More Baby Knitting Than I Had Anticipated

I've done a litle pink hat for the new baby. It's the Daisy hat from Itty Bitty Hats.

I think this is the fifth one of these I've made. The new baby's cousin has one: she's almost exactly one year older and she lived in the U.S. until recently. Now she lives in Dubai - very well travelled, my hats.

I also ran up this little number, in All Seasons Cotton. I keep wanting to knit warm hats, but for the moment this baby will need sun hats more than cosy ones. I'm very tempted to knit Miss Dashwood, maybe in Summer Tweed, but I think that for the brim not to flop, it would need to be knitted very tightly, and I don't fancy cotton yarn and small needles.

The friend that I knitted Mavis for was interested to hear about the handspun baby shawl because she has a new relation due in January, and we had a long talk at cross-purposes which ended with my saying, 'Oh you mean a baby blanket, not a baby shawl.' There was a short pause at the end of the line, and a sharp intake of breath. I can't really blame her.

The mother-to-be is apparently incapable of washing wool properly, so I proposed Lorna's Laces, as it's superwash. I also proposed the worsted weight, as I couldn't face knitting something this size in sock yarn, but it occurred to me later that it would be warmer in worsted, so I've stopped feeling guilty about that.
It took us a long time to choose the shade, especially since it wasn't to be too blue or too pink. The finalists were Child's Play, which is a sort of pastel rainbow; Daffodil, which is yes, yellow, but with lots of green and a bit of blue too; and Hawaii. Those of you who carry a Lorna's Laces shade card in your head will recognize this instantly as Hawaii. I've wanted to use this for something for ages because jade green and purple is one of my favourite combinations. It has a lot of white in too, which makes it very fresh and more babyish.

It's the Pinwheel Baby Blanket, of course. I started it last night on 5mm needles, and I can't decide whether to go down to a 4.5mm. I don't have a set of 4.5mm dpns, or I probably would have done it by now.

I bought the yarn on eBay, as I couldn't find a UK stockist who had this colour in this weight. While I was waiting for it to arrive, I cast on for the only Christmas present that I'm planning to knit this year. I'll show you when there's a bit more of it.

Nancym, I'm sorry I didn't answer you sooner about the Forest Canopy - I did 19 repeats this time. It's ended up being the same size as one that I did in heavier yarn and 15 repeats. An earlier one that I made in sock yarn was 15 repeats, and it was only just big enough - it's a scarf more than a shawl - but the nylon in the sock yarn probably means that it doesn't stretch so much in the blocking. Good luck!