Going cross-eyed

My Daddy's birthday is coming up.  He'll be the big 64.  Old man.  ;)  I've been thinking of different things I can make him.  My go-to item is a hat.  They're quick, they're pretty simple.  But what kind of hat?  The first thing that popped into my head was the Pillsbury Doughboy.  I wish I could give you a really good explanation for that, but I really can't.  I know he has at least one Doughboy shirt that we've given him, but why... I don't remember.  I couldn't find a pattern for a crocheted Doughboy hat or chef's hat, so I kept thinking.  I thought of just a basic earflap beanie, but that seems so boring.  Why does it have to be a novelty hat?  I don't know.  I guess that's my thing.  

I texted my sister and asked her for a suggestion.  Her suggestion?  Pillsbury Doughboy.

So... what to do?

Come up with my own pattern.  Heaven help me.

I doubt even a professional crocheter would have a clue what this means

 

I was confusing myself, so I made myself a little chart.  I really can't tell you if it will work yet or not.  Hopefully, finger's (and eyes) crossed, it will look vaguely like this little poppin' fresh dude's hat.  Key word:  vaguely.  If I can figure it out, maybe I can make a mini one and then figure out how to make an amigurumi Doughboy.  THAT would be awesome.  

What's in the bag?

I normally have two yarn projects going at a time, sometimes more.  It keeps me from getting bored if it's a big project and I have two fairly big ones going on right now. 

My first bag contains the body, head and arm of a jester.  He's for the girls.  I have to work on him when the girls are asleep or Olivia runs off with the appendage-less thing to play with him.  The pattern is by the same lady who made the Dotje doll that I just realized I never posted about.  Here she is:

She was a gift for my boss

I love this woman's patterns.  Just too cute.  

My other bag contains about 1/3 of an afghan that I'm working on.  

Babette Blanket in black and white - I have more done than this now

I am not a huge fan of granny squares.  But I like how this one uses different sizes.  The original pattern is in colors... LOTS of colors.  I loved how it looked, but I thought it would be less expensive (and yes, yarn gets expensive when you're buying 14 different colors, even the cheap stuff) I decided to just use black, white, and two shades of gray.  I used a random stripe generator to come up with what the squares would look like. I'm not as thrilled with it as I want to be.  But I intend to see it through to the end and I'll find another afghan to work on that I will love.  The girls love blankets so I'm sure if nothing else, one of them will claim it.   Well, not Zoe.  Linus is faithful to her purple fuzzy blanket.

Yesterday, I did knock out something different.  I had been meaning to make a birthday gift for a friend and coworker and kept forgetting until yesterday.  Her birthday is Friday and she's off, so I needed something quick to bring to work today.  I've been wanting to make some wrist warmers and figured if I knew anyone who would like them, she'd be the one.  The pattern was ridiculously easy and quick.  I would say if I could have sat down and worked continuously that I would have had them finished in an hour.  But I rarely have that luxury.  It still didn't take that long and it was easy enough to do it and help Olivia with her reading.

They're cuter on her ;)

I love wrist warmers and fingerless gloves, but they're really not me.  Mainly because I have the hottest hands you've ever felt.  If my palms are cold, you better check to make sure I even have a pulse.

So that's what is in the bag at the moment.  I'll probably be finished with the jester before too long.  The blanket will take much longer.  I can only make so many granny squares a day before my brain shuts down.