I Hath Knitteth!

As regular readers may know, socks have long been my personal challenge. Why I'm so obsessed with knitting socks is beyond me: I think it might have to do with my deep-rooted suspicion that, in order to fully assimilate with my German habitat and finally become a good Bavarian Hausfrau, I should be able to knit a sock - and knit a sock on double-pointed needles (I know you can knit them on circular needles, but I want the hard-core sock-knitting experience, because that's how I roll, crochet-hookers.) But thus far, it has been beyond my abilities. Like all bad work(wo)men, I readily blamed my tools:

Ode to my DPNs
I hate you so much & I just have to share,
I know that you’re mocking me and really don’t care.
I’m beginning to see you as the essence of evil:
My personal Everest is a double-pointed needle.
The ones not in use have a mind of their own
And will stab or attack me, given a second alone.
My fingers are sore, work twisted and grubby,
And the blue cloud of cussing has scared off my hubby.
You’re psychological torture in crafting disguise
I’m sure you’ve been used to break KGB spies.
It’s taken me an hour to accomplish three rows,
With each knitted stitch my hatred just grows.
I hate you, I hate you! - that had to be said,
And if I didn’t say it, I’d break you instead.
So I give up: you win. What more can I say?
I’m going back to my hook and my comforting crochet.

However, I am pleased to announce that the pregnancy hormones have finally been good for something: I have mastered double-pointed needles (seriously, if I can't get a handle on them, how I am supposed to keep a hold on a wriggly newborn? No messing about any more) and I have knit not one, but two socks, using a boomerang (yo-yo) heel method. This method is wonderful - it has been described as a "miracle of German engineering" and while I'm not sure whether it really is German, I'm willing to ascribe this wonder to my adopted homeland. Vorsprung durch Technik, how are you?

Anyway, I feel this should be announced in Ye Olde English to underline its gravitas:
I doth hath knitteth a socketh!
(okay, I got a bit carried away there, but there's nothing like a splattering of 'th' and superfluous auxiliary verbs to fake Ye Oldinesse.)
Beholdeth!

Socketh

Gestational Alcoholism

Aww - look at that tasteful image of the
blooming pregnant lady! Lies, all lies.
That cramped look on her face clearly
indicates an attempt to suppress a bout
of pregnancy flatulence. The Murkel of Life
involves inordinate amounts of gas and
liquids - don't be fooled,
oh childless innocents.

Today marked the end of my fifth month of pregnancy. By all accounts, I ought to be "blooming" and "flourishing" and the sight of my roundiness ought to bring a tear to the eye of random strangers. Instead, I have acne and leg cramps and am so clearly pregnant that people are afraid to ask me when the baby is due, and when they do, their eyebrows shoot up in surprise when I tell them that there's another four months to go.

Ah, pregnancy. I had no illusions about the whole mess before I began but I was lured into a false sense of security by having had a very easy time so far. Suddenly, this changed: leg cramps. Not particularly painful cramps (although I've had those, too) but more often than not, tickly muscle cramps that make me stretch and twitch my legs in search of some kind of relief. I've been taking magnesium and calcium, stretching legs and putting my swollen, Shrek-like feet up on towers of cushions, enduring the loving lymph massages doled out by my husband and his lumberjack hands. I've even tried a couple of folk remedies: my mother told me to squeeze the bridge of my nose very, very hard. That just resulted in twitchy legs and a sore face, to boot.

Were all of that not fun enough, the child has decided to make his presence felt. While I lie in bed in the witching hour between 3 and 4 a.m., my hips and legs breakdancing involuntarily beneath the bed covers, my child decides to get in a few punches. Literally, kick me when I'm down. When I finally do drift off to sleep, I inevitably roll over on to my stomach and then get a sound karate chop ("Mama! You moron! Roll over!"). I've actually woken and shouted, "Sorry!"

Oh, the glamour.

This, on the other hand, is a tasteful
image of a bottle of wine that I would
like to rub my face up against and
inhale deeply.

And if that weren't bad enough, I've developed something that I think is actually gestational alcoholism. See, I was never a big drinker - during my student days I didn't have enough money to drink myself stupid in the grand ol' tradition of college parties and once I actually started to earn decent money, I discovered that I was more of a Quality rather than Quantity Gal. I can go for months without touching a drop of anything exciting, and then really, really, really appreciate a glass of good wine. But ever since alcohol has been denied me (24th January, 2012), nothing, but nothing has a greater appeal. Do you know how good Bailey's Irish Cream smells? Do you know how luscious a glass of Burgundy looks? And how about that delicious fizzzzzzzy sound of champagne splashing into flutes? Oh, man. I'm aware that I'm beginning to creep other people out, what with my googly eyes and pathetic facial expression. I definitely ruined the strawberry limes cocktail my husband got to drink yesterday at his father's birthday celebration ("Is that good? It's good, isn't it? Is it really sweet? Can you taste the strawberries? Is it made with vodka? A lot of vodka? Is it chilled or are there ice cubes? Are you enjoying that? Are you?") When someone (usually my husband) suggests that I take a sip, I cover my unborn child's ears and hiss, "Are you crazy? Don't you know the dangers of foetal alcoholism??" Actually, I'm more concerned about my own lack of self-control: a sleepless night of leg twitchery and a battered uterus might not allow me to stop after one sip - and he mightn't be able to wrestle the bottle of strawberry vodka out of my hormonal hands fast enough, to be honest.

