Tale of a Giant Hat

DH's San Francisco Giants hat was a really fun and easy knit. I could have gotten it done much faster but for time. Time busy doing other things (when I would rather be knitting) and time spent unknitting almost 1/2 of the design grid. Somehow, I accidentally created an increase and had an extra stitch that I did not notice for quite sometime. This is a good enough reason to count your stitches every couple of rows as counting takes less time than unknitting!

As an aside, my husband was upset with my last post. He said ,"Giants are an NL club so there is no DH in San Francisco." I guess in his mind DH can only mean Designated Hitter...oh darling husband of mine.

I will try to post the grid to my patterns page in a day or two if you have your own SF Giants DH!

Happy knitting!

Nuts to You -- A Squirrelly Lesson in Design

I started playing with this design about a month ago and have blogged about the process here. There are things that I don't like about the hat, but I really learned a lot in the process and this hat will make me a better designer in the long run.

Things that turned out well:

I am really happy with the colors. The graduation in the three light colors from pale yellow to a golden tan works nicely in the corrugated ribbed band.

I love the way the circle of acorns turned out at the top of the hat.

The triangular motif that I pulled out of Alice Starmore's book sets off both the ribbing and circle of acorns. I am so glad that I did them as mirror images to each other.

Things that I could have done better:

Although I do like the squirrels -- the design is way too big for the hat. I am not sure I could make this any smaller for this style. Believe me I cut a lot out of the design. This is something that should go on a sweater.

The ribbing would have been better if it was narrower and done with a smaller needle. In fact the entire hat could have been done with a smaller needle.

Back to the drawing board.

Happy designing.

The Design Process

I have been working on a new pattern in color-work. It has been giving me fits. The design process can be both a joy and a frustration and this one has been no difference! In order that you may share in my discomfort, (or maybe avoid it) below are some of the salient points so far:

I started out thinking that I would do the hat using worsted weight. I did all the necessary math to figure out how many stitches I needed for an adult head and developed my pattern with those numbers in mind. Then somewhere along the way, I changed my mind and wanted to knit the hat using a fingering weight yarn. I didn't recalculate the math until late in the design process and then had to scrap part of what I had wanted to do. Ooops!

As a result of the math change, I went from 126 stitches to 168 stitches around. This made me have to change one of the motifs in my design. Since I couldn't modify the motif, I ended up replacing it. When I replaced it, I used something that looked visually lighter. This forced me to reconsider one of the other motifs in my design and I "lightened" it up as well. That made the entire design better.

I incorporated the ribbing that I learned when doing a color work mitten back when I first started this blog. I have to admit, I never finished those mittens, but like everything else, I learned from them. Learning to knit continental has helped tremendously. It lets me knit one color with each hand and it also helps that my knitting has gotten so much more even.

I tried to place the colors into the pattern before I even got started knitting, but I think that it will work out better if I just pick those as I go.

I settled on Knit Picks Palette. With 150 colors to choose from, this is a great "palette" to choose from. I got 40 different colors by purchasing two different kits on sale and was able to get the yarn at near 50% off.

Knitting Lace -- or starting another project before finishing any of the others.

I know that I shouldn't have done it -- but I did. I started another project before finishing any of the others. This seems to be a trend. Let's not talk about the 12 partial quilts in the basement, or the needlepoint picture, or the crocheted afghans (two that I can remember), or the still unfinished baby overalls with the cute little ladybugs on them, or the tatted lace, or the . . .like I said we won't talk about it!

Today we are going to discuss my new project. This is as far as I have gotten in a week. I have done several more rows than this; however, you don't see them because they were frogged* -- repeatedly. First I knitted 12 rows only to find I did something wrong and had to rip it out. Then I started again, knit 15 rows and looked at the pattern again and realized I was right the first time. After a 2 day break, I started again, this time adding life lines every 4 rows. It is hard to see the life lines in this photo as they are white yarn. Adding the life lines have helped as I am ripping out fewer lines when I make a mistake. I think that I have knitted close to 50 rows altogether, but you only see 20 rows here.

I read somewhere once that lace didn't look very good until you blocked it. That is an understatement. I can't tell what this lace will look like -- and right now it looks like a "dog's breakfast"**.

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As for some of my other UFO projects:

Actually, I DID finish the scarf that I had started some hundred years ago. And I have enough yarn left over to do a hat with the same yarn to "match" it. I found a pattern for a lacy slouch beret -- I just need to get size 7 dpns.

The old afghan I found in a drawer has been stagnating in my knitting bag. I am beginning to think that I have two choices: frog it and use the yarn for something else or try to run a life line past where I lost the pattern and begin again.

I have a partially done baby sweater which I am knitting on my USM knitting machine. I have done one of the sides and the back, but it too has been languishing waiting for piece number three to be completed.

I have done some work on the mittens, errr, mitten, singular as I have not gotten past the first few rows of the pattern. I think that this evening, after dinner is done, it will be me, the mittens, a baseball game and a glass of wine. 

