sling

I mentioned before that my sister just had a baby. What I didn't say was that she called me while in labor and asked me to come and be with her and her husband for the birth of their child. I was so excited! It was all I could do to wait until a little later in the afternoon when I had child care for my own little darlings & head down to the hospital. Her son is the first birth I've attended where I wasn't the one in the bed begging for drugs, or for someone to shave my head (I was hot! And I totally would have done it too, but for some reason nobody took me seriously - huh, go figure).

Anyhow Monday my sis and I were talking about how sometimes people don't have the same personal space boundaries we are used to or they think the boundaries do not apply to newborns. I mentioned how I had always wanted a sling but never had one. I didn't know much about them, like where to get one or even that they could be made but I had noticed that people tend to stay further back from an infant in a sling. Of course my "baby" is four years old. Since my daughter's birth I learned to crochet (a little). About 9 months ago a woman at church briefly showed me a sling she had crocheted using a free pattern online. So I thought I should try to make one of those for my sister and her little babe. I found a few interesting looking slings online, but I had one problem - I don't know how to read crochet patterns. Oh well. I thought I'd try to make one anyway, without a pattern.

A couple of weeks ago my craft store had cotton on special 30% off, so I bought two cones of a very natural looking cotton with dull flecks of color. I think it's called potpourri. I had in mind to crochet an afghan with it, but that didn't exactly work out like I planned. I decided that would be good yarn to use and gave it a go on my new bamboo hook (I think it's a G, or an H, or an I - can you tell I'm not a real crocheter?). Pictured above is what I came up with. I don't really know how I did it but I think I am going to attempt to recreate it (or something similar) for my sister in law.