Sigh. Four months. About 18 more weeks to go. And knowing my luck, childbirth will put me off alcohol forever.

TUTORIAL: Sprinkly Donuts

 

This pattern is available for download as a PDF here.

This "recipe" was inspired by Nevada Mama and KTB Design's iced donut patterns. I've tweaked the instructions a bit to create a donut that worked well with my yarn and tension. Bear in mind, though, that this is a recipe and, like every recipe, you might have to add or take away a stitch or two here or there to make something you like.

You need:

• Some brown yarn for the donut (about 15g)
• Scraps of pastel yarn for the frosting
• glass-headed pins (the 'sprinkles')
  
• a smaller hook than the size recommended for the yarn. I'm using a sport weight/DK yarn with a recommended 4.50 mm - 5 mm hook (G or H) and I'm actually using a 3.50 or 3.75 mm (F) hook. The reason for this is that you want a really tight weave, so the stuffing isn't visible.
• ... and a darning needle.

This pattern uses American terminology. The British terms are in [brackets].

• SC [DC] - single crochet [double crochet]
• 2SC [DC] tog - 2 single crochet [double crochet] together (Insert hook into stitch of previous row, draw yarn through. Put hook into the next stitch, draw yarn through. You now have three loops on the hook... yarn over and pull the yarn through all three loops. Picture demo here.)
• HDC [HTR] - half double crochet [half treble]
• DC [TR] - double crochet [treble]

You will be working in rounds, so end every round with one slip stitch into the top of the first stitch in the round. Chain 1, then begin the new round by doing your SC [DC]s into the top of the first stitch of the previous round.

The increase rounds (with 2 SC [DC] in one stitch) and the decrease rounds (with 2SC [DC] tog.) don't have to be exact - the increases/decreases have to be spaced more or less evenly across the round. So don't worry if you've done 2 SC [DC] before an increase and then 3 SC [DC] before the next one - no panic, just a minor blip, no one will notice!

The first round is quite wriggly. Persevere!

Begin by chaining 18 stitches.
Rd 1: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch.
Rd 2: 2 SC [DC] in each stitch around.
Rd 3: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 4: *2 SC [DC] in first stitch, 1 SC [DC] in next stitch**. Repeat from * to ** all round.
Rd 5: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 6: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 7: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 8: *2 SC [DC] in first stitch, 1 SC [DC] in next four stitches **. Repeat from * to ** all round. 
Rd 9: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 10:  *2 SC [DC] in first stitch, 1 SC [DC] in next five stitches **. Repeat from * to ** all round.

At this point, my donut is like a flat(tish) saucer with a hole in the middle. It measures about 12 cm/4.75 inches across. If yours is bigger, don't worry - you might be using a thicker yarn. You can either rip back a row or keep going to make a bigger donut. (See? My tape measure does imperial and metric!)


 

Now we're going to decrease:
Rd 11: *2SC [DC]tog, 1 SC [DC] in next five stitches **. Repeat from * to ** all round. 
Rd 12: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch

At this point, you might notice your work is starting to curl back in ... that's perfect!

Rd 13: *2SC [DC]tog, 1 SC [DC] in next four stitches **. Repeat from * to ** all round.
Rd 14: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 15: *2SC [DC]tog, 1 SC [DC] in next three stitches **. Repeat from * to ** all round.

Rd 16: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 17: *2SC [DC]tog, 1 SC [DC] in next two stitches **. Repeat from * to ** all round.

Rd 18: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 19: 2SC [DC]tog all round - crochet every two stitches together


 It now ought to look something like this:

Now the fun bit starts! Stuff it with as much stuffing as you can manage and sew the the inner edges together as shown. And then stuff some more stuffing in there - they have to be really full.


 

 















Frosting:
Begin by chaining 18 stitches.
Rd 1: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch.
Rd 2: 2 SC [DC] in each stitch around.
Rd 3: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 4: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 5: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch
Rd 6: *2 SC [DC] in first stitch, 1 SC [DC] in next four stitches **. Repeat from * to ** all round. 
Rd 7: 1 SC [DC] in each stitch

You should now have a shape similar to the flat donut photo above, but it might curl in a little more. Again, don't worry - this is good. The edge of the frosting is done by making stitches of different heights into each stitch of the previous row - randomly, to look like dripping frosting. For example, I usually do:
1 SC [DC],  1 HDC [HTR], 1 DC [TR], 1 HDC [HTR], 1 SC [DC] - up and down, up and down!

 

Then sew the inner edge of the frosting to the inside of the donut and whipstitch the edge of the frosting dribbles to the outside. Stick in your pins ... and there you go!

You may use these patterns to make for your personal use, as gifts, or to sell at craft fairs or craft markets. You may not reproduce this pattern in print or claim it as your work. You may not sell the pattern. Do not copy and paste pattern to another website, please use a link.

