FO: Cozy Oregon Hat (patent stitches)

I finished Ed’s hat today and am really pleased with the way it came out!  Here’s my in-house hat model:

I had a hard time reclaiming the hat from Boy 1 after our front porch photo shoot, so maybe he needs one of his very own.  I have plenty of yarn left – the finished hat weighs in at 64 g.

I spent a fair bit of time yesterday playing around with the decreases.  I learned that the pattern looked best when I only did decreases on the light-colored rounds (which are more knit-y than purl-y), and you have to do some fancy float dropping on the patent stitches to make the line of the light yarn nice and straight.  The decreases go down by 2 stitches each time, also in order to preserve the two-color columns.  And to get a nice rounded crown, I began the decreases every 4th round and then sped them up to every 2nd round, ending with 8 stitches at the top.  It took me a bit of swatching to figure all this out – here’s the evidence: But I think the end result is worth it – check out the bird’s eye view! I love how this turned out.  Did I say that already?  I feel so clever and want to cast on again for another one right away.  But… Bada Bing calls.  I also need to finish up some Christmas tree ornaments.

And before I know it, it will be time to pack away some sock yarn and plan appropriately interesting-yet-simple projects for travel knitting.  Any suggestions?

A Hat Experiment

Back in September, I took a class on Estonian patent stitches with Merike Saarniit.  This technique is really interesting; it creates a reversible, cushy, smooshy, warm fabric with lots of air pockets in it.  I decided to practice by making a hat for my friend Ed, who needs a warm hat to keep his (not very hairy) head warm when he’s in Portland. I don’t have a pattern.  I’m using the Two Color Full Patent Stitch for this hat.  One of the interesting things about patent stitches is that they create a fabric that is very different in gauge than “regular” knitted fabric.  I’m using Malabrigo worsted (a single ply 100% merino yarn that is very, very soft) and I would classify it as a “heavy worsted.”  My needles are size 5, and I only cast on 64 stitches for this large adult hat.  It’s big enough, though. Ed specifically requested a hat with enough length that you could fold up the bottom and double the fabric around the brim.  I think this two-color pattern will look especially nice folded back.I’m not exactly sure how I will create the crown decreases.  I have a practice swatch I started to figure out some details at the beginning – I guess I’ll go back to it and practice some decreases before doing them on the hat.

This technique is really quite captivating.  I recommend it!

Piggle

Piggle is done!

My sister-outlaw suggested this pattern for her older daughter, Allie, who is two-and-a-half and always wears pigtails. The pattern calls for DK weight yarn. I used some sportweight sock yarn from my stash. When asked what her favorite color was, Allie replied “green yellow purple red green.” I figured multicolor was a good choice.

This hat is a lace pattern. Normally I would never use a self-striping yarn with lace, but it sort of works for a child’s hat. The lace makes the hat very stretchy, which is good.  Hat holes are also good if you live in a warm climate like east Texas!  You can really see the lacy holes in this photo.

I used one entire 50 g ball of this yarn plus just a bit of the second ball.

I used Jeny’s Surprisingly Stretchy Bind Off on the pigtail holes – this technique originally appeared in Knitty.com.  Here’s a video by Cat Bordhi that shows exactly how to do it:

If I knit this again, I would knit the waste yarn for the holes in stockinette, not in pattern. It would have been much easier to pick up the stitches that way.

Merry Christmas to Allie from her auntie!  And many thanks to Lily for being such a great hat model!  (It was actually kind of hard to get a photo of the hat holes, because she instinctively turns toward the camera!)Now I have one more hat and the Bada Bing sweater to finish, and that will wrap up my Christmas knitting for 2009.  Bada Bing has issues.  We’ll talk soon.

Flower Power

I just adore this wee hat that will be a Welcome to the World gift for my newest niece, who is expected to arrive around Christmastime.  This pattern is called the Norwegian Sweet Baby Cap (see Ravelry for tons of photos, and the pattern is here).  This pattern appeared after my own boys were babies, or I would have been all over it then.  I love the vintage feel.  Not vintage.  Maybe “classic” is better.

