Merry Christmas ornaments

A slight side trip from knitting. I made these ornaments from inspiration found in the best little store: Smitten in downtown McKinney.
First I got some wooden disks at Michaels. Then I tore Christmas carols out of a hymnal - (okay, before you wig out, I did not steal the hymnal. I bought one at Half Price Books and used it.) - and applied them to the disks with mod podge. Used Christmas themed paper on the back, again from Michaels, and glittered the edges. Vintage seam binding made the hangers. By the way, the ornaments are hanging from twine strung across a screen door that came off of my mother's house before it was torn down. Kinda cute, right? One of the rewards personally was reading through the words of these very special hymns. It brought the focus right where it is supposed to be for Christmas - on our Savior!

Cason's sweater

From the book One Skein Knitting comes this darling color block cardigan for children. I used all of the yard left over from Cason's baby blanket. This was very easy to knit - I changed the pattern slightly, adjusting for the amount of yard I had. It is meant to be asymmetrical - that is not a mistake!
The trim around the neck and down the front is an attached I-cord. This should have been easy. It only took about 5 tries to get it right. Now I am going to use this trim a lot.

New Mother's Gift

This is a shawl for nursing mothers. It is a leaf lace pattern, very easy and very beautiful. I used Misti Alpaca chunky weight yarn in a dark green from Shabby Sheep. Because the yarn is handpainted, some of the dye washes out and it becomes several shades and hues of the green.The pattern is from Natural Knits for Babies and Mums by Louisa Harding. It is fabulous book available from any bookstore (try Amazon). It is a basic shawl pattern with the addition of buttons for modesty. The scalloped edge is a natural result of the pattern.