loving it

I have just added this wee hoodie to my shop, I enjoyed designing and making it so much, I love it when a plan comes together! The hood really freaked me out, I have made knit fabric hoodies for my kids, but knitting a hood is so different to sewing one. When I finally finished the calculations and drawings it was a beautiful thing - amazing how it just worked.

I wanted a point of difference between this sweater and every other organic merino baby garment on the web (there are HEAPS out there...who knew?) most of them seem to be scavenged from vintage knitting patterns - which I feel is kind of cheating, but I digress...I just have to feel satisfied that I have created my own designs from scratch. I searched my cable designs and this one caught my eye...it looked just like the top of a nikau palm...it just needed a cabled trunk - perfect! The nikau is an iconic symbol of NZ, along with the kiwi, pukeko and silver fern - iconic without being overtly "kiwi".

While I was putting the website together I was so flat out that I didn't have time to design, now that everything is ticking over (apart from the firefox issues - which I will fix when I transfer the website to a new server) I am enjoying the design process again - sketching, daydreaming, calculating and finally knitting - listening to podcasts (I feel like these have always existed) Penn Gilette , New Scientist, Scientific American, Nature - as well as the usual knitting suspects (tip: if you have big kids - over 8 or so - check out the Naked scientist podcast - they have great experiments) I have to make myself leave the house every day - go over the road for coffee or something, just to avoid becoming a recluse!