Gradient Hat

I used some of the hand-dyed gradient yarn to make a hat.

Ombre (mine ravelled here),

knit in Ella Rae Classic Solids (hand-dyed)

I've had this hat pattern in my favorites for a long time. (Check out the pattern photos here.) I love the way this hat turned out, but you wouldn't think it was the same pattern. Changing the colors so they're a gradient makes dramatically different fabric than choosing lots of contrasting colors.

I imagine I'll knit another at some point, esp. since it's a good way to use up scraps. The only problem, and it's a big one, is that it's too small for me. I'll go up a needle size and perhaps even add more stitches the next time. I'm thinking about giving this one to my 7-year-old niece.

Stripes All the Time

I'm not sure why everything I've worked on lately is striped, but it has been. I feel fine about that.

Gummy Bear Socks (mine raveled here), 

knit in Knitpicks Felici in the Gummy Bear colorway

Diagonal Ribs (mine raveled here), 

knit in Knitpicks Felici, Fanciful colorway

Turn a Square Hat (mine raveled here), 

knit in leftover Noro Silk Garden in colorway 252 

and Knitpicks Swish Worsted in the Cobblestone Heather colorway

 
And my current project?

Zigzagular Socks (mine raveled here), 

knit in ONline Supersocke 100 in colorway 1317

Stripe on.

2 x 2, 2.0

Much thought was put into the knitting projects I'd take on vacation, even though I knew, I knew, that I knit much less on vacation than at home. At home, there's a television, and knitting while watching TV is the best way to watch. On vacation, I read. I mean, I do lots of things, but I never watch TV and I read a lot.

This trip had a lot of time in the car though, and so I knit.*

Andrew's original ribbed hat is pretty pilly. I shouldn't have been surprised; Knitpick's Chroma yarn is like that. This is the lightest-weight hat I've made Andrew, and he wears it a ton. I decided that I wanted to make him another one, and then I could absolve myself from feeling guilty about my beloved wearing a pilly hat. If he chooses to wear the purple one, that's fine. I know I've made him a second hat out of really nice yarn, and he can choose whichever one he wants.**

The hat spent some time with a mango daiquiri on a cruise ship. The hat approved.

2x2 Ribbed for His Pleasure (mine ravelled here),

knit in Miss Babs Tarte in the Biker Chick colorway

This pattern has a really great patterned decrease on it. I apologize for the fuzzy photo, but them's the breaks. (Actually, go look at these pictures from the actual pattern page if you want to see the decreases, which you do.)

Knitting a ribbed hat out of fingering weight yarn is a labor of love. A boring, somewhat tedious, hand cramping labor of love. If there's anybody in the world worthy of such projects, it's Andrew. I mean, really, look at him. Adorable.

*And read old Choose Your Own Adventure books out loud. This is an excellent way to kill time in the car. "Will you go to the dock or flee the city in the stranger's jet?"

**I recognize how crazy that is. Sometimes it's easier to give in to the crazy and move on than denying it.

Salunga Beret

My mother-in-law requested a red hat to wear at Christmas. I wanted to use fingering weight yarn so it could be worn indoors if she wanted. I spent some time wandering around Ravelry until I found a pattern I liked, and pulled a barely-used skein I had in the stash.

The knitting went smoothly, but I had problems with the bind off. I used a different set of instructions for the tubular bind off than I've used before, and it ended up way too tight. I couldn't get it to easily frog, and I was in a bit of a temper after working at it awhile. I ended up with this:

That hat messed with the wrong girl. 

The next day, I did a bind off using these instructions, and everything went just fine.

Perhaps I am easily amused, but I love seeing the difference in lace before and after blocking. This hat called for blocking over a dinner plate, and it added the helpful instruction to weave a piece of waste yard between the ribbing and the main body of the hat. Once it was on the plate, I pulled on the waste yarn to cinch it a bit, which meant that it dried without the ribbing being all stretched out.

It's cute on my head, but it's more stunning in its blocking form.

I think I'll recommend Karen occasionally carry it around on a plate and show it off that way. I'm sure she'll see the reason in the request.

Salunga Beret (mine ravelled here),

knit in Knitpicks Stroll Tonal, Gypsy colorway

Mad Dash to Stash

At the end of my post about the Zig Zags, I put a call out to anyone wanting a hat. My sister said her two boys would like one. We discussed, and I started on a blue dinosaur hat for my 4-year-old nephew.

It was way too big, and instead became another hat for my friend with the big head. (The bigger the head, the more room for the brain, right? Right.)