Naughty Me, Pudgy Me

Yes, I've been a bad Gingerbread Lady and haven't posted in ages and ages. In case you've been worried about me, I have to reassure you that this was mostly due to the fact that nothing much was happening in my life. As I said, pregnancy is sucking out my creativity - it's being turned into valuable vitamins and minerals for my little Murkel. But I am doing a number of baby blankets - 2012 is awash with fecundity. This is one I just finished:

As you can see, I am expanding daily. Daily. As in, every day. My midriff now has a mind of its own and, as you can see above, has started to gatecrash photographs. If you've never been pregnant before, you might find it alarming to imagine that one morning you wake up and look down - and you've grown a potbelly overnight. Or so it seems. Even more unsettling is the fact that everyone congratulates you on your roundiness: what a great bump I have! How rotund I've become! It's like wearing a very silly hat: everyone feels compelled to comment on it.

In addition, I'm beginning to feel movement (strange) and see movement (creepy). Mr Gingerbread is currently reading a book about his impending fatherhood and this is giving him Notions, e.g. every time I mention that I can feel something squirming inside, he drops everything to get in on the action by kneading my stomach. Yesterday he had his hand on my stomach when the fruit of his loins decided to karate chop the wall of my uterus. He shrieked and whipped his hand back, as though stung. "I'm sorry," he said, "but that just feels weird." Haha. Bet they didn't tell him that in his stupid book.

See, gone are the days when men were present at conception (just about) and then, nine months later, were hauled out of the pub closest to the hospital, handed a cigar and told the sex of their offspring. No. Nowadays, they are involved from the beginning onwards and are encouraged to interfere.
"Your bag is too heavy, let me carry it."
"No, it's not too heavy. I took most of the stuff out of it so I could carry it myself."
"Give it to me, I'll carry it."
"I said I was fine, thank you."
"You're pregnant, let me carry it."
(tug of war with bag ensues)
"I'm pregnant. It's a condition, not a disability. Let me carry my own bag, please."

Worse still is the Battle of the Bicycle. Mr Gingerbread is not keen on my riding a bike. We have a battle of wits every time I try to mount my trusty velocipede. He's not so much afraid of my cycling abilities, but rather the possibility of me falling off, or being hit by some other vehicle. Clearly, there is more of me to hit than there was before, but that doesn't mean that the entire population of Gingerbreadtown has plans to whack me off my bicycle on the way to work (and if they did, they'd have to drive up into the bicycle path to do so.) On the rare occasions that I cycle, he stands in the doorway and watches me reproachfully, his big, blue eyes full of remorse at my wilful endangerment of our unborn child.

P.S.: Mammy, I know you're reading this and I know your fingers are itching to pick up the phone and lecture me the dangers posed by bicycles in pregnancy. I cycle at a snail's pace on bicycle paths, I will not fall off, go into premature labour or be hit by a bus, I promise. The husband has already outlined every possible danger from attacks by rabid squirrels to crashes involving out-of-control trucks.
No need to worry, honest.

Cathedrals

I love cathedrals, I really do. And I love living in a place with a plethora of them. This is Regensburg's Cathedral:

People built this with their bare hands a thousand years ago. Bare hands! A thousand years ago!

I want these in my living room. Is that so wrong?

Although this looks like a venerable saint being mugged for his cloak, it actually represents St Martin sharing his cape with a penniless beggar. I find the statues in Regensburg's cathedral charmingly ambiguous. See below:

Two figures, smooching saucily. Quite at odds with their surroundings, not least because - to my untrained eye - they look like two women. Very mysterious and very much ahead of its time.

The dirndl shop down the road. I want a dirndl. I want to be clad in the costume of a nation that celebrates the virtues of the well-stacked woman.

Mustn't Grumble

I spent the weekend working with a group of people from the south of England. I must mention that it's the south of England, because my boss - who is from Hull, in the north of England, - says that the northerners are different. Different to the southerners, that is, who are also different to the Irish. Now, despite our centuries of political, um, disagreement, I - like most sane Irish people - quite like the English. I don't have anything against the Queen; on the contrary, I tend to think that she's a remarkable old dame and I must admit that I admire her greatly. I sincerely hope I'm as full of beans at 85 as she is. However, in a group of southern English, I notice how ... unEnglish I am, despite the fact that we island folk are often lumped together as one vaguely Britishy entity.

For starters, I simply have not mastered the delicate art of understatement. I actually find it quite difficult at times to figure out the degree of seriousness or severity being relayed to me by a stiff-upper-lipped person of gentle English persuasion: "Indeed, it was jolly inconvenient to have to call an ambulance at 4 o'clock in the morning but I dare say that my husband's chest pain was rather discomforting, given the fact that his lips had turned slightly blue and he was a tad comatose. But, after seven weeks intensive care, he pulled through, so mustn't grumble!" More alarmingly, information like this is often delivered with a bright smile and the cheerfully rallying voice employed by Mary Poppins during her nursery-cleaning extravaganzas. It takes me a couple of minutes to figure out that we are, in fact, discussing a near death experience with this person's nearest and dearest, and not the likelihood of MacVities discontinuing their range of chocolate Hobnob biscuits.

