baby cardy

My friend, Rose, is going to have her first baby (a boy!) at the end of August. I wanted to make a little knitted gift, but didn't have a ton of time. Luckily, I found a project that was super-sweet and knitted up really fast. Dream come true, right? 

This yarn is a dream come true! Catherine helped me pick it out. She swears by baby alpaca. 

I would pet a baby alpaca right now. So very soft.

I felted a toadstool rattle to go along with the sweater. 

Little fungus stem and underbelly.

All nestled together.

The back, arms, and sides are all knit together, and the rib stitch collar is knit by picking up stitches along the edge. Then you just seam together the edges and you're good to go. Easy-peasy! The pattern is free on Ravelry. You can also find it here. The pattern doesn't give you any guidance about what stitches to use for the seams, but I decided the mattress stitch was the way to go for the sides (Knitting Help has a great tutorial on mattress stitch) and a horizontal seam was the way to go for finishing the sleeves (find an OK tutorial here).  If you do it right, the seams will be invisible from the outside.


Still need a little more help? Knitsimple also has tons of info on all types of seaming. Highly recommend. Happy knitting!

Wrapped up and ready to go!