she went to feed the cats).

The Not Too-Too Beret

There will be a May Day Sock Swap post later today - but first: PANCAKES!

Thank you to everyone who left comments to welcome Ellie! I will answer each one personally as soon as I get brave enough to check my email - I have a fear of over filled in-boxes. Did you know that baby books don’t include special pages for blog comments? Luckily, I’ve got a book that has three rings so I can add all the scrap book pages I want. That is what we call Displaying Adaptability.

The cats have displayed a remarkable amount of adaptability of their own.

Cats love babies. It’s a fact.

Several people have asked for more details about Ellie’s arrival. Below is the short version of the events from Sunday, February 17 through Wednesday, February 20. If you aren’t interested (doesn’t hurt my feelings at all - there is hardly any knitting), just scroll right on through and look at the pictures. Before you go, I have one small piece of advice: a casual approach to preparedness is what the Universe calls a Gotcha Opportunity.

I fully expected to be sent home when we showed up at the hospital (as a precautionary measure), but it turns out that I was leaking amniotic fluid (ewewewewew) so I had to stay. Luckily, I had brought my intended hospital knitting with me (Michael had to go home for everything else - but we live right across the street so that isn’t as big of a deal as it sounds). The nurse was very understanding about running my IV way high up on my arm so that I could knit.

Socks for my doctor (this amuses me greatly).

Then came 18 hours of sitting around. More than half of those hours included pitocin and none of it included painkillers (don’t worry, I didn’t need them) with absolutely 0 progress and some weird baby heartbeat things that interfered with the knitting (oxygen and side-lying were called for at that point). The doctor came in to assess the situation and said to the nurse, “How long has Baby’s heart rate been tachy?” And that was that: abdominal surgery for me and a tee-tiny IV to fill Ellie with antibiotics.

Ellie resents being tethered to equipment as much as I do.

What followed that was a seemingly miraculous recovery on my part (according to every nurse there). The next morning I was functioning like an ordinary person (a person without a hole in her stomach) and the morning after that Ellie’s blood tests came back clean and we all got to go home.

We were both really happy to go.

That was Wednesday. Today is Saturday. Except for the obnoxiousness of a glued up incision, I feel better than I have in weeks and weeks.

I also seem to be suffering from some kind of Post-Partum Nesting Instinct. I feel compelled to finish up everything that I had planned for Monday and didn’t get to do. Not the least of which is finishing at least one of three blog posts (I’ve got to do the other two tomorrow) - I’ve been writing this one since yesterday morning. Turns out, babies are an enormous time-suck. Who knew?

PS She is named for my great grandfather’s sister. Aunt Eleanor was (and really still is) one of my most favorite people of all time. “Airey” is a very old family name that my mother and I also share. The Ivey is self-explanatory.

Eleanor Airey Ivey, born February 18, 2008 at 12:47 PM Central

Mom and baby doing well. More pictures will be on Flickr and on ellieivey.com shortly.

–Michael

No baby yet! I just thought I would get that out of the way to begin with. For your amusement, I took a picture the MiniMiracle’s bump from my point of view:

I know y’all stay up nights wondering what it’s like to be me.

I made the Mini’s first cardigan (and have misplaced ours).

The Ribbon-Edged Cardigan (sans ribbon) from Special Knits.

This is the first Debbie Bliss pattern I’ve made. It was a simple, elegant and easy knit marred only by the conspicuous absence of schematics. The instructions tend to say things like: Work for 30 rows and then start the neck shaping. This means that particular attention must be payed to row gauge. This makes substituting yarns more challenging (I used KnitPicks’ Elegance). You can use the suggested gauge, do some second grade math, and figure out the length - but how hard is it for designers to draw a little picture? While this kind of thing bugs me to pieces (it bugs me more if the pattern is an adult sweater with shaping), it is certainly not enough to keep me away from her designs in the future. This cardigan is probably the last of the knitting for the Mini until it reveals its true identity. In the meantime, I’ve got a few grown-up projects to entertain me.