Ravelled here

Then I tried again on the dinosaur hat and got it right:

Ravelled here

My 8-year-old nephew decided that dinosaurs might be a bit too babyish for a world-weary gent like himself, but color was good. Got it:

Ravelled here

When I thought the first hat might be big, but not SO big, I sent an e-mail out to see if anyone wanted it. My other sister thought my 16-year-old nephew would like another hat. Okay:

Ravelled here

At this point, I was fairly sure I was done with hats for awhile. I'd move on to a nice, juicy sweater.

Except.

Except we were taking my mom's dog back to her house after dog-sitting for a week. Then we were headed to the airport to pick up Andrew's family from vacation. That was a lot of time in the car. It didn't lend itself to trying to swatch and figure out a sweater.

Do you know what it did lend itself toward?  Yep.

Baa-ble Hat (mine ravelled here),

knit in Cascade Yarns Pacific (cream), Lang Yarns Silk Dream (blue), 

Ella Rae Classic Superwash (navy--looks black enough for me), 

and Stitch Nation by Debbie Stoller Full o' Sheep (green)

This one's for me! I wanted to make myself this hat as soon as I saw it.

I feel like this post should go down in infamy. EVERY ONE of these hats was knit with yarn I already had in my stash. That never happens. I have more yarn than any one human being has a reasonable right to own, yet I always end up buying yarn for new projects.* I'm fairly sure I've used up all my stash karma and will find that I am 20 yards short for anything else I try to knit from the stash, but that's to be expected. I'm just going to enjoy the moment.

And maybe cast on a pair of socks.

*Actually, now that I think about it, socks are an exception. I have enough sock yarn in the stash to---let's not think about it. Let's just agree that I have a lot of sock yarn.

Falling Stars Hat

I've owned the Falling Stars kit from Knitpicks for.... a long time. It sits on the shelf and pleads with me whenever I walk into the yarn guest room.

Recently I knit a laceweight sweater as a test knit. I decided if I could knit a LACEWEIGHT SWEATER and then put it in the mail for someone else to enjoy, I surely could knit myself a fingering weight sweater that I'd get to keep.

I decided not to knit the hat that they suggest you knit as a swatch to get comfortable with the colorwork. Then I decided I was a) too lazy to knit a proper colorwork swatch that would then get frogged, and b) not stupid enough to start a very frightening sweater without doing a little bit of prep.

So I knit the hat.

The colorwork is beautiful.

Despite that, I have been looking at it for a month, and I still don't know how I feel about it. I'm not sure I like the purls. I'm not convinced the result is worth the hassle of four thousand yarn colors tangling around one another. I'm not sure I want to try intarsia bobbins even though I own them. (I know. It makes no sense to me either.) I'm afraid the sweater won't fit. I'm worried the neck is too high, and the wool will be scratchy on my delicate self. I am filled with trepidation and can't seem to move past it.

Plus, there will be a steek. Terrifying.

So, I put the hat where I see it all the time and the rest of the kit back in the yarn guest room. It's only been a few years. Maybe I'm just not ready yet.

Zig Zags

I made myself a Zig Zag Chevron Hat. A friend tried it on and then requested one for herself. I borrowed her winter coat, took a trip to Nomad Yarns and bought some Ella Rae superwash.

This is a seriously cute hat and a lot of fun to knit.

Zig Zag Chevon hat (mine ravelled here),

knit in Ella Rae Classic Superwash, colors 11 and 28

Here's a close-up of the hat, because I can:

Can you hear it whispering, "Maaaaaake meeeeee."? I thought so.

I had yarn left, so I looked for some fingerless gloves to go with it and found the perfect pattern.

ZigZag Fingerless Gloves (mine ravelled here)

Do you see how there's one pink stripe that's bigger than all the others? Totally a mistake. But I mirrored it on the other glove, and now I call it a design feature. 

Rachel was happy and looks adorable!

Footnote: Hats are lovely to knit. I knit so many socks and fingerless gloves and mittens, and you'll notice that all of those come in pairs. Hats? Just one. Let me know if you need a hat.

Rainbows all around!

Holly, mom to the adorable kid, and I have been friends since the third grade. (Second grade was rough for us. I was super jealous of her.) She lives in Germany and is in Indiana for a visit, so we pretended yesterday was her birthday even though it's not for another six weeks.

