Poncho

Here's the poncho that was giving me so much trouble:
It's not my greatest effort, but it is pretty nice. Very simple too. Just two rectangles of double crochets sewn together. The trim is a very simple shell stitch around the hem & a plain sc around the neckline. Then the flowers were freehanded and sewn on.

The yarn, of course, is Caron Simply Soft, mostly CSS Brites. The flowers were made with leftover yarn from the Berry Blue Halter top. I might make a cap to go along with this and sell them both together, but I'm not 100% positive yet. I may just keep it for Smoochie & make another for Linda, as they've outgrown their ponchos I made 'em in '04. We'll see.

Here's another photo, a close-up of the neckline:
I do like those flowers. I started out planning to put them all down the seam, to hide it, but after those I was starting to think maybe a whole line of them would be overkill. So I threw it up online, with my trusty doll Annabel wearing it, and most agreed that three flowers are enough.

Of course, most also thought it was a doll poncho. Which is understandable, considering my model. But the kids were in bed! I'd be insane to rack 'em out just to have them model for me.

Smoochie, of course, loves to model things for me. She's a natural ham. Loves having her photo taken, always has. And since she's the eldest, we have a huge amount of pictures of her, LOL. Not so much of the other two. Lucky me all my kids look alike, so when they get older I can lie and say some of Smoochie's baby pix are of the other two. (No, I won't, not really.) I did take photos of Smoochie in the poncho, because I think that photos of someone actually wearing whatever make the product more appealing, but I just couldn't get great pictures. Here's the best of them:
Of course, ideally you don't take your modeling photos after dark! But I was just not willing to let yet another day go by without getting photos of one of the kids wearing the poncho.

It's actually been cool enough here lately, in the evenings at least, for ponchos to be worn without roasting the kids. We took them to McDonald's last night and we were practically all sitting on top of one another to keep warm. The rain has kept things from heating up too much, but it's already starting to be appreciably warmer during the daytime hours when it's generally pretty sunny. Spring has arrived in Hawaii, and it is wet.

I have actually spent the day not doing much crocheting. I've done some, because I don't seem to be able lately to pass the day without doing something, but I've only been doing swatches and trying to make up my mind about my next project. I have the yarn, Simply Soft as usual, & it is in dark country blue and light country blue. I was about to say they're some of my favorite colors, but I don't think Simply Soft has a single color I don't like! At any rate, I've just decided to make an infant boy's suit, a very simple one, just overalls and an open front jacket. I know the stitch too. Not sure off the top of my head what it is called, but it's sc, dc, then on the next row sc in the dc & dc in the sc. Produces a nice, knobby fabric. I'm going to make it in a size 6 mos, mainly because I haven't done anything infant sized in a while, but also so I can have Esther model it. She can do drag, LOL.