Like the May Day Sock Swap. Lynne and I started planning this one a long while back. The idea of a small, closed-circle, conventional, low-impact swap has a refreshing appeal for me. We’ve set up a little blog page (nothing fancy) so that everyone can keep up with the progress. This rounds’ participants have already received their secret sock pals, but I sincerely doubt that this is the last of our Holiday Swaps (Lynne is the Queen of Good Ideas).

In case you think I’ve forgotten: Wee Tiny Sock Swap 2008 (the fastest swap in Blogland) is right around the corner! If you need a little exposition, peek at the Wee Tiny Sock Swap of 2007 post. Sign-ups will be unlimited by anything but the cut-off date. I’ve got the swap on the calendar for the last week in March (I had to push it back a little because Easter is early this year). I’ll be more specific as we get closer and announce the opening of sign-ups several days ahead so that there is plenty of time for word to get around.

There is also some grown-up knitting happening. I finished up a pair of socks and then started another one to keep in my bag.

Tuscany, by the talented Abigail.

A couple more CounterPain Squares are also behind me and I am entertaining the idea of darning the Sock Pile.

Maude chewed the green striped ones, but the rest have holes in the heels.

I think about the Sock Pile about once a month, and then do my best to find something else to knit. Maybe I can squeeze in a hat for my Darling Sister. She can wear it during the next cold snap. Well, the cold snap after this one - it’s 28° here this morning.

I almost forgot! Happy Valentine’s Day!

Great Gran has given up all sweets for Lent. I find this Appalling. So I made her a treat.

I fixed a bakery box and everything!

I had a bunch of stuff I really needed to do yesterday. Instead, I spent all afternoon knitting a cupcake. The pattern is here in case you want to blow off this weekend’s To Do List in favor of non-fattening, high-fiber confections.

I am not sure how it happened, but we convinced Great Gran to go to Build-a-Bear with us to celebrate her birthday. After weeks of hedging (if you want Great Gran to go out in public, you either have to start harassing her early or catch her by surprise), she finally came around.

I made a monkey and Great Gran made a little Valentine bear!

I think she had a really good time! We spent at least an hour picking out animals and clothes. My choices were easy: there was a new monkey for my collection, and as soon as I saw the shoes I knew he was a hard core treehugger. Which works well since it is Common Knowledge that monkeys love trees and even have tree names for last names. This is Lee Redwood. My others are Emma Appletree and Lucinda Pecan - my Mom has the infamous Katie Magnolia. Even though I realized that I hadn’t made my two CounterPain Squares for January, I spent all afternoon working on a poncho (adapted from this pattern) for Lee.

All that’s left is to tie-dye his shirt and fix him up a hacky sack.

I’ve also made a few pairs of baby socks,

The next pair will be a little larger. I hear that babies grow.

attached the flower to pacifier clip pieces,

I just noticed that I attached those completely backward. Sigh.

and made a single Magic Slipper.

I think it needs bells on the toes.

For SuperBowl knitting, I am going to make January’s CounterPain squares. It’s the only pro football game I pay any kind of attention to each year (primarily because of the commercials). College football is a different story.

Energy Saver light bulbs really give a room that nice parking lot ambiance.

Those really belong to the MiniMiracle. Buzz is from my sister and Albert attended homecoming with my Aunt Patti and Uncle Bruce this year. Stuffed guys don’t even need a ticket if you acquire them inside the stadium.

PS Michael installed Leopard for me at the beginning of the week. This caused some trouble. Mostly because CS2 no longer worked, and I had to upgrade which I really wasn’t ready to do yet. Fortunately, Adobe now offers their software as downloads. Unfortunately, they haven’t ironed all the kinks out of the process yet and it took more than 24 hours to just get “approved.” Not to mention how long it took to get the whole disaster working properly. Out of spite, I haven’t bothered to read the documentation to see what’s so great about CS3. I also had to install the new version of iPhoto which I dislike for so many many many reasons. What was so wrong with drag and crop I’d like to know? And it’s not like they used the dragging for any kind of new feature. Gah. I am going to write them an email.