Friendship Booties

Friendship Booties by Lorna Miser (yes, she of Lorna's Laces fame) from Faith, Hope, Love, Knitting.
How sweet are these? My friend Jayne says I made her cry when she saw the photos! They're so tiny, and will encompass a newborn foot so well. All you need to do is tie the ribbon snuggly.

Now, I know they're not a complex pattern and won't fit for very long; they're just a bit of fun but I enjoyed making them and am really pleased with the result.

Each booty is basically a square of knitted fabric, with eyelets along two opposite sides, through which you thread your choice of ribbon. I chose a rainbow stripe that I happened to have in my ribbon stash. Yes, you've guessed it, for as long as I've had the button problem, I've had a ribbon stash, though I wouldn't say it's quite as serious... yet. (You need only search the blog for the word button to find the myriad posts dedicated to the wondrous things!).

The ribbon is very girly, though it could have been worse (I have metres of pink gingham, grosgrain pink edged in dashed white lines, even birds and hearts). For a boy I would change the ribbon (fear not, boys are also catered for in the ribbon section).

Although I'm not religious in any way (the book is quite spiritual), I really fell in love with the ethos behind this book , when I found it when on holiday in the States last year: as Lorna says, "Each story has a knitting project that relates to that friendship". Though there are a few projects in the book which don't appeal to my personal taste, the story behind these miniature booties really touched me.

Though I can't put it as well as her, when Lorna designed these booties she had recently started looking after bunnies with a friend, with the aim of using their fur to spin and knit with. Thus the angora became these little booties for three new Mums when Lorna had her first daughter, along with two others who became friends. One of the other Mums took to the spinning and dyeing of Lorna's angora so much that she eventually set up a knitting and spinning business with Lorna. Apparently their daughters are still friends today, ever since they met in their little angora booties as newborns.

I didn't use pure angora, but Sirdar Snuggly instead as I was struggling to find bulky weight angora. However, they're still extremely soft, snuggly and sufficiently fuzzy to have that "aaww" factor!