Might As Well Face It

I'm trying not to get in the habit of making a new baby sweater for my niece every time we go down to visit my family. After all, my rather large family just keeps getting bigger, and if I start setting a precedent of showing up with new handknits for babies, what began as one quick sweater could easily turn into an assembly line reminiscent of Detroit. I run the substantial risk of setting myself up for disaster once my other brothers start having their own little families. The thought of twins makes me shudder, and when I flip past Jon and Kate Plus Eight, I start to break out in hives. (Must. Make. Six. Tiny. Identical. Sweaters. Right. Now.)



My obsession with tiny knitted things could eventually cause me to forsake gainful employment and instead sit around all day, experimenting with all manner of baby yarns and patterns, my need for unending cuteness growing so mighty that, like kudzu, it covers everything in its tracks and whisks away my last remaining strands of sanity...



I think the best thing to do in these situations is to submit to the magnetic pull of the unbearably adorable. Enter my latest fall off the wagon:



Yarn: Brown Sheep Cotton Fleece (2 skeins)
Pattern: Little Sister’s Dress (by Tora Froseth)
(pattern available on her blog as a free PDF download)



I figure the faster I can knit it up and get it out of my system, the easier it will be to resist the siren song of the next painfully cute baby knit, right? Better to send this little sweater out into the world, where it can be properly worn and loved, than to horde all the cutest baby knits in a jumbled pile of tiny buttons and sleeves in my overstuffed closet, causing raised eyebrows from Steven.

S: “Why are there ten baby sweaters in our closet?”

H: “Oh, honey, don’t be silly. Those are obviously dog sweaters.”

S: “What about these mittens? This hat? And for goodness sake, the booties, Heather?”

H: “Um… Uh…I don’t know what you’re talking about. Those aren’t mine! Someone must have planted baby booties in our closet to frame me! How maddening!”

S: Rolls his eyes.

H: Goes back to trolling the internets for more cute baby sweaters.



Hope you enjoy the sweater, Riley. And please pay no mind if I overload you with knitted things in the first year of your existence. I’m looking into a 12-step program for that. In the meantime, please ask your mom and dad to have you tested for any wool allergies. You know, just in case 90 lbs of woolen outerwear happens to arrive on your doorstep this Christmas. Or something.