My Little Playdate

Max exploring Miracle Beach Park in his new Playdate cardigan

Once or twice a year, I travel home.  Leaving Scotland behind, I visit family on Vancouver Island and spend a week working with Alexa in Port Moody.  It’s always an exciting and tiring visit with a schedule full of chatting, crazy last-minute sample knitting and photo-shoots.  Now that Max is a toddler, it is so much fun to show him my favourite spots in the place I grew up!  He loved the forest and sand at Miracle Beach, a beautiful provincial park just a short walk from my childhood home.

Boys love sticks!  And Max ate a LOT of sand at the beach.

He also loved crawling around and exploring the forest floor, finding pinecones to chew on and sticks to wave about! For the trip I had to put Max in a little playdate to show off. I decided on a simple pattern change: single row stripes!

Sure, you can eat that pinecone… if you really want to!

Playdate Project Details:

Pattern:  Playdate Pattern $7 – available for download now (or get the Max & Bodhi’s Wardrobe ebook)
Sizing:  This adorable cardi is sized from baby to big!
Yarn:  Rainbow Heirloom Merino Light in ‘verdant’ (the Nostalgia Club colour for June 2015) and ‘jewel sea’ – less than 2 skeins required
Needles:  US#3 / 3.25mm and US#4 / 3.75mm (or as required to meet gauge)
Gauge:  24 sts & 36 rows / 4″ in stockinette
Notions:  stitch marker, darning needle, buttons

Single Row Stripes

When working a flat piece of knitting in single-row stripes, you need to use a circular needle, because you must work two right-side (RS) rows, then work two wrong-side (WS) rows, so you need points on both ends of your needles.

Single Row Striping Pattern
Row 1 (RS): green
Row 2 (RS): teal
Row 3 (WS): green
Row 4 (WS): teal

As you can see, I decided to keep the pocket opening section in the green, and then worked the pocket bind-off row in teal, which made for a tidy little detail.

I considered quite a few options for buttons, but in the end I chose these vintagey looking olive green ones.  I love choosing buttons – I always wait until the knit is complete, then take it to my button store, and try a bunch of different options before selecting the one that matches the mood of the design best.  It’s difficult to buy buttons in advance, because you can’t be sure how they will look with the buttonhole spacing and button band width of the finished knit.  So it’s easiest to wait until the project is finished to find a perfect match.

Details, details… I love choosing buttons!

Simple Pattern Hacks

Have you ever knit in single-row or single-round stripes?  I was inspired to make this ‘pattern hack’ by the creative and talented Laura (undone57 on Ravelry) who made this little scrappy playdate with stripes and fair-isle dots… Exquisite eh?  Check out her project page on Ravelry for more information.

Over the years, we have created a number of simple designs that lend themselves well to the striping or the addition of simple colourwork patterns.  One of my favourites is the free Flax pullover from The Simple Collection.

Other simple designs perfect for ‘hacking’: