Gray for the boys

Two of my nephews have birthdays in November, and I decided to knit for them both. Nephew 1 turns six this year, and since I made socks for his older sister on her birthday earlier in the year, he gets socks too. (These kids have great taste in socks; they love the hanknitted ones.)

Yarn: my handspun
Needles: 2.00 mm (US size 0) DPNs
Pattern: 2x2 ribbing with purl ridges

Mainly I picked this yarn because it was the most masculine handspun superwash yarn in my stash. Masculine or not, I'm now thinking of making socks for myself out of the other skein of this yarn. I love how it knitted up.

Nephew 2 was born a few days ago, and he's getting this:

Pattern: Owl Baby Vest (Rav link), by Jodi Haraldson
Yarn: Knit Picks Swish DK, "Cobblestone Heather"
Needles: 3.5 mm (US size 4) and 3.75 mm (US size 5)

This is such a sweet little vest. I've been waiting for an excuse to knit it for quite a while. I did make a few modifications to the pattern...nothing drastic, though. I knit the body over 112 stitches (vs. 110 in the pattern) to make it easy to center the V-neck over the middle owl. Then I knit the V-neck edging in the traditional manner, decreasing one stitch on each side of the V on each round. Finally, I did five rows of 2x2 around the neck and armhole openings.