It is very slow going and I keep finding more patterns to save and dream about doing. Not to mention all the time I spend writing this blog.

Happy knitting!

*Frogging is to rip out the previously knitted work. As in Rip it, Rip it.
**Dog's breakfast is British slang for a complete mess.

Hat Finished -- Lessons Learned; and More Yarn coming!

At first glance, this hat looks pretty good. But I know where every error and problem is and I know why some of them happened. So this was a great project if only for the lessons learned.

1. Be careful when substituting yarn. Part of me was just wanting to practice a little knitting and use up some old yarn at the same time. This pattern called for a 100% wool sport weight yarn. I used an acrylic that feels a lot like a cotton. But the other half of me isn't satisfied with the end result because I am not sure I like the feel of the hat, the too crisp look of the hat, and because I ran out of the cream color, I had to go with a solid blue top and did not do the fleas/specks/dots at the top of the hat.

2. Don't get lazy and not read and re-read the pattern. It also helps to print out the photo of the finished product to which to refer while knitting. It would have eliminated some mistakes I made -- like putting the motif designs in the wrong order. Having a picture would have helped me figure out the way the top was constructed, as it was, I didn't count the stitches in the pattern and just assumed that the repetition was 1 for 

each needle as opposed to 1 and 1/2 for each needle. This made the top of the had too elongated and I used way more yarn than I should have used.

3. Put in life lines before starting each new motif. This would have saved me some time in correcting some errors and given me the option of correcting others. For instance, I could have quickly ripped out a couple of rows instead of painstakingly  "un-knitting" each stitch, one at a time. By the time I had realized that I should have put in the boarder motif immediately above the horse, I had finished all but one row of the hearts motif.

4. Be more relaxed when knitting the 2 strand color work. I was hurrying through part of it and got the floats on the back a little tight. This gives some of the hat a bunched up look.

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Since I finished the hat, I ordered some more yarn for that mitten pattern from the front cover of Mostly Mittens. Because of lesson learned number 1 from above, I specifically ordered the exact same yarn used by the author albeit in slightly different colors. I ordered Brown Sheep Naturespun Fingering Yarn in graded shades of green and pink. I am hoping that they look as good as the combination on the picture of the mitten on the cover.

Update on the Running Horse Hat

This is about half way done.

The project that I started last Sunday is coming along nicely. I have not had too much time to work on it outside of my train commute into the city. I wish I was a faster knitter. I am not really getting the hang of the hold-a-yarn-in-each-hand thing. I seem to get a death grip on the yarn and my knitting turns out way too tight.

I do like the colors I picked -- a pale cream and a periwinkle blue. The yarn is just what I had left over on hand from a baby sweater I crocheted some years ago.  It is Lion Brand Micro-spun sport yarn -- an acrylic; it won't be as warm a hat as if I had done it in wool.  I may do another version in a wool or wool blend; however since I have a lot of old left-over yarn and no budget to buy new yarn; this will have to do for now!

Above the row of horses is a row of crowned hearts and then it begins to decrease to the top of the hat. The pattern, as designed, has a yarn pompom on the top, but I am not sure that I will put it on the hat or not.  I was never too fond of froufrou things. Besides the fact that I am somewhat lazy about some things.

Used Books

Why buy a new book, when used ones are just as informational?

As the DH always says, "Mail delivery is the highlight of my day!" It definitely was for me today. I received a used knitting book that I ordered on Amazon last week. Since I am interested in experimenting with two strand color knitting (i.e. Fair Isle), I ordered a book I saw called Mostly Mittens by Charlene Schurch.  To tell you the truth, it was the colors on the mitten featured on the front cover of the book that attracted me! Yummy!  There are 36 beautiful mitten patterns included as well as 2 hat and 2 sock patterns. I know that I will be able to get at least one pair made from this book. If I can find the time! The mitten shown on the back cover is equally as yummy as the front. The hardest thing will be determining which of the patterns I end up choosing.

Then there comes choosing yarn and colors. For my first pair, I will probably stick to the suggested fingering weight 100% wool yarn. It is unlikely that I will find many of the actual colors, given that the book was © 1998. But I know that at least some of the yarns used such as Brown Sheep Company's Nature Spun and Nordic Fiber Arts' Rauma Finnullgarn are still produced.

This is obviously not Fair Isle knitting, but a style of knitting done by the Komi People of Russia. According to the book, the Komi People are a reindeer-herding people who are found in northern Russia just south of the Arctic Circle (where sweater weather never ends). The women knitted the colorful mittens and knee high socks that were worn by both the men and women.  As you can see by the cover pictures, the patterns are geometric, centered around a diagonal shape. Each village had it's own variation of the diagonal pattern and a Komi would know where someone else was from based on the design of their clothing.

All in all, this book is a lovely find and I am defiantly looking forward to digging in.

Speaking of color, there are certain color combinations that I really love: olive green and orange-red (think martini olive); chocolate and hot pink; light lime green and a bright pink; and a clear red wine and grape purple. But please don't limit me to those combinations as I could change my mind tomorrow.