Irish people, on the other hand, tend to relish the drama. While some groups of English people prefer the curt, mustn't-grumble approach to life, Irish people often welcome the opportunity to embellish the circumstances and spin the story. While the English people of the stiff-upper-lip variety would sooner wrestle a komodo dragon than succumb to emotion, Irish people slather it on top, like butter on toast. Plus, we invoke our deity and a variety of minor religious figures for good measure - and if you are not keen on the Lord's name being taken in vain, I would ask you to (a) look away now and (b) never visit Ireland. For example,
"Jesus, Mary and holy Saint Joseph! I nearly ended up in the emergency room yesterday - the foot nearly fell off me with the pain! I very nearly took a hack-saw to it and amputated my own appendage! God above! I nearly died in agony!"
(In this case, the speaker probably stepped on a Lego brick by mistake and endured a sharp, short shot of pain, but with no lasting effects on foot or ability to walk.)

As you can imagine, putting people of these two very different persuasions in the same room results in some very interesting exchanges, probably because we expect to have so much in common: our history is so interlinked, we share so much culturally that the differences are all the more shocking. George Bernard Shaw, a fellow Irishperson, once said that Britain and the US were "two countries separated by a common language." I wonder, to what extent, this also applies to England and Ireland - if not language, then the way the language is used?

Back On Crafty Track

Let's intersperse my holiday snaps with some crafty projects.

As my Uterus Is Now A Temple, I have decided to try my hand at knitting baby things. This is possibly because, as an expecting mother, I have been bitten by the Provide For My Child bug: my offspring shall be clad in my wonky knitting attempts, because ... well, because I (sort of) can. This is a little piecework cardigan that is actually a double crime: (a) it's knit in acrylic (eeek!) and (b) in a shade of yarn known disparagingly as "clown burps" by people who knit with mermaid bumfluff. I have been told time and time again to knit pieces of clothing in one piece - I have been directed to patterns for top-down cardigans and one-piece raglan jackets - but I prefer to knit in small, manageable pieces that I can sew together. This is something I share with my mother; clearly, we have a short attention span.

But I decided to give the one-piece cardigans a whirl - hence the apple green piece on the needles - but rows of 100+ stitches are really quite odious to work through. As a crocheter, one likes to see a bit more action and, quite frankly, a little more progress after two or three hours of knitting. But I will persevere, 'cause I'm cranky like that.

And I'm crocheting - cream, cappuccino and sky blue yarns.This one is working up very quickly. I think it's going to be nice!

AWOL in Regensburg

My brother and sister-in-law came to visit over Easter, during which time my laptop was re-assigned as the general entertainment centre. Now that the Irish whirlwind has swept back up to the Emerald Isle, I have time to post some pictures of our adventures over Easter.

First of all, I would like to mention Murphy's Law of Visitors and Weather. Before the Easter holidays, the weather was passable. Crisp and sunny, with evenings of weak sunlight and interesting skies:

This was a nobleman's residence, built next door to the archduke's castle (a clear case of brown-nosing if ever there was one.) Now it's used by the university and, as a former student there, I can confirm that one feels ever so much more erudite when one battles with the vagaries of German grammar in such an environment.

"Darling, the façade looks ever so dull. Columns are so last year."
"You're right, my angel. Let's throw up a few classical statues for kicks and laughs.""Bravo, my sweet, bravo."

Now that I am With Child, I have taken to scoping out the local playgrounds and taking note of the level of danger the facilities pose. Swings, slides and monkey bars have never looked so threatening before - bear in mind, that this child will be the product of two extraordinarily clumsy and accident-prone people. I expect to get to know my paediatrician very well.

 

 

As soon as my visitors arrived, the weather became cold, dark and wet. As it does. Not that we had planned to do very much with them, but it is nonetheless quite annoying when even the simplest outing turns into an extreme sport. This was the case when we visited Mr Gingerbread's hometown, Regensburg.

We were well-prepared: the plan was to have Easter brunch with the in-laws, so I baked lemon muffins, decorated eggs and knit a bunny hat for my two-month-old niece (because, frankly, why have children if not to dress them up in ridiculous festive outfits and take photos of them that will be later pulled out when new boy/girlfriends come to  visit). But the after-breakfast tour became a battle with the elements: I was cold. Coooooold. And Regensburg lies on the River Danube, so it's not the usual cold, it's the freezing, soggy, damp cold that seeps through layers of clothing and settles in your bones.

The Danube is a very scary river: it always looks angry, even in the middle of summer when the water level is low. I don't know how Strauss was inspired to write the Blue Danube waltz - this is not a civilised, gently-swaying body of water. It needs an Eminem song as its signature tune, or a piece of Death Metal:

"Roooaaaaaaaar!"

So we sought refuge in various churches, like the Baroque St. Emmeram's Abbey. Now, I don't really like Baroque - I find it quite tacky. Gilded cherubs do not feature prominently in my décor. However, the Abbey has lots of interesting statues, like an almost-hidden wall panel of Queen Hemma (left) and several imposing panels featuring stout bishops or abbots (right).

Weirdest of all - for our modern eyes - were the relics of long-dead saints, laid out in saucily insouciant poses. I'm sure they were highly-treasured in their day, but nowadays they simply look quite creepy.

"Booo!"

 And that's where we're going to stop for this evening, readers. Blogger is groaning under the weight of all these photos, so I'll post some more tomorrow, along with - yes, finally - some crafty projects.

