BIBS & TEETHERS BABYSHOWER GIFT SETS

My poor sewing machine had been sitting collecting dust for far too long, so for my third project I needed something to get my sewing mojo back. Lucky for me, I also have a few friends who are expecting babies pretty soon. Perfect opportunity to sew a couple of baby-sized projects, no?

So I brewed myself a pot of tea, put on some music and started sewing. I used these free patterns from See Kate Sew—probably my favorite sewing blog. I bought the fabric from a local shop, some terry cloth for the backing, and wooden rings I found on Amazon. I didn't want the terry cloth to be too thick and bulky, so I just used some thin towels—cheap and cheerful!

This was such a fun and simple sewing project, and I love how they turned out. It's a perfect way to use up old scraps of fabric too, which I kinda wish I had thought of before I went out and bought fabric. I still have leftovers from when I made this skirt and this dress, and how cute would that be, a black gingham set and a pink floral set? Note to self: remember to check your craft stash before you hit up the craft shop haha.

The wooden rings were part of a 20 pack though, which means I have quite a few rings left. I'll definitely be making more of these, but probably not a full 20 sets haha. Does anyone have any suggestions for something else I can use the wooden rings for? A wall hanging perhaps? Or a plant hanger?

ATHENS PHOTO BOOK

I was just about to start this post about this photo book I made from our trip to Athens "last year", until I realized we actually went in 2016 which is not last year at all, it's almost two years ago already. How did that happen?

This was actually Oscar's first holiday abroad, and his first time on a plane! He was just three months at the time and the flight went swimmingly, he just fed and slept for the whole time. It's a whole other story now when he actually has to be entertained for the whole flight (looking forward to that trans-Atlantic flight we're venturing on in a couple of weeks...!) And oh my, the Greeks certainly love babies. He was doted on wherever we went, with strangers of all ages coming up to coo over him and kiss his feet. He was like a tiny celebrity.

We had an awesome trip. As it was our first time travelling with our kiddo, we were a little unsure of how everything would go. We actually ended up spending a bit more on the hotel than we normally do when we travel, just in case everything went to hell and we'd be stranded at our hotel the whole time. Thankfully that didn't end up being the case! We visited the Acropolis and Parthenon, Temple of Olympian Zeus, Ancient Agora, the Panathenaic Stadium—there is just so much to see in Athens, so many historic sites so many beautiful neighborhoods to walk through, and not to mention so much delicious food. I mean, just look at me casually feeding Oscar on some old beautiful street in Plaka in the photo above. If only every breastfeeding session was that idyllic! Ha!

We also celebrated our first wedding anniversary while in Athens, and went out for a meal in Kolonaki, which is what Oscar is all dressed up for below (I also tried to snap a family photo for the occasion before we went out, which ended in hilarity as Oscar decided to spit up mid-photo haha! Ah, parenthood is so glamorous.). Our plan was to celebrate with a nice steak dinner, but what the waiter brought us was definitely not steak. "Umm, sorry, we ordered the steak?" I asked. "Yes," said the waiter. "This is steak. Baby steak." Ah! Haha. Not quite what we had in mind, but tasty all the same.

For this album, I used Blurb's option of a softcover rather than a hardcover. Most of the photo books I have made so far, I have had printed in a plain hardcover with a dust jacket, and then I've just removed the dust jacket and kept them with plain covers. The 2017 album was actually the first album where I used the hardcover imagewrap option, and I was really happy with the result and definitely plan on using it again. I'm not actually as impressed with the softcover option though, and I find it a bit annoying that you can't get anything printed on the spine if you go for a softcover. My plain hardcover albums don't have anything printed on their spines either, so if anyone knows a good DIY for this that still looks neat, let me know! Or should I just get everything reprinted as hardcovers with imagewraps? (Kidding! I think. Haha)

CURRENTLY IN MARCH

wondering where in the world spring is? We spent the weekend at my parents cabin at the southern coast of Norway, and while it might look like spring in the above photo, but it was practically a snowstorm by the time we left.

watching Queer Eye! And a lot of movies. We recently got a new projector for our downstairs living room, and man, it's such an upgrade. Yay for movie nights!

reading Pax by Sarah Pennypacker, which will be my 10th book this year. I've set myself a goodreads goal to read 24 books in 2018, and so far I am very much on track.

planning a big road trip in a couple of weeks! An old friend of mine is getting married in Austin, and as I like to make mountains out of molehills we are now road tripping from from Houston to Los Angeles, via Austin, Marfa, Las Cruces, Tucson, Sonoran Desert, Flagstaff (with a trip up to Grand Canyon), Las Vegas, Joshua Tree and Palm Springs. Because if you're already making the transatlantic flight with your toddler, you might as well take full advantage, right? Travel tips and suggestions are very welcome!

getting a pretty good gym routine, and feeling pretty good about it.

remembering that four years ago, I was in Korea. I'm basically getting daily reminders on my Facebook and Google photos, and I can't believe that was four years ago already!

enjoying Strikketerapi.

GRAEME & OSCAR'S MATCHING HATS

Graeme's always complaining that I never knit him anything. It takes a lot of time and not to mention yarn to knit men's sweaters though (hence why kiddo knit is so much fun), so instead of anything too big and complicated I decided to knit him a hat. The pattern is the Hipster hat from Petite Knit.

My plan was to knit it out of some leftover Drops Baby Merino I had from a baby blanket I made last year for a friend's baby (sorry--no post or photo, I just knitted it and sent it away). I have a lot of leftover yarn sitting around with no future aspects and this seemed like a pretty good project for that. But wouldn't you know, I ran out of yarn juuuust as I was about to finish and had to go out and buy another skein. In other words, instead of getting rid of leftover yarn, I ended up with more yarn than what I started with. Facepalm.

The answer to this was obviously to knit a matching hat for Oscar as well. I've seen a lot of patterns for "mommy and me" matching dresses and outfits, so I figured a "daddy and me" set of matching hats would be pretty cute? I used the same pattern as the one for Graeme, and just modified it a bit to fit a child. Luckily, Graeme is one of those who embraces these things, and would love to match his outfit with Oscar on a daily basis if he could haha.

I still have more yarn than what I started out with though!

SWEATER WITH LONG STITCHES

How terrible is that name for a sweater? I'll admit, it's my own weird translation, but that's what the pattern is called in Norwegian--sweater with long stitches. If I were naming it, I would have named it something like stripy beach sweater, or summer stripy sweater or something to that effect. As you might guess from that, this is a little off season as I plan on wearing this in summer.

So here's a bit of irony for you: this pattern is by a local yarn producer, Sandnes Garn (yes, I live in Sandnes) and you can download it for free here. However, the yarn it calls for, Sandnes Garn Kitten Mohair, is out of production. I'm sure I could have found another replacement yarn to knit it in, but I actually managed to track down some Kitten Mohair online form an online yarn shop in the UK that specializes in Scandinavian knitting. So here I am, importing my towns exports haha. I actually got a pretty good discount on it too!

As for the finished product--I think the shoulders turned out a bit weird? I haven't seen any photos of what they're meant to look like, and the pattern was a bit vague, so I'm not sure I did them right. Maybe I was supposed to continue the long stitch stripe pattern. I also feel it's a relatively small sweater for what's supposed to be an oversized L? I'm excited to start wearing it once it gets a little warmer though! I'm thinking it'll look really nice with a pair of distressed denim shorts (aka my favorite shorts), or maybe even layered over a denim button down?

I also have about 8 skeins of Kitten Mohair in black now (what was I thinking buying black yarn?), any suggestions what I should knit with that?