so, the baby cardigan is ready! i never knit this fast, i was so curious about the construction and lace parts on the yoke)...  i just couldn't put it away. :)

 

i finished it with fuchsia buttons, sticking to the "pink" theme. (picking buttons was so hard, i tried yellow, blue and green to tone down all the pink, but nothing worked.)

the lace parts were fun to knit, i really had to focus and count stitches, but only for some time, and then i could knit a lot of stockinette again. the perfect mix of easy and challenging. :)

 

 

i was actually planning on giving it away, but i don't think i can do it. :)

some weeks ago i received the nicest package ever. a big box stuffed with yarn! Himiko sent it to me, she cleaned out her yarn stash and sent all her leftovers to me! just because! after 3 years of blogging i'm still amazed of all the friendship and generosity in blogland. :)

but, just look at all this yarn! lots of pastel colours (which is great, cause pastels are not colours i would pick myself) and some good quality yarns like Phildar!

 

there was quite some baby pink Phildar yarn, so i decided to knit a cute baby cardigan!

 here's one sleeve...

 and here's the other...

and some lace details on the body.

i'm loving this knit, it's going incredibly fast because i'm so eager to finish it and to see how it turns out. verrrry girly and pink, that's for sure! :)

(pattern: Maile sweater by What to knit when you're expecting)

happy dance!! because.......i finished my simple lines shawl!

 i started knitting in december and six months later, i finished. it was a love/hate project for me; love for being so easy (yet pretty), hate for being so damn boring sometimes! i didn't count stitches but i'm guessing the last rows were about 300 stitches and at the end, it would take me almost ten full minutes to finish a row... phew!  

but i persisted.. with the following result:

 

 

 i have quite some Madeline Tosh left for another project... enough for a simplicity cowl, a constanze or maybe a lacy baktus?

sometimes, i'm convinced there is no better way to relax than having a nice cup of coffee and crocheting a bit... especially crocheting these hexagons; picking the colors and deciding where to put them in the blanket... :) it really takes my mind of things!

do you find crocheting and knitting just as relaxing? :)

today was the first good day of spring, it was finally warm enough to sit outside in the sun... and i had my first outdoor knitting session of this year. :) we also went on a bike ride today! my batteries are all charged and i'm longing for more days like this.

 my simple lines shawl is coming along quite nicely. remember i'm making a colour blocked-shawl? i added the second colour, which is a warm grey or a deep beige or whatever. :) sometimes i wish i chose a more daring colour combination, but i do think these colours bring out the stripe pattern... and they are so neutral they will go with many of my spring/summer clothes.... what do you think about the colour combination?

oh... and it's getting quite big, too. :)