I just have to say that I'm so grateful to my sister Suzie for starting me down the exciting and wonderful road of soa
ker knitting! As my very first soaker project, I learned a lot about myself as a knitter. I learned that I'm much better at improvising and designing with knit than with crochet. Case in point, the sock monkey skirty.
Suzie found a pic of a skirty that she loved and I figured I could probably figure out how to do it. I'm smart! Even though I don't necessarily have a lot of knitting experience, I had mastered knit and purl, how hard could the rest of it be? We searched and searched, and Suzie found the PERFECT sock monkey yarn (imho) and I took it with me up to my husband's grandmother's house when we went for a weekend for our church's general conference. The kids were occupied with all the other children there and we were watching the conference on TV. It's the PERFECT time for a knit or crochet project.
As wonderful and inspiring as the general authorities of the church are, they're more interesting to listen to than to watch. So I set to work, and by the time the conference was over, I was all but finished with my first sock monkey skirty. I felt like a kid who's just learned to ride a bike! It's exhilarating to finish a project, especially one that you have no idea how it's going to turn out! Such an accomplishment!
So I took it home and put it on my beautiful niece Addy, and it's been a big hit ever since. I personally loved it so much that I had to make a matching halter to go with it. She still gets lots of compliments every time she wears it. It's gone through some major overhauls since I first made it. It's gotten lots of improvements, but I'm still very proud of and pleased with the first one :).
Look at my cute Princess Addy!! I just have to say, she makes one heck of a model! This skirty was SOOO cute right off the needles, but I had no idea how cute it REALLY was until we put it on Addy. Personally, I think she's a natural. I mean, look how inspired she was to stick her tongue out, knowing how well the look would go with the monster that was on her bum!! I love this design. It was so fun to do. Seriously, I started giggling when I was sewing the eyes on I was so impressed with how cute it was coming out. It's funny, I look at these beautiful things I've created, and it doesn't really register that they came from ME. I mean, I'm just me, plain old me. Mom to two toddler boys and exceptionally bad housekeeper, and yet, these adorable things come out of my hands. I was surprised by how cute I thought these were wh
en they were finished. They might as well have been designed and knitted by someone else. I can't wait to make one for my little nephew Jack... the monster is TOTALLY fitting for him :)