P.S. Thank you to Tecrin for the blogging award! This deserves a post of its own - I'll have to put on my thinking cap, as it requires my doing some homework ...

Things You Don't Want To Hear

... when pregnant.
"Bwoah," said my midwife. "Bwoah!"
Bwoah is not really top of my list of things I want to hear from healthcare professionals during the course of a pregnancy. Normal I like. Normal is good. As in -
"Yes, pet, I know you think you look like a beached whale but actually you don't. You're a bit tubbier but that's normal."
"Don't worry, dear, a total lack of morning sickness is not an indication that your baby has stopped growing, it just means that you were lucky. It's unusual, but normal."
"Well, Mrs Gingerbread, I'm not sure if a newly-discovered love of wiener sausages actually counts as a symptom, but if you are eating three or four a day, then it might. It's a bit weird, but still normal."
This is all very nice.

However, whilst I am perched upon an uncomfortable doctor's stool, watching the midwife looking through my latest test results, including the high-tech scan that was carried out for the nuchal fold* (it came back - thank goodness - normal. How I love that word!), she cast her eye down the baby's measurements, including its head diameter and the length of the baby from crown to rump.
"Bwoah!" she said in delight. "That's one big baby!"
I felt the cold finger of fear tickle the back of my neck. Yes, Baby Gingerbread measured a twelve on a scale of one to ten for normal measurement in his development stage. This ordinarily would be good news - who does not like a bonny baby? - but the person in charge of the baby's exit is experiencing a sense of trepidation. The father of this monster baby is quite proud - our baby is going to be the best baby ever and beat all other punier babies in terms of length, breadth and girth. (And, by the way, the ultrasound scan also saw Baby Gingerbread flailing his arms about. We were told that what looked like thumb sucking was a purely random thing, but Mr Gingerbread and I have decided that we have a genius in utero, one already capable of complex hand movements, unlike the other afore-mentioned punier babies in its age segment. Competitive, much?)
"Don't worry," said the midwife. "The growth rate might slow as the baby develops. It's more than likely that you'll have a perfectly normal-sized baby."
Hmmm. Not sure I believed her, but I allowed myself feel comforted.

So there you go, readers. And thank you all for your kind words about the impending Gingerbread expansion. I will take your advice and do what so many of you suggested - ignore everyone's advice and do what feels right to me. Tomorrow we'll be back to our usual programming and proceed with all things crafty.

* If, like me up to 13.5 weeks ago, your knowledge of babies extends to polite smiles when they're handed to you and sighs of relief when you hand them back, you probably don't know what a nuchal fold test is. No worries. Rather than read a book on pregnancy, I rely on my midwife to inform me on a need-to-know basis: pregnancy in bite-sized chunks. One such chunk was the recommendation to have a very high-quality scan done that measures the amount of fluid in the baby's neck fold. This allows doctors to determine the likelihood of the child having some chromosomal defect. The chances of this happening are relatively slim (though, being an ancient mother - 37, gasp, - they are statistically higher. Some people - like my husband - presume these things happen to everyone else; other people - like me - assume that they will be hit by a random thunderbolt of fate. As it happens, everything was ... well, normal.

Bun in the Oven

I've not been feeling very creative recently. I can identify the cause of the creative abyss: it's hormonal. For yes, readers, I am ...
(dramatic pause)
With Child.
I have been Blessed by the Murkel of Life.

The Gingerbread Man and I are going to have a gingerbread ... um, cookie. Actually, I'll be doing all the actual having, he's accepting the congratulations and looking pleased with himself (well, he is now. He had a facial expression of frozen shock for about a fortnight.) The, eh, Gingerbread Child is due in September and so far, I've had a very easy time of it - no nausea or other nasty symptoms, I simply have to be fed every four hours or I turn rabid. I storm the kitchen and open cupboards and the fridge, whinging, "I'm staaaaaaaaarving! I'm staaaaaaaarving!"
No, actually, that's not really a pregnancy symptom, because I was like that beforehand, too.

I have been negotiating the maze of information available to pregnant women, though. During the first few weeks of my impending motherhood, I actually made attempts to procure and read books about my Delicate Condition, but then I realised that I wasn't reassured by the blow by blow accounts of foetal development, on the contrary, I found it a bit icky. I feel faint at the sight of blood, so clearly this kind of thing is not for me. I decided to draw a veil over it - ignorance is bliss, after all.

What I have discovered, though, is that pregnancy, childbirth and motherhood are a veritable minefield of judgement and condemnation. Through my perusal of online forums (populated primarily by opinionated pieces of baggage that seem to spend more time online telling other people how to look after their children than offline looking after their own), I have found out that there is a whole checklist of things that you have to do "right" and if you don't do them "right" - well, then, you're Just Plain Evil. Any misstep - any decision to do the wrong thing - is laden with nose-wrinkling censure:

• homebirth with doula (good) vs hospital birth with doctor (Evil)
• breastfeeding (good) vs bottle-feeding (Evil)
• breastfeeding for 24 months (good) vs weaning at 8-12 months (Evil)
• cloth diapers/nappies (good) vs disposable nappies (Evil) 
• puréed organic vegetables (good) vs packaged baby food (Evil)
• stay at home mother (good) vs working mother + daycare (Evil)
• extra-special madey-uppy name like Tygretta or Säyrit (good) vs boring ol' traditional name like John or Ann (Evil)

Good grief, readers, I don't know about you, but I am ready for the stocks already. That being said, I have decided to take a Frank Sinatra-esque approach to the whole shebang and "do it myyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy way." Yes, I might be sticking Tygrette in Pampers or leaving Säyrit with his/her father when I return to work, but chances are, I won't mess up my little tyke any more than most people do.

