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Sunday, August 30, 2015

Three Hats

In my first post this month, I mentioned I had made another Man Hat for charity but I noticed I had not posted a picture - so here it is.



I decided not to make one of the suggestions for July, instead I searched for a crochet pattern I could make with yarn in my stash. I chose Textured Unisex Hat crocheted on a size 6.00mm hook with Lion Brand's Vanna's Choice. The hat looked really big but fit me so I added a couple of rounds of single crochet on a size 5.00mm hook to make the edge fit better.



The knitted suggestion for August was Turn A Square by Jared Flood. I had knit this pattern before in 2011 and decided to knit it again for charity. It was knitted on size 5.00mm needles with Red Heart Soft from my stash.


Tuesday, August 18, 2015

A Tale of Two Socks

I know I’ve only just posted but as I have a photo, I’m quickly writing about my socks before something shiny appears. These socks have a bit of story behind them as it was a classic case of love the yarn, can’t find a suitable pattern.

The yarn is called Opposites Attract by Barking Dogs Yarn


This is how the dyer describes the colours: Fun pairs of one split skein! The idea behind these pairs is to get a pair of socks whose colorway has reversed itself. One sock will have a large area of a main color with other smaller accent colors. The alternate sock is just reversed as in one of the accent colors used in the first sock will be the main color with smaller accent colors.

This seemed a fun idea so I bought some; way back in 2010. There were fewer colourways then and I chose Liz & Richard for a couple of reasons. The colours duh. Of the choices at the time these two went together well and Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor were a British/American couple just like my spouse and me.



When the yarn arrived I knew there was no way I was going to make a pair of socks with it. Although the skeins were complimentary, I would not want different colour socks. So the yarn sat in my stash. After failing to convince a friend to swap for something of hers, we did some brain storming and decided it would work as a shawl(ette) and in August 2014 we started a mystery shawl pattern.



Both of us gave up pretty quickly although I did knit all the light blue and let it sit on the needles until May 2015 when I decided to use the yarn for a mystery sock pattern. I started off with the dark blue, loved other people’s socks, just not mine.



Now I was determined to use this yarn. The challenge for June 2015 in Sock Knitters Anonymous was Unusual Construction and I found just the pattern for the theme and my yarn - Pole Dance - each sock has both colours. To fit in with the trouble this yarn has been, I did not finish these socks by the end of July – the finish date of the challenge – I finished them in August.



Monday, August 17, 2015

Not As Long As I Thought

It feels like such a long time since I posted on here but I see that it’s only been a month. In that time one post was started and forgotten and 8 items have been finished. Impressive eh? Just not sure how I still have many items on the go!

I finished three hats, a cowl, 2 shawls, a toddler jacket and a pair of socks. I don’t have photos of all of them yet but I can show some off in this post.

I’ll just show these in order of finishing.

Firstly the jacket for a toddler.



The yarn is Cozy Soft Prints by Ella Rae which I bought on last year’s yarn crawl. I purchased two balls to make a toddler’s cardigan which should have been enough except I chose a pattern with a hood. (I should insert here that I took forever to choose a pattern because I wanted to make something different which is ridiculous really because I was just making a cardigan.) My friend had bought the same yarn on the yarn crawl and let me have her left overs. (She had made a hat.) With my two balls and her left overs I had just enough to complete the jacket.



Buttons were in my stash, from frogging this.

Next finished item was a hat for charity. It is another Man Hat. When I was away at the end of May, I took yarn to be able to make two of these. I cast this on when I had finished the first one and finished when I got home. The yarn and needles are the same except I used the Faded Denim colourway.

And then I finished a shawl. I had another skein of TOFUtsies by South West Trading Company that I had been given and as I liked this shawl so much, I decided another shawl would be ideal.



The pattern is Crooked Cathedral, available through Ravelry (of course). I had purchased this pattern in 2013 when it was on sale so I was pleased that I actually got to knit it. (I rarely buy patterns unless I am ready to cast on.)



I used size 4mm needles, I lengthened the first section according to pattern but not the second as I didn’t have enough yarn. I worked a beaded cast off. There was yarn left over but not enough for another row.

I have a poor photo of another shawl I finished. I’m showing it because I love this shawl so much. More information when I have better photos.



And another hat. This time because I wanted to try the pattern. One of my knitting groups meets every other Tuesday evening and I have started to go on a more regular basis. The organizer of this group is Heather of Ewe Ewe Yarns and her friend is Meaghan of The Unapologetic Knitter. Meaghan is originally from Calgary which must explain why she designed this hat. (Isn’t that a great photo of Meaghan BTW.)

I decided to knit this pattern because I have never knit two colour brioche: I certainly don’t need a thick hat. And if I’m going to knit something to try the technique and support a knitting group friend then it certainly makes sense to buy the recommended yarn and support another knitting group friend. I had never used Ewe Ewe Yarns before, so this was a good excuse.

This was a good learning project. I am disappointed with the neatness of some of my decrease stitches. I probably shouldn’t beat myself up about that as it was the first time of working decrease in brioche knitting. On the other hand, I am an experienced knitter and should know better.



And that’s it for photos. I still have to photograph a hat and the socks and get better photos of the shawl. I’ll try not to leave it so long.