She's asked for a hat:

Ann Budd's Basic Hat Pattern with picot edge, 

using polka dot chart from Hilary Smith Callis' Dots Cowl

(mine ravelled here)

a cowl:

roughly based on "My Favourite Things" Infinity scarf

(mine ravelled here)

and Totoro mittens:

Norwegian Totoro Mittens (mine ravelled here)

 All were knit in Cascade 220 Superwash in 854 Navy and Knit Picks Chroma Worsted in Carnival.

I don't know Totoro, so those didn't strike a cord with me, but I love the hat and cowl A LOT. I'd wear them myself in a heartbeat.

Happy birthday, Holly!

Dinosaur Hat

A friend asked me to knit her son a dinosaur hat to match his mittens... which I apparently never blogged. The fact that her kid is adorable is a bonus.

Dinosaur hat, knit in Kelley Green Vanna's Choice 

I used Ann Budd's Basic Hat pattern for 18 months through 4 years. The yarn pretends to be worsted, but the gauge is closer to a bulky. I had to frog and reknit because it was much too big the first time around. (That's what I get for not swatching.)

For the dinosaur spikes, I used this pattern and sewed them to the top of the completed hat. It was cute when I finished it, but it's much, much cuter on Luke's head!

Welldigger Blues

I knit a lot of things that come in pairs. It's not unusual for me to get burned out on knitting two of everything, and that's when hats come in so handy.

Welldigger hat (mine raveled here),

knit in Mineville Wool Project worsted in Moutainside

The last time we made a trek to Simply Socks, they had worsted weight skeins from the Mineville Wool Project. I asked Andrew to pick a color to become a hat.

I decided this hat would look better with a more invisible cast on than my usual long-tail, so I watched a Eunny Jang video a few million times and did a tubular cast on.

I saved this in black and white because the waste yarn is bright orange--

as in my-eyes-are-bleeding-orange. You're welcome.

You cast on half the stitches you need and knit a few stockinette rows in waste yarn, then knit 4 rows in the real yarn, starting with a wrong-side row. On the fifth row, you knit one, then pick up the first purl bump from the first row of the main color and purl it, knit another, pick up another purl bump, etc. until you've alternated between knitting the stitches on the needle and purling the stitches you picked up from the first row. Continue for a couple rows of the pattern, and then you can take out the waste yarn. Eunny explains it much better here (although the site itself is clearly written by a nonknitter). The resulting cast on is still stretchy, which makes no sense to me, and nigh-invisible. It's the superhero of cast ons.

The Welldigger hat uses a slipped-stitch pattern. The result is a very squishy, thick fabric. I think this hat will be worn on the coldest days. Andrew, naturally, looks adorable in it, even when he's sticking out his tongue.

He's so cute I made him a pair of socks, too, even though he picked a Zauberball color with so much navy I spent most of the knitting time praying for a color change.

Blues for Andrew (ravelled here),

knit in Schoppel-Woole Zauberball #2134

I did my usual pattern for Andrew socks--1x1 ribbed cuff, 3x1 broken rib leg and top of foot. I started with 68 stitches on the leg and decreased after the gusset down to 64. I decreased the toes down to 20 stitches before kitchnering.

I didn't have time last night to pick yarn for my next project, so I did something completely out of character and just brought a book to read at lunch. I think the next project should be my mittens (See? Another pair.), and that's going to take some planning.

Knit on, my friends. Winter is coming.

Ribbed Hat and an Update

I've made Andrew a few hats, with varying degrees of success. Last year, he was wearing a storebought hat. It was a nice storebought hat, but I've begun to find storebought winter accessories slightly offensive. He told me that the storebought one was lighter weight, and he needed that when the weather wasn't extremely cold.

Fair enough. I could make that. So I made him the Brain Wave hat. It's a great hat, but I realized that it's not really lightweight. Sure, it's lighter than a worsted weight hat, but it's still stranded knitting. Even in fingering weight yarn, stranded knitting is dense.

I have remedied the situation, making a hat that is one thickness of fingering weight yarn. Lo, the Ribbed for His Pleasure Hat.

2x2 Ribbed for His Pleasure (mine raveled here),

knit in Knitpicks Chroma Fingering, Misty Morn colorway

This is not challenging in the sense of technique. It is challenging in the sense of patience. There are 160 stitches in a round, and it's entirely in 2x2 rib on size 2.25 mm/US size 1 needles. I started it on dpns, but switched to a circular and am very glad I did. I had to buy the right size circular, but it was worth the money. Forty stitches on a single dpn is just a few too many. They kept trying to jump off the needle.

I persevered. Snug. Lightweight. Covers the ears.