Ranting aside.
I'm also trying to make some crochet hats for a local photographer, who wants baby hats in different styles. Alas, my knowledge of babies' heads remains (still) theoretical and I find it hard to judge head-sizes, even with helpful sizing charts. I've modelled the hats on Galia melons, upside-down bowls and big apples, but they are no substitute for a real head:

Sock It To Me

My efforts to declutter continue, hampered primarily by my husband's need to keep everything Just In Case. His grandparents were pre-war children, his parents were post-war children, my husband was born in the affluence of 1970s Germany - but he has the pack-rat instincts of someone on rations. Yesterday, while rummaging in the wardrobe for clean bed linen (an adventure in itself - I'm almost afraid to lean in too far, in case I topple over and end up in Narnia), I found a bag of odd socks, which my husband had clearly hidden for cleaning emergencies.
Awwww, you say. Isn't he thrifty? What a good husband!
No. No, he's not.
This is third such bag of orphan socks and abandoned underwear that he has put aside for cleaning rags. I simply do not know where all of these socks have come from - and, more disturbingly, I have no idea where their partners have disappeared to. Clearly, there are three bags full of odd socks whizzing around in an alternate universe, not knowing their matches are here, hidden in my wardrobe. One of these bags even came into the relationship with him: yes, that's right -  I have known his bag of odd socks as long as I have known him. I'm surprised he didn't organise a pageboy on our wedding day to strew the aisle with odd stockings as a sign of our undying love.

And the thing is this: on the rare occasion that we do need an old sock for cleaning purposes - e.g. to rub in furniture wax on our table - he produces one of these ancient rags with a triumphant flourish.
"Aha!" he says. "And YOU told me to throw them away!"
Being a good wife, I bow my head and pretend to stand corrected. If I did throw his socks away, we'd immediately have a sock emergency and he'd never forgive me for this crime, so I've made my peace with the socks.
Mostly.

 ______________

Okay, I'm about to do a volte-face, which is going to come across as rather ironic, given the above rant. But such is my honesty, I'm going to do it anyway.

  ______________

Whilst in the Narnia wardrobe, I also found a bag with a baby blanket partially sewn together. I had even put the yarn in there, too. Thankfully, I can remember putting it there - I put it aside before I started on some of my big blankets last year, and wasn't really motivated to finish them. But in the spirit of tidying up, I took them out, finished off all the leftover squares and sewed them together

I finished the coloured squares blanket that you saw recently:

And on Wednesday I'll show you the coloured patchwork squares, with a slightly enlarged border. We'll have a look at it and see how it pleases us then. By the way, Paula asked what I'd planned to do with the brightly coloured yarn in the last post. I have no plans yet, but such a nice rainbow of colours is sure to find a home in a blanket or a cushion or something nice.

Hmmmmmmmm

My husband is a big man. And he likes to look at stuff. And he makes contemplative noises while he does so: "Hmmmm. Ummmm. Ehhmmmmm." Despite the fact that he's well over six foot tall, he likes to lurk behind my shoulder and look at what I'm doing - not saying anything, just hmmmmmming. He's very good at lurking - he can effectively block a doorway, hovering between two rooms, dipping in and out of various conversations.
"You're blocking my light," I'll snap.
He blocks my light constantly - and I don't mean in the metaphorical sense, but in the physical where's-the-nearest-source-of-light-so-I-can-plonk-myself-in-front-of-it sense. It drives me bonkers.

So my recent decision to take stock of my cottons afforded me the opportunity to arrange my bright skeins according to colour - so pretty, look at the colours, aren't they nice? - was something that clearly interested him enough to hover nearby and hum. While I was positioning myself over the cotton, camera in hand, waiting for a ray of sunshine to light up the table,  the dark shadow appeared behind me.
"Hmmmmmmmmm."
"Get out of my light, please!"
(side-steps. And blocks light from another angle.)
"Hmmmmmmmmm."
"Get out of my light!"
Minimal movement just outside of my peripheral vision.
"Please! My light!"
And as suddenly as he appeared, my shadow-husband disappeared and I could take my photo.

It could be worse, though. Sometimes he asks questions:
"Why are you doing it like that?" he'll say.
"Why not?"
"Oh, no reason."
"What do you mean - no reason? Is there a better way to do it?"
"The way you're doing it is fine."
"Yes, but is there a better way to do it?"
"I didn't say that."
"But you implied it. Should I do it another way?"
"Not if you don't want to."
"It's not a matter of not wanting to. I just want to do it as efficiently as possible. Is there a better way to do it?"
"To be honest, I don't know. I'm not even sure what you're doing. Hmmmmmmmmm."

God grant me patience.

