baby blue is for blondes

I suddenly find myself in the enviable position of having a lot of blog content....do I meter it out in drips and drabs...do I cram it all here and make you want to skim rather than even read...gah, I know you come here for the pictures anyway (evidenced if nothing else by the couple of people who told me they liked that last cowl I knit)--not my pics, not my cowl, tho I am knitting it!

God knows I spend a lot of time skimming blogs myself rather than actually reading them. Does anyone else using a reader find that it makes them really REALLY lazy when it comes to catching up on blogs? The impatient girlie that lives inside of me is always like "come on, you get the gist of what's being said here, let's move onnnnnnnnnnnn (stomps feet), you have 30 more updates to read today".

So here you go:



The Star Crossed Slouchy beret, as modelled by my gorgeous friend Rebecca. I secretly hate her and her natural blonde hair, ice blue eyes, and perfect skin that never needs a lick of make-up. Fortunately for me she's as sweet as pie, so therefore impossible to really hate.



pattern: as mentionned above, is a free ravelry download for those of you on there
yarn: less that 1 skein of Emerald Blue Malabrigo
needles: US size 10

A SUPER fast, super slouchy knit. I cast on less stitches for my pea-sized head, but I dunno, it wasn't really working for me...I think it's all those varigated blues:



Rebecca's head is even more pea-sized than my own, so it's slouchier still on her--but it just suits her so much better and I'm happy to gift it to her. I have another blonde GF in my life *and* another skein of this so I will likely bust out another the same for her as well. The yarn is gorgeous, and as knits go it was jiffy-quick.


***matching shirt totally not planned!***

I've cast on for a number of new projects lately, but I'll save those for another post--some "secret" knitting in there too. Someone a while back was asking me about some Barbie knits too (apologies for my lack of memory!) and in the throes of all my recent unpacking I was afforded the chance to take some fresh pictures of these for you:


(the background is our new house which is very slowwwly starting to come together...)



N.B: my mother knit all of these outfits for some of the vintage dolls in my collection. I know I've said this before but I promise I'm not some crazy Barbie collecting lady (not that there's anything wrong with that...) but these are all Barbies from either mine or my sisters' collections growing up.

I'm a pretty serious feminist, but I still have a major affection for Barbie (I know some folks might find that strange), but my love for kitsch pretty much outweighs my love for most things in life. Especially the older dolls, before her face went all weird in the nineties (heh). I'm well aware that a couple of the American girl barbies I have when NIB are worth something ridiculous like 2 grand each, but these are dolls that I played with, not mint, and definitely not for sale. There, that is my one disclaimer here. Also I'm hard up for doll shoes so I am also aware that those red shoes are not a pair and definitely do not match. Make that my second disclaimer. Barbie can be lazy when it comes to fashion too, but I prefer to think that what she's really doing is taking it to the maxxxxx.





All three pictured above are from this book. The next two are from old patterns from my mom's own collection (they are all hand-written so I couldn't tell you where she originally got them...)





So there you have it--baby blue hats for blondes segued nicer than one would think into a post about Barbies...