(Almost) Finished Object

The other day I took the boys to Hobby Lobby with me to pick up a few odds and ends. I was poking through the sale fabric when the 8-year-old (I'll call him EV, for now) saw a bright coral reef print and went crazy over it. "Can you get this and make me a shirt, Mom??" Well, DUH. Any time one of my children requests me to make something for them, odds are very good I will jump at the opportunity. The print seemed appropriately loud and tropical to be a Hawaiian shirt, so I grabbed a pattern (this one).

This was a more technical, complex project than I'm used to. I've gotten pretty good at putting zippers in because of the jumpsuits, but aside from that, those are pretty simple. This had facings, collar, pocket, and side vents, not to mention set-in sleeves. The collar and facings took a lot of fiddling, and the sleeves not much less, but I finished it this afternoon, all but the buttonholes and buttons. I'm really pleased with it! There are one or two little glitches, but nothing major. EV likes it, which is the main thing. The funny thing was, his autistic sister LOVES it, which I was not expecting! I had brought it out of my craft room and hung it from the corner of a chair, waiting for EV to finish what he was doing and try it on, and when she saw it she grabbed it and brought it to me to put on her. She got a big kick out of it - laughing, spinning, hugging me and all the other ways she expresses her delight. So now I guess I'm going to have to make another one!

I had so much fun making this that I might have to make a few more. The romper looks pretty dang cute, and wouldn't take much fabric. Too bad I don't know any babies to make it for....

I'm also in the middle of working out a knitted handbag pattern. It's a cabled bag that uses one of the Celtic-style cable motifs from Alice Starmore's St. Ciaran throw. I knitted the body in the round, with smallish cables at either side that will continue past the top of the bag to become the strap; I'm planning to work the bottom in the same cable, using the perpendicular shoulder strap technique (found in Knitting Ganseys and Knitting in the Old Way), so that the same cable travels around the bag in an unbroken line. I've toyed with the idea of trying to submit it to Knitty, but I will probably just publish it on Ravelry for free.

Speaking of handbags, I've ordered the materials to make Amy Butler's Sweet Harmony Handbag, using these fabrics:

For the exterior:

For the interior:

It was really hard to choose just two. There were half a dozen combinations I loved.

I got the fabric and all the notions (including a heck of a lot of interfacing) from fabric.com, which has a great selection and free shipping for orders over $35. They also e-mailed me a coupon for 15% off my next order, yay!

Hopefully by next time I post I will stop being lazy and actually post some photos of my stuff....