Crisis of Praxis: Knitting Away

Before it's too late!

I'm a lap knitter, so it's only a matter of time before the lap becomes a hindrance to my knitting. Much crocheting has been ferreted away for such an emergency.

Yesterday, I:

had to make myself breakfast, because the boyfriend was up and down all night with stomach pain (we have no idea why, but it's mysteriously gone now);
as a result, I ate half of a piece of cold vegetarian lasagna with about 1/4 cup of milk;
but I did manage to pack lunch, which I ate all of: a piece of lasagna, a Muenster cheese/mayo/ sprouts sandwich, and two carrots;
brought a box of instant organic maple oatmeal to work for emergencies;
ate a serving of it right before going home;
had more lasagna upon arriving home;
cast on a baby sweater;
told the boyfriend the fetus is named Bubba.

Today, I:

rousted the boyfriend out of bed to feed me at 6am (He is supposed to make sure I eat right! No shirking!);
ate a two egg omelet with spinach, mushrooms, Parmesan cheese, two slices of wheat toast, and a cup of cafe au lait (you see why I get him up? :P);
supervised the Packing of My Lunch while I did dishes;
implemented the Grocery List on the Fridge Plan;
had two carrots and two pieces of celery, basically all morning;
drank a cup of doctored Earl Grey;
drank a glass of water;
had 1/4 of an avocado/sprouts/Muenster cheese/mayo sandwich (I think those carrots and celery may have done me in!);
am contemplating having a boiled egg before leaving work;
was pleased to hear at lunch that the Grocery List on the Fridge Plan is working.

In a way, I am training a stay-at-home-dad, because that is the sort of guy my boyfriend is. He cleans much better than me, and he's good at (and seems to enjoy) doing all the grocery shopping, with some direction (which I am hoping to slowly remove so that he will act independently), and he's not as equipped to deal with structure imposed from external sources as I am. He agreed that part of his participating in this pregnancy is looking after my nutrition, because I am terrible about remembering to eat, etc., but I am finding that I am having to gently impose this half of the time, or else he tries to sleep. I think that after a couple of months of this, he will have a pattern worked out and will be on automatic. That'll be handy if I am practically useless myself from nausea, fatigue, etc.

Knitting

The baby knits are under way. In fact, I must confess that they were begun before I was actually pregnant. The following items were knit the month before:

KnitPicks Crayon beanie in what I thought was a newborn size, but turned out 3 month old size. Oh, well. Good thing I knit this:
KnitPicks Comfy beanie in Blackberry colorway.
I still have half a ball of yarn from either beanies, which I will probably make socks or mittens from.
This is a baby jacket knit with Reynold's Odyssey. I am in love with it. It needs blocking and buttons. I figure I have... 8 months to get that done?

I also started a maternity sweater.

All I have left on the front is the right neckline. It's the Mommy Shrug from Interweave Knits. I bought this yarn about a week before I started the project with the intention of making a maternity sweater, but I had totally misjudged how much yarn I would need. Imagine my horror when I cast on and saw I was about two skeins of Cascade 220 Heathers short! However, I am one lucky knitter, because I went back to the store A MONTH LATER and got three more skeins in the SAME DYE LOT. Whew!

I also bought a shitload of yarn for baby stuff, including my first baby cashmerino:
Seamless baby booties! Size 6 months, though.

Well. This is hit-or-miss, I'm finding. Fortunately, babies grow, so all is not lost! This should just be a lesson to me on the unpredictability of gauge when you think it's not worth swatching for a project that would take as long as the swatch to complete.

Nevertheless, I made a matching hat, which is definitely not newborn size, may be closer to 3 months than 6 months, but oh well again. (I should not make matching sets, but mix-and-match things.)

I'm pretty pleased with it.