They've got the uglies...

...for a little while more, at least.

I've got a few projects I've been working on this month. I managed to finish one doily:



I've been working on a BSJ and another doily, but they're moving slowly. Last week, I started having some tingling in my right hand, so I laid off the crocheting for a week. The knitting (the BSJ) gets worked on just half an hour a day during my lunch break, but I like the way it's going--like the way the increases are turning out.



I'm on row 75 (or so) on the sweater, and there are 114 rows total. This is a nice cotton yarn, and the finished sweater will fit a toddler rather than an infant.

The doily is on round 28 of 33. This pattern doesn't get all lacy and open at the edges; it gets very dense there, with lots of stitches. 240 sc (and other stitches) on round 28; 520 sc (and other stitches) on round 32, then lots of picot stuff on round 33. And the doily is going to need some serious blocking; at present, it ripples and waves all over the place:



I'm going to push a little to see if I can get these two projects finished by the end of February so they can lose their "uglies." The doily may be getting "denser," but the stitches are a bit easier--not so many wrist-wrenching double-crochet stitches. (In another demonstration of how Anglo-English and American-English differ, British double-crochet stitches are American single-crochet stitches; the American double-crochet stitches I was doing are British treble-crochet--I think.)

I'm waiting for my pregnant coworker to decide whether she wants traditional pastel colors or bright, nontraditional colors. I've got a BSJ in mind in red with a coffee-brown button band, and red, heart-shaped buttons. If my coworker wants something more traditionally colored, I might still make the red and brown one for another baby.

Backtracking

I seem to have skipped posting about a November BSJ (that's "Baby Surprise Jacket").

I made a sweater for a coworker who had a boy in November. She asked if she could pay me to make a larger-size sweater for her boy, a sweater he could grow into. Well, I didn't take payment for it, but I made the boy this:



Here's a close-up of the buttons:



And with some leftover yarn I made baby washcloths:



I've now made seven sweaters from the BSJ pattern, and I'm working on the eighth...and I have yarn for more. It's a lovely pattern, pure garter stitch, which is sort of mindless knitting, easy to do during my lunch break.