This has been a big year for babies among my friends. So far four have been born, with another four due between now and February. This works out well for me, since I love knitting for babies and now have plenty of kids to foist my creations on. The great thing about knitting for kids is that the projects tend to be small and therefore a convenient way to try new things (when you have to rip out an entire sleeve’s worth of knitting on your first sweater, it’s a lot less grief if that sweater is toddler-sized). It’s also an outlet for any urges you may have to knit something “cute”–assuming, of course, that your grown-up acquaintances aren’t clamouring for you to make them a pair of booties with pom-poms.
Sometimes it’s hard to decide what to knit for friends’ kids, though. Take these fruit hats. Yes, those are baby hats made to look like little strawberries, plums, etc. Pretty cute, I thought, and I planned to file them away for future projects, but then I heard a couple of parents say how creepy they are. And yeah, maybe you wouldn’t want your child’s head to look like something edible. Good point there.
A lot of people like to give silly nicknames to their unborn baby, which I find cute and funny. I actually nicknamed my co-worker’s unborn baby, and she was good-natured enough to laugh at my choice of “Cletus” rather than refuse to speak to me ever again. Anyway, this brings me to my next dilemma: is it okay to knit an item related to the in utero nickname? Most people never use the nickname again after the kid is born, and don’t want other people using it either. However, a friend of mine referred to her daughter as “the Squid” before she was born, and I was so very tempted to make her this squid hat. In the end, I knit her something else and filed away the squid pattern in case a marine biologist friend of mine ever decides to have kids.
Check out itty-bitty Hats by Susan B. Anderson – it’s a whole book of super cute baby hats. I like to make hats because they are quick and easy and I think people like to get them. Sweaters are sometimes tricky because some people don’t like buttons, ties are tricky around babies, a pullover is hard to get on a baby, etc. Personally, I don’t think the fruit caps are creepy and my kids get tons of compliments when they wear them – just check my comment section.
Heather
Oh, I think the hats are cute too, but I’ve heard enough people express negative opinions about them that they’ve moved off my list for potential baby gifts. Thanks for the book rec, I’ll have to check it out!
LOL the squid hat is adorable! Wouldn’t have taken offense at all… But we do love the booties!
Begs too questions however:
1) Would it have become a black beret or green army cap once Squid became into Baby Che’?
2) What on earth would you have knit for Trucker? (GiGi’s name in utero…)
Oops – I mean TWO questions (babybrain…)
Glad to know you share the squid hat love 😉 I think a black beret would’ve been most appropriate for Baby Che, and as for Trucker/GG… well, a trucker hat is all I can think of!
God don’t you love the babybrain typos? “became into”? On what planet does THAT make grammatical sense??!
when I first read that, ‘became into’ made perfect sense… what does that say about me?!