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Hatapalooza 2009

I must be out of my mind.  I haven’t whipped out this many hats in years, since I first started knitting.  I got SO tired of them.  And yet, in five days, here we are:

Hat Trio From left to right we have Swell, #14 Blossom Hat, and Koolhaas.

I started off with the Blossom Hat, which can be found in the latest issue of Vogue Knitting (Fall 2009). It’s a Norah Gaughan design, and it is great. The only things I changed about were that I knit it in the round, and the ribbing is 3 inches, not 4.

#14 Blossom Hat

It’s knit from the top down and hides these fun bobbles at the top. I like the structure of it a lot.

Next up is Koolhaas, which according to Ravelry has been knit approximately 3500 times. I can see why: it’s awesome.

Koolhaas

The texture is just fabulous. I should have knitted it a smidge longer, though. As it is, I knit it to exact specs for the ladies version. Probably should have fudged it a bit between the ladies and mens version, ie about half a pattern repeat longer. However, no big deal as it is totally wearable, and I probably can block it to the size I want.

Then, I had a ton of the yarn left over (Dream in Color Classy in Blue Lagoon and Spring Tickle) so I went wild and knit the following in a single day because I AM CRAZY:

Swell

Swell, from Knitty. It’s a good little pattern that I didn’t follow exactly to specs. Left off the purled peace signs on the earflaps (ugh, I hate peace signs), knit the whole thing a bit longer before decreasing, and did two rows of single crochet around the edge to help flatten everything out.

Anyway, I had never used the Classy before, but I had used Smooshy for various things. LOVE IT. LOVE IT MORE THAN SMOOSHY. I got three hats out of 2 skeins, and STILL have more – could probably get another hat out of what’s left, though to be honest, I am sick of the colors at this point! hahaha. Still, I think it will become my go-to hat yarn, because it is THAT AWESOME. As soon as I have more money (as if) I am going to get another skein in a pink or red for something else.

The other thing that is crazy is that there is almost another done hat to behold.  Needs earflap ties and a healthy blocking, then will be done.  It’s a Malabrigo cabled hat.  SORRY MALABRIGO WORSTED, YOU HAVE BEEN SUPPLANTED BY DiC CLASSY IN MY HEART. I know, right? Who woulda thunk.  I still have a bunch of Malabrigo to knit up too. I think I will be knitting a Zimmermann Ganomy hat out of some Mal in that awesome red candle wax color.  I have one going in a purple/green colorway, but I can’t friggin find it – looked everywhere, but it seems to be a casualty of the move. It’ll turn up, I know it will, but MAN, that’s annoying.

I still love Malabrigo sock the most.

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17 Months

Berry Nice Socks

After a healthy 17 months on the needles, I finally finished ye olde Berry Nice Socks.

I used Knitpicks Felici in the Mixed Berries colorway on size US 1 DPNs. For my sizing, it was 80 stitches on US 1 needles with a 3×1 rib over the whole thing. Easy peasy but I guess I was bored by them. At any rate, they are finally done!

I like the yarn a lot, so the fact that these took so long is stupid.

Speaking of Felici, I cranked out a quickie stockinette scarf on the knitting machine on Friday.

Felici Scarf

It’s also out of Felici, and knit at a loose gauge. It’s an experiment that worked out all right, though I’m not in lurve with it or anything. I will have to tighten up the gauge a bit for future experiments.

But all things considered, I made a six foot scarf in a half hour, so whatever.  I blocked a little bit and it curls less.  I’ll probably block it a bit more another time to see if I can kill the curl some more.  Hopefully that will work. I just pinned it this time; I didn’t use the blocking wires.

It’s a good way to use up that self-striping yarn, because despite its flaws, it turned out fine, so more will probably be on the way.

I also finished a scarf I knit the summer of 2004 while I was staying in Leon Springs, TX – house-sitting in BFE, basically.  I’ll post pictures of that another time. I found the scarf when I moved again in January, and I finally wove in the ends and blocked it this weekend, so technically speaking it is a 2009 FO. Heh.

Right now I’m working on some socks and also thinking about a sweater with all this dark grey Wool-Ease I got on sale awhile ago. We’ll see.  I’d knit the front and then machine knit the rest because I am super lazy and product oriented when it comes to sweaters.

I also got a bee in my bonnet about hats, so next time: a finished Norah Gaughan hat from the latest Vogue Knitting, and maybe, if I crack the whip, a Koolhaas, which is a hat I’ve wanted to make since its debut in the 2007 Interweave Knits holiday issue, and finally found the perfect yarn for it – the blue lagoon Dream in Color Classy I got for my birthday.  The Norah hat is also knit with Classy, in Spring Tickle. It’s been a busy week, and I haven’t really been home when there’s been good light, so no pics just yet.

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Ishbel the Second

I made something this week.

Ishbel

Another Ishbel, from the lovely Ysolda Teague pattern.  I knit an orange one in June, and this is its royal purple counterpart.  I used some of the Miss Babs sock yarn I purchased at Stitches this year, and it was wonderful to work with.  This is the colorway Clematis, which is a bit more purple than appears here, though still in the blue-purple category of which I am so fond. The yarn itself was springy with a nice feel, and it blocked out very nicely.

Here you can see the size difference between the two different Ishbels I’ve made:

Ishbel

The orange one is the small version as written in the pattern – small stockinette section, small lace pattern. The purple one is the large stockinette version with the small lace pattern. I’d seen this version on Ravelry quite a bit, and it used up the yarn nicely; there is only a little bit left of the 400 yd skein. Eventually I would like to make a large version as written in the pattern, but that will be later. Another small awaits me in the near future.

This pattern pretty much knits itself, and everyone should download a copy. I must confess I watched the dollar and nabbed the pattern for fairly cheap. So if you care about that sort of thing, buy it when the dollar is up and the pound is down. What, I am a capitalist, watching my bucks.

Speaking of bucks, I am fully committed to not spending money right now, so hopefully I will have saved some up by the end of the year. I don’t have too much going on the rest of the year, save a trip down to LA to visit Sarah.

I am also going to get back on the Wii Fit. There, I said it. Now I have to DO IT.

Ishbel