Bless My Cotton Stocks

My cleaning up and clearing out continues - though, to be honest, the more I clean up and clear out, the more untidy the house looks as a result. Things are standing around in nice little piles, waiting to be removed to more permanent homes. In this period of transition, I decided to finally start working my way through the skeins of cotton I had so thoughtfully bagged and labelled sometime last year when I was obviously so bored, or reluctant to do housework, that arranging yarn by colour in zip lock bags kept me occupied for an evening.

Baby blanket number one -

And, this one, which is a bit crazier but more interesting to make:

I think the squares in the second blanket need a bigger border to offset the colours of the cotton. Hmmm. I need to rearrange the squares for a more harmonious mixture, but that's not all ... Something's not quite right. Any helpful suggestions or general musings welcome!

P.S. I'll pass on your reassurances to the husband that baby-holding just requires a bit of practice. Thank you very much!

Babies: They're Not Rocket Surgery

Uncle/Niece Bonding Moment

Babies. They're scary: what with their bendy limbs, googly eyes, floppy torsos -  and that soft spot. Of course, if you're like me and have had a plethora of babies pass through your hands (eldest of nine, aunt to eight), you tend to be a bit more blasé about the whole thing and have a sure grip of the little monsters, even if they're trying to escape your clutches and dive headfirst towards the floor. My husband, on the other hand, has always tended to view babies with something akin to fear - they're his kryptonite. Up until three years ago, he'd never held a baby. Whenever he visited our home in Ireland, he was offered a cup of tea, a biscuit and, as a special favour, a "go" of whatever baby was currently being passed around. We thought we were giving him a treat: the chance to snuggle whatever newborn was being handed from aunt to uncle (and, even more of a treat, handing the baby back to the parents at the first sign of crankiness or whiff of malodorous activity in the diaper department), but he shied away from it. Three years ago, he was handed my baby niece, and he held her, awkward and sweating, till she was passed on to my little sister. He was not impressed by the experience.

"It's not rocket surgery," I pointed out. (That's our favourite phrase at the moment - I can't open a jar of beetroot? Well, my husband says, it's not rocket surgery! Nothing like a bit of metaphorical mangling.) Babies are deceptively robust, I said. As long as you don't drop them, they're generally pretty easy to hold. He was sceptical. The thing is, though, my sister-in-law has just had her first baby and Mr Gingerbread is now a proper uncle, as opposed to an uncle-by-marriage, and there's no longer any chance of avoiding his call of duty. So last weekend we travelled down to the south of Bavaria, to inspect the newest member of my husband's family.

Once there, Mr G. manfully stepped up and took the child. He even held her for half an hour, albeit as one would hold a plank of wood or a toaster. But she appeared comfortable and didn't even squeak. He, on the other hand, looked about as relaxed as a tightrope walker, but they both got through it without any residual trauma.
"See?" I said, "Not rocket surgery! Any fool can hold a baby."
"You're right," he replied solemnly. "I guess you've hit the nail on the hammer."

Gladdens the Heart!

A few years ago, my husband picked a blanket out of my stash for his friend's new baby. It wasn't this one, but one very similar:

Last autumn, friend's wife had a second baby and we went to visit her, another blanket in tow.

When we got there, we inspected the baby - as one does - and found her cute in all respects - as one does - and then I noticed the original blanket hanging over the side of the new baby's cot. It was battered and tattered and stained, despite having the appearance of something that had been bunged in a washing machine on a number of occasions.
I was thrilled. This is just wonderful. There is no greater compliment to anyone's work to see it well-worn and well-loved and, despite its wear, pulled out again for the next baby.

Which is why I was very glad that my friend Lenka liked her blanket.
"If it's too bright," I said, "You don't have to take it. You don't need to be polite - I can give it to someone else. I won't be offended, I promise."
"No!" she said and clutched to her chest. "No, I love it, I love it! I swear, I love it!"
And, reassured, I handed it over.
"Don't be precious with it," I said as she left. "Use it - wash it - wear it out. When you do, I'll make you another one."
And I meant it - I would gladly replace something that well-loved. It gladdens the heart :-)

Every Little Thing She Does Is Not Magic

I had a week off this week and I did lots of exciting things. For a start, I emptied my side of our too-small wardrobe and finally came to terms with the fact that I am now two sizes bigger than I was before I met my husband. Coincidence? I think not. In any case, I have virtuously parted with these items of clothing, having finally realised that I will not be fitting back into them any time soon.

I also have been experiencing a kind of schizophrenic crafting dilemma - I simultaneously have no interest in actually making anything, while being full of ideas about stuff I could make. The problem is, when I start to experiment with something, it doesn't go the way I want it to ... and then I get disheartened and cross. This doesn't happen to me very often: I usually get really stubborn and cranky and power on, till the offending item is finished and then I realise that I do quite like it, actually. but this week has seen me tossing stuff aside, willy-nilly. After seven days of the blahs, I have a bunch of started projects that I don't want to finish.

Witness my madness, readers:

A crazy patchwork Klimt blanket to use up a stack of random squares in autumnal colours. Now I've run out of squares and I don't feel like finishing it. It just sits in my workbasket and laughs at me.

Hexagons in pretty shades of turquoise and spring green and powder pink and chocolate brown. Goodness knows how many I'd need to make to make this into a blanket ... for a baby. My head explodes when I think that this could be a full-sized adult blanket. These hexagons are stacked on the table beside me and out of the corner of my eye, I think I can see them sticking up their yarn tails at me in derision.