I used some Dream in Color Smooshy sock yarn in color “Spring Tickle” left over from these socks:

I really like Dream in Color Smooshy, especially these early colorways with no pooling.  Spring Tickle is my absolute favorite.  I may need to buy myself another skein to have in reserve!

I was convinced to use a semi-solid yarn and inspired to add a flower by this version. 

The hat’s total weight is only 24 grams, even with the yarn-hungry crochet flower and long (16”) i-cord ties.  I still have 30 grams of Smooshy left, so I could whip out another one!

There are at least a thousand patterns out there for crocheted flowers.  Here’s the video I used to make mine:

I have to say, I really enjoying crocheting this little flower.  But there is something about the way I hold a crochet hook that immediately makes my wrists hurt.  If I were to seriously take up the hook, I would need to address that right away.

I won!

I won some free yarn last week – what fun! 

I’ve been listening to the Knit Picks podcast ever since it began back in April 2007.  I love the interviews with designers, I love hearing about how yarn is created, I love hearing what people do with various techniques, I love the book reviews.  It’s a good podcast, and that’s why I keep listening.  After the 100th episode, Kelley Petkun (host and owner of Knit Picks) introduced some new segments to involve her listeners more.  One of them is a trivia contest.  I enter this occasionally, and this time I won!

The question was: “Who created the SSK decrease and made the technique popular?” (or something to that effect).  The answer is Barbara Walker, which I learned at the Luminary Panel at Sock Summit (the crowd gave Barbara a standing ovation when this fun detail came out).  I sent in the answer and was chosen in the random drawing.  The winner was announced in episode 122.  I got to select 2 free skeins of Stroll Handpaint.  I picked colorways Lullaby (the blue one) and Make Believe:

I haven’t knit with any of the Knit Picks handpaints yet.  Will they sent up to my Felici standard?  Hmmmm.  Felici sets a pretty high bar.  The yarn feels very soft, though.  The hand reminds me of one of my new favorites, Cascade Heritage, so my hopes are high.

We’ll find out.  Expect a full report in a future post.

Thanks, Kelley and Knit Picks!  It’s sooooo much fun to win something, and winning yarn is the BEST!

More ornaments (Kristin Nicholas-style)

Now we’re getting serious.  Kristin Nicholas has posted a free ornament pattern on her blog – there is a crochet version and a knit version:

This reminds me that I still haven’t gotten around to making Kristin’s 2008 ornaments, which I liked very much:

The 2008 version is felted.  Looks like the 2009 version is just knitted (or crocheted) and then glued to cardstock to make it stiffer.

Boy 1 is home sick today with a fever.  I wonder if I could convince him to try some embroidery on an ornament if I knit the base part?

In case YOU get the fever (Christmas ornament fever, that is!), here is more to take off the edge (just previous posts, all collected in one place):

• http://tt820.blogspot.com/2009/11/more-knitted-christmas-ornaments.html
• http://tt820.blogspot.com/2008/12/christmas-ornaments.html
• http://tt820.blogspot.com/2008/12/ornaments-again.html
• http://tt820.blogspot.com/2009/01/deck-balls.html
• http://tt820.blogspot.com/2008/09/only-107-days-until-christmas.html

Ana-ana-anastasia!

Katie’s birthday socks are done – she will be 4 next month. Hmmm, maybe I should have made her 4 socks instead of 3.  Then again, that might be a bad precedent.  Sweet 16 would be quite a commitment!

I started this pair with a single, 50-gram skein of Koigu (pictured in the middle) from my stash, thinking it would be no trouble to get a 4-year-old girl’s pair of socks out of it.  WRONG!  I ran out of yarn at the heel of sock #2.  So… I grabbed other leftover sock yarn and made socks using the same pattern out of other colorways.  The pastel yarn on the left is left over from Lily’s 2nd birthday socks, and the brighter yarn on the right is left over from Signe’s 11th birthday socks.  Both of those were knit back in 2004.

Hopefully Kristina can make a trio of mismatched socks really fun for Katie.  Help a knitter out.  Ham it up!

Also in sock knitting news, I found a new sock knitting project bag this weekend.  This cicada bag was made my Hiroko Rubin in Fairfield, PA.  Isn’t it cute?