One of the things Miriam wears almost every day is a pair of babylegs. They are great under dresses when a wool diaper cover makes tights look ridiculous. I also put them on like legwarmers under her pants to cover the gap between the pants and socks. She wears them almost every day, so I decided to make her an extra-warm pair out of hand painted alpaca. My first project on double pointed needles! They are very relaxing to knit, just round and round and round, with a few rows of ribbing on each end. I’m just about to cast this one off and start another. I used Ginny’s tutorial to get started, but cast on 32 stitches (and increased to 36 by the end) since they are for a little skinny baby and I made them long, so they can cover her entire leg. I also did it in stockinette stitch instead of all ribbing, partially because I screwed up the ribbing in the beginning and didn’t want to fix it, and also because I thought this pretty yarn was shown off best with stockinette. Hopefully the three or four rows of ribbing on each side will keep them in place.

I’m finally reading Simplicity Parenting, which I’ve been hearing about from others for ages. Much of it is about things I’ve been aiming toward for a while - less stuff, simple toys, not a lot of scheduling, and very little “screen access” for James. But it’s nice to get even more ideas and learn more about the “why” of a simpler childhood. I already culled James toys quite a bit and have chosen out just four books for the week, which we read each night, rather than having 30 books to choose from, which, truth be told, mostly meant I picked them all up off the floor three times a day. We have a nice evening time of reading those four books on the “big bed” while I nurse Miriam. Next week we’ll choose different books, although I’m trying to always have one of them be a book of poetry. We are reading Eloise Wilkins’ Poems for the Very Young currently, along with Where the Wild Things Are, Hand Hand Fingers Thumb (James favorite book of all time), and Goodnight Moon.

See Ginny to read about what others are knitting and reading.