Adventures of a Desi KnitterKnitting (and now sewing!) keeps an Indian academic sane in the States. Almost.

FO: Baby kimono

§ March 21st, 2010 § Filed under Baby things § 5 Comments

Spring is finally here with some gorgeous warm weather. “Here comes the sun” is playing in the cafe as I type this post, the sun streaming through the windows and the trees in blossom outside. The latte is hitting the spot, and despite the grading, taxes, reading and reviewing that I have to finish in the week ahead, I am very happy that it is spring break. My students practically browbeat me into holding class on the grass outside on Friday, and I went on a picnic lunch with Alison, whose visit has been an occasion for more yarn crawls!

I also have another baby project to share with you, a little flowery kimono for Maya, a beautiful one-month-old. I was too terrified to photograph her in it, but Hima, if you’re reading this, do take a couple when she does wear it and send them to me!

This was a lovely, quick project made all the more interesting by the unusual, nubbly texture of the Elann Esprit cotton yarn (which is an identical, poorer, twin of Cascade Fixation). I knit it on size 5 needles, which is a fairly large size for how thin the yarn is, but it still resulted in a fairly firm fabric. I can’t determine whether it’s a purply grey, or a greyish purple, but I decided to jazz it up with the leftover Koigu from the Arch-shaped socks, and also have it sprout some flowers in its grassy texture.

Project Notes:

Pattern: Baby Sachiko Kimono (Ravelry link; it’s available as a free Ravelry download).
Needles: size 5 bamboos
Gauge: 6 spi, I think
Yarn: Elann Esprit, cotton/elastic, 1.5 skeins and Koigu KKPM sock leftovers

Notes:

I have linked to the Sashiko kimono pattern, but I used it just to start at the neck, and then basically worked on the fly as I went along – I didn’t add the side-slits on both sides, and I added buttons with loops instead of I-cord ties. I also shortened the sleeves and decreased a stitch each at both ends of the ‘join’ line of the sleeves at the cuffs, to give it a slightly puffed look. For the red trim, I picked up stitches all around the front edges and neck with the Koigu yarn doubled, and bound off purlwise with a larger needle on the next round. The red trim on the bottom was basically two ridges of garter stitch, then bound off purlwise.

The best part was crocheting the loops on, basically with a chain stitch – a knot on the wrong side with both ends of the yarn holds the loop properly in place. It helped that I found a ladybird-like button to go with the red flowers!

In the last post I said baby knits are difficult because of the odd sizing. I am currently on the third seamless top-down, and I’m also finding that working out interesting variations within the basic seamless raglan theme can be a lot of fun. An interesting design frontier! So far I’ve worked off existing, simple patterns because I’m pressed for time, but I imagine that’s where the design challenge for baby knits lies – you don’t want them too complicated with a lot of finishing because babies outgrow daily wear items fast, and yet you don’t want them to be too boring and repetitive either.