{yarn along} Bundle of Trouble

Reading about babies got me in the mood to start a new batch of baby hats. And after a couple of hours of mindless garter stitch, I think I'm about ready to cast on another shawl.

It was Ayelet Waldman's Mommy Track Mysteries that got me started reading cozy mysteries again, so when I saw Bundle of Trouble, the first in the Maternal Instincts mystery series, I grabbed it right away.

Kate Connolly is just going into labor with her first child when her husband receives a call from the police, asking him to identify a decomposing body found in the San Francisco Bay as his estranged brother, George. But the situation is more complicated than just identifying the remains of a homeless relative.  Even though Kate is trying to adjust to life as a brand new mom, she finds herself plunged into a murder investigation.

Finding a killer while suffering from Mommy Brain? It makes for a fun read. Diana Orgain does a great job of combining the usual new mommy worries with an intriguing murder mystery. As the days of her maternity leave fly quickly by, Kate realizes that she doesn't want to leave her newborn and go back to the office and she starts to wonder if she can launch a new career as a private investigator. The "to do" list that she revises daily shows her changing priorities.

I'll admit, I've got very strong opinions when it comes to parenting and how it should be done. Diana Orgain treads lightly and doesn't take sides in the mommy wars. I did want to offer Kate a few tips -- if she got a baby sling and learned how to use it safely, she could dump that clunky baby carrier and get around a whole lot easier.  But maybe I shouldn't encourage her to follow suspects with a baby in her arms...




I don't have babies of my own to knit for anymore, but I love to browse through books of baby knits. What to Knit When You're Expecting by Nikki Van De Car is one of the cutest ones I've found in a long time.

The projects are divided into three sections -- more complicated knits for the first trimester, gender specific knits for the second trimester, and easy knits for the last three months. I never found out the gender of my babies - I just knit what I thought would be cute and gave away the "wrong" ones.  And I was knitting things in the last trimester that I'd never tackled before, but maybe that's a bed rest thing.

The book is full of really cute designs and they all look do-able. All of the patterns are written for wool or cotton, but I've never knit a project with the yarn the patterns calls for.

For more fun knitting projects to drool over, check out On the Needles at Patchwork Times and Work in Progress Wednesdays at Tami's Amis.