Andrew's adorable. Who wouldn't knit a jillion stitches for this guy?

Update: Anyone remember my Year of the Heifer? It didn't work. I've decided that's okay. A bummer, but okay.

Another Benefit of Knitting

Knitting does a lot of good things. It keeps the brain active. It develops fine motor skills. It supports a slew of small businesses. It keeps me from killing people in a waiting room. It allows me to show people how much I value them in a concrete, unique way. It provides patterns for the cat to lie on while I'm trying to knit in the evening.

It also keeps me humble.

I'm knitting the requested Packers hat. No problem. I'm doing four-row stripes, and I'm knitting the first row in every stripe so my purl bumps don't show. I'm slipping the correct stitch to make a jogless stripe.

I'm rocking this hat, in other words.

This afternoon at lunch, I smugly get ready to decrease.

Round 1 done.

Round 2 - Huh. This doesn't line up the way I'd expect. Still, it's probably right.

Oh. I've run out of stitches but haven't yet run out of pattern instructions.
I'll just tink (unknit) this row.

No, I probably don't need to tink the whole round. I'll just adjust on the next round.

Except I can't figure out how to do the next round since the first two don't line up. 
No problem. I'll tink the second decrease round.

Huh. I still can't figure out why this doesn't line up.

I'll tink the first round.

No, that's silly. Surely I don't need to tink the entire round. 

I'll reknit those stitches I took out.

Um, I still can't figure out how to fudge round 2.

This went on for longer than I care to admit. Of course, I ended up tinking both decrease rounds completely. When I started round 1 again, I realized that I had been doing something entirely different than what was written. What I was thinking, I don't know, but there was no way I was ever going to be able to fudge those.

After a half an hour, it still pretty much looks like this:

Cambridge Watchcap (mine ravelled here),

knit in Berocco Vintage, 5152 and 5121

Thanks, knitting. I probably was getting a little overinflated.

A Clump of Hats

I was working on the gray items. Really, I was.

Then I realized that I was meeting a friend for coffee after work on Friday, and I can't read charts or count while drinking coffee and chatting. So, I started a hat.

Ann Budd's Basic Hat Pattern (mine ravelled here),

knit in Blue Moon Fiber Arts' Gaea, Jabberwocky colorway

My coworkers and I sponsor a couple families for Hanukah each year, and one of the adult women requested a warm, knit hat. I decided to use the yarn left from the herringbone hat disaster. When I reknit Andrew's hat, I didn't use the yarn I had used originally. I used the other half of the skein. The yarn I had frogged from the hat was slightly felted. It worked fine reknitting it into a plain hat though. This yarn is so busy that it needs a very plain stitch pattern, so I knit it following Ann Budd's hat instructions.*

Because I am skilled in the art of denial, I pretended this wouldn't grow when I washed it. I'm still not sure why I did that, since I have painful memories of this exact yarn growing. Maybe I thought it wouldn't grow because it had already grown in the wash.

The hat's too big.

Pretty colors, but too big.

I'm planning to take it to a friend this weekend and see if it fits him. He has a big head. I choose to remain hopeful.

Because I am a Glass Half Full kind of person, I've decided this is for the best. The woman for whom I was knitting lives in a nursing home. I cannot depend on the person who does her laundry to handwash a hat. It probably would have gotten felted. Then she would have been sad.

So, I went to Michael's and shopped the acrylic. I made this on Sunday.

Ann Budd's Basic Hat Pattern (mine ravelled here), 

knit in Red Heart Boutique Unforgettable, Echo colorway

I know this yarn is Red Heart. I, too, try to avoid Red Heart whenever possible. However, the colors are pretty and the yarn is soft. This is no Super Saver, and the color shifts are interesting.

In this midst of those two hats, I saw my neighbor. She is pregnant. Very pregnant. She said she's doing a lot of walking, including up and down her staircase, in hopes of encouraging the baby to make her appearance. I kept thinking about how astounding it is that this woman is making another person. If she's making a new human, the least I can do is make that human a hat.

I picked white because their baby will be dark-skinned, and I think white will look beautiful against the brown.

Otis Baby Hat (mine ravelled here),

knit in Bernat Softee Baby in white

The pattern has an 8-row cable, which you repeat two and a half times before doing the decreases. I changed this to a 5-row cable as the result of misreading the pattern a careful design choice.

I think I'm done making hats now. Back to gray!

*Ann Budd's The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns is indeed handy.

Spirals, Spit Splicing, and Success

Once I started knitting Andrew's hat, I had a very hard time stopping.