And experiment disaster: Hey, I thought, wouldn't it be cool if I could make a motif that resembles a peacock feather? So when you sewed them all together, you'd have this amazing blanket that would look like the vivid colours of a peacock. Like this.

And this is what I came up with.

Epic design fail; sulk, sulk, sulk. I don't hear this motif snickering at me because its mockery is drowned out by the laughter of my unsupportive husband.
Back to the drawing board.

Me Day

Today the husband set off for a day with his buddies. This Big Boys' Day Out has been in the works for the past week, with lots of excited phone calls and complicated arrangements. Finally he set off, with his hair freshly quoiffed and his freshly-shaven face slathered in aftershave. I don't believe he even changed his socks for Valentine's Day. Just saying.

In any case, I had a day for me (that's actually more like a day for meeeeeeeeeee!!!! in my head.) I did lots of exciting things: I baked. I put away laundry. I surreptitiously threw away stuff that my husband will not part with but won't miss if they're gone (and, in case he reads this: the bowl was cracked. Cracked - much like you, sweetie.)

Then I waited till the sun came out briefly, took a snap and then wrapped up my friend Lenka's afghan:

(And this was not finished a moment too soon. I had just about reached the point where I was crocheting resentment and ill-will into every stitch, and that shouldn't be part of the present you give.)

 I also started taking apart a jumper that my friend Vanda gave me: it's a cashmere pullover with excellent seams for unravelling:

Although it almost seems blasphemous to take something like this apart,
the wool was in need of a bit of tender loving care ... in the form of a Kool Aid bath.

The first dreaded snip has been taken!

It wasn't as easy as I thought, but once I'd found the correct thread, it all came apart quite nicely in my hands. By the time Mr Gingerbread came home, there was a pile of kinky cream wool on the floor and it looked as though I had shorn a particularly big sheep.

Tomorrow, I'm going to dye it! This, as you might remember, involves Kool Aid and a big mess - hurray!

Valentine's Hearts

Valentine's Day. I'm not a fan. Not least because my dear husband maintains it's a conspiracy by greeting card companies and florists to trick dopey men into shelling out their hard-earned cash for woman-pleasing trifles. At least, that's his story and he's sticking to it. And he's more romantic than I am, so that ought to give you an idea of how fervently we celebrate St. Valentine's Day in this house.

But this is a very quick and simple pattern for little hearts that have an infinite variety of uses. Made with a 3.75mm (F) hook and mercerised cotton, mine are 5 cm / 2 inches tall and a little over 5 cm / 2 inches wide at their widest point. They take less than five minutes to make - in fact, I can knock one out in two or three minutes flat - and use small amounts of leftover yarn.

Here's how you do it...
You need 

• a 3.75mm (F) hook
• scraps of coloured cotton

This pattern uses American terms. The British terms are in [brackets].

DC [TR] = double crochet [treble crochet]
TR [DC] = treble crochet [double treble crochet]

Start by chaining 4, then join with a slip stitch.
Chain 3 (counts as the first DC [TR]), do 2 DC [TR] into the ring. Chain 2, 3 DC [TR], chain 2, 3 DC [TR], chain 2, 3 DC [TR], chain 2 and join to the third chain of your first 'fake' DC [TR].

Chain 3, then do 1 DC [TR] in the same corner gap, crochet one DC [TR]  in each DC [TR] of the previous round. Crochet 2 DC [TR] in corner gap, chain 2, 2 DC [TR] in same corner gap, then continue with 1 DC [TR] in each DC [TR] of the round below, and 2 DC [TR] + chain 2 + 2 DC [TR] in each corner. Join to the third chain of your first 'fake' DC [TR].

You should have a little square with 7 DC [TR] on each side.

 
* Slipstitch. Start a TR [DTR]: yarn over twice, then insert hook in the top of the fourth DC[TR] (the middle stitch) of the previous round.


Yarn over - you now have four loops on your hook. Yarn over and draw through two loops. You now have three on your hook. Yarn over and draw through two loops. You now have two on your hook. Yarn over and draw yarn through remaining two loops. You now have one loop on your hook.




Now do 6 DC [TR] in the same stitch as the TR [DTR] (i.e. the fourth of the seven DC [TR]s in the round below.) In the same stitch do one more TR [DTR].

 

Slipstitch the 'petal' of the heart into the corner gap **
and repeat from * to ** on the next side of your square.

Slipstitch twice, yank yarn tight and cut a tail, which you then weave in and out of the stitches. Pull your heart into shape. At this point you might consider blocking or starching your hearts - I starched mine, using a light spray-on starch and a warm iron. You can see that the heart on the right is slightly stiffer and flatter than the one on the left.

Now all you have to do is make enough to adorn inanimate objects or to simply make a decorate garland.


If made in a thicker yarn, for example worsted weight, you will have hearts that are big enough for bunting. If done in cotton, you can sew two together  leaving a gap at the top to make a little bag (e.g. for sweets or candies - a nice idea for a wedding favour, if you have the patience to churn out dozens of little hearts in your wedding colours.)

Happy Valentine's Day!