Wishes: Happiness

I told a friend the other day that when I make something for The Kid, it’s usually a way for me to express a wish for my baby – health, happiness, warmth, safety, that sort of thing. In this case I made bunting, which is a wish for joy.

I also put a little thought into what the baby might like, so this bunting features a complex pattern with high contrast colors, both elements that babies tend to be fascinated with, from what I understand.  Plus there are all sorts of gently waving parts when you turn on the fan. It’s probably hung to high to be interesting at first (I think sight range is initially something like 18 inches) but it will be there for a while.

I’m actually pretty thrilled with how it came out. As you can tell, the room is quite white, and our landlord forbids painting, so I’m looking for ways to inject color into the space in fun ways.

It may also be true that I love rainbow colors.

I’m thinking in terms of wishes these days because of the odd contrast of fragility and sturdiness of babies, and I suppose humans in general. There’s lots I can try to do to help this little person in the world, but there are lots of things out of my control, too. Sometimes all you’ve got is the hope that things will work out okay and hopefully make sense eventually. I’ve had a lot of those moments during the last six months, and at those times I’ve just tried to put my wishes into something I make and hope for the best.

This wish is for happiness. I suppose I am remembering babies watching something or someone that fascinates them with either a big wide-eyed stare or giggling at something. That was always awesome. That’s what I was going for.

Plus, these rainbow colors are quite cheerful. I loved rainbows when I was growing up. It actually made me really sad when therapists started telling people that children who draw rainbows are probably depressed. I was not depressed, but I loved rainbows. Therapists can be crackpots.

This also makes me feel better about color. Anyone who knows me knows that I have strong feelings about how completely inappropriate it is for people to be shoehorning tiny infants into genderized roles before they have a chance to find their own personalities. This often translates into a general distaste for the blue/pink themes that follow you everywhere in the new-parent world. Add to that my general dislike of of pink and pastels in general, and … well. You can tell I’m not really a candidate for 90% of the stuff marketed to parents.

So rainbows and primary colors make me feel a lot better.

If only the rest of the room were as done as this banner. If you looked below this, you’d see about 18 sewing projects on a table where the crib is supposed to be. NOT READY YET. Luckily I have three more months.

P.S. Details:

1 – Yarn: A combination of things. There’s orange and oatmeal from Vanna’s Choice, another orange and green from Red Heart Soft, the blue is TLC Essentials (nasty yarn, that), and I have no idea where the red is from. The label was lost years ago.

2 – Hook Size: If only I’d written it down. But I did not.

3 – Triangle Granny Pattern: I made up the triangle pattern from looking at my inspiration pictur/blog post. At some point I went looking to see if there was a pattern, and on one of Loretta Grayson’s Flickr photos I found reference to a triangle granny from Lee Ann Hamm. It’s pretty much what I did, except I simplified the first two rows. If I make more triangle grannies I’ll write it down this time.

4 – Tassels/SC/Chains: As far as the tassels and connections go, I figured out the tassels as I went, and the whole thing hangs together with a single crochet in the top of each triangle connected by five chains between. Each end has a dangling end of 50 chains. Then I went back and added a second row of single crochet along the whole thing for stability.