So, basically, I didn't. 

Brain Wave (mine ravelled here),

knit in Crystal Palace Yarns' Mini Mochi in colorway 103

The combination of knitting with two balls at once and multiple colors in each ball makes this hat look crazy hard. It was not. The ribbing was slow because I don't purl well with my left hand. (I do it combination style, and that means I have to purl through the back loop and blah blah blah.) Once I got to the stockinette part, it became lots faster.

I did cut the yarn and spit splice a couple of times because I didn't like how the colors were progressing on their own. I'm glad I did. There are a couple of places where the colors get a little muddy, but there would have been big swaths of muddiness had I not forced the colors to do what I wanted.

Most importantly, it fits! It covers Andrew's ears and is tight, two things that are Imperative Hat Qualities in Andrew's book.

I meant to do a very lightweight hat. Although I did knit it with lightweight yarn, it is stranded. That means it's two thicknesses of yarn instead of one. He'll definitely get a lot of wear out of it, but it's possible I'll end up knitting another hat someday that's a single thickness of lightweight yarn.

That's okay. I have a lot of knitting years left. It's a relief to still have no problem finding projects to queue.

Success!

Important news first:

Dexter is much better. He had to wear the dreaded cone Tuesday overnight and Wednesday during the day so he wouldn't tear at the bandage on his paw. It was heartbreaking. He's obviously still uncomfortable, but he jumped up on our bed yesterday, so he can't be in too much pain. The vet said that it would be a month or so before we knew if his nail was going to grow back, but I don't think it matters much. He'll be able to walk perfectly well without it, and he lives a pampered life. I'm so glad he's better.

I redid Andrew's hat, and I had enough yarn that I didn't need to use the felted stuff that I used for the first attempt. He was thrilled with the fit.

Now I'm afraid to wash it. What if it grows?

I would hate to disappoint someone so adorable.

Herringbone Rib Aviator Hat (mine ravelled here),

knit in Blue Moon Fiber Arts' Gaea, Jabberwocky colorway

The tree immediately behind Andrew is the one that fell over. Yes, we have more than one Christmas tree. Our holiday cheer cannot be contained in one tree.



Quick Things

I'm taking the next couple of days off, and I thought I'd give you an update:

• The tree is back up. The stand arrived Friday, and we redecorated it that night. I think I'm happier with the lights now than I was on our first try. At least, that's what I'm telling myself.

• Albert Pujols was fixed with superglue and Andrew's mad skills. There were a few ornaments that weren't fixable, but most were. 

• Nocturne loves hanging out on tree skirts. This is a problem when it is time to go to bed and she won't come out. My response has been to wrap packages and strategically stack them so she has to lie within reach. Clearly, I am a genius smarter than a cat.

• Last night Dexter tore a nail. We took him to the vet this morning. He is going to be fine, but it makes me very, very sad to see him bandaged up looking pathetic. I love that dog so, so much. Please send good energy his way.

I would take his pain in a heartbeat. I can rationalize an injury. It may hurt, but I know that it will heal and it won't hurt forever. I haven't figured out how to communicate this with a dog. I'm not sure how parents survive.

• I should not be allowed to buy holiday wrapping paper for years. Really. The amount of gift wrap, boxes, bows, and tissue paper I own is embarrassing.

• Yet I can never find a bow the color I want. How is this possible? Where are all the plain red bows?

• I made Andrew a hat. He wanted it a smidge tighter. I handwashed it in hot, and it grew. We tried to felt it slightly in the washer, and it came out wider and shorter. I was able to frog the yarn, and I will reknit with needles two sizes smaller. Andrew feels very badly about this, but I keep reminding him that it's just knitting. I like knitting. It's fine.

• I finished a pair of socks for him.

Zittron Trekking Hand Art in Trinidad 511 colorway (ravelled here)

They look like this, but... more finished. Andrew likes them. They're in broken rib--k2, p2 on one round and knit all stitches on the next. I did that mostly because the thought of knitting another ribbed sock made me want to poke my eyeballs out with my supersharp knitting needles. If Andrew still likes them once they're washed, I will have successfully figured out how to do fingering and sport weight socks for him. This is a relief to me.

• Year of the Heifer is off to a good start. I earned $10 last week and have worked out 2 days this week.

• I appreciate no one pointing out that my Year of the Heifer is actually about 13 months. That would be annoying, so thank you for not doing it.

That's it for me! I hope everyone is having a nice Hanukah and/or nice prep. for Christmas/Solstice/Insert Celebration of Your Choice!