Seasons Hat <– ravelry project page
Pattern: Seasons Hat by Jared Flood
Yarn: A bunch of unknown brown yarns that were gifted to me. 100% alpaca, or majority alpaca blends, mostly sport/dk weight. The darkest brown was heavy lace/light fingering held double.
Needles: I’m not sure… US 4 and 6, I think? (3.5 & 4 mm)
Notes: I pretty much just grabbed the colorwork chart from the seasons hat, and plugged in my own numbers, since the gauge was different. As with last time I knit this pattern, I had to do a bunch of swatches to see what color sequence I wanted. As with last time, I’m very pleased with the final outcome.
I wasn’t sure which color I wanted at the very edge of the brim, so I did a crochet cast-on and knit the body of the hat first, then unraveled the crochet and knit down the brim. Which took forrreeevvvveeerrr. But I knew I wanted a long 1×1 rib, and my cousin Sara was around for some of it, and would work a few rows when I was feeling done with 1×1 ribbing. Knitting down the brim also allowed me to do a sewn tubular bind off, which I *very much* prefer to a tubular cast-on. I couldn’t tell you exactly why, it just feels so much less finicky.
This hat was finished in 2014, and the pictures were taken in the foothills around Ojo Caliente in December. When I look outside right now, there’s something like 35 inches of snow on the ground.
Chunkeanie <– ravelry project page.
Pattern: Chunkeanie
Yarn: Brown Sheep Nature Spun and a bit of leftover Manos del Uruguay
Needles: I’m keeping very poor track of what needles I use recently… That’s not great. Probably US 6 & 8? (4 & 5 mm)
Notes: My friend Craig lost the last hat I made for him, so he was resorting to wearing store bought non wool hats. I think all knitters will understand how that is a PROBLEM. The solution of which is to make him a new hat, of course. I had a bit of yarn left from the last hat I made him, so I paired it with another yarn and made him a striped reversible hat. I’m not sure there’s much more to say on the subject!
Incidentally both of these hats were made for youtubers. So I think maybe we ought to do a little video show and tell?
The seasons hat was made for Rob Scallon, who is a talented musician. His style ranges allll over the place, but here’s a lovely meditative piece that he shot in the same warehouse that we have used as a location in PoPS (Damon’s warehouse, for the curious):
Check out his channel here: Rob Scallon
Craig is Wheezy Waiter on youtube, and his style tends more towards humor, but last September was his 1,000th video, and it’s something a little more special:
Oh, man, I’m such a softie… It makes me misty eyed every time. Craig’s channel is here: Wheezy Water.
i feel like a broken record sometimes, but one of my favorite things to do with a remix is choose an item in my closet that i love, but i’m intimidated by. this dress is that item. i love this style of dress, and i have since i was teensy tiny. My aunt spent some time in central america when i was a babber, and brought us back embroidered dresses like this, as evidenced here:
look at my cute mama! so cute!
and last year in LA, with a few hours between flying in and departing via train for san diego, we dropped off our luggage and walked to nearby olvera street for some delicious mexican food and a little shopping, which resulted in the purchase of this dress.
so this dress is great for summer, totally comfortable, and i got like four compliments on it. i also spilled everything i attempted to consume on it over the course of the day. #classiceliza
olvera st my (real) green dress – hand-me-down belt from gram – target shoes
* ah, and since we’re already on the subject of the barenaked ladies, i’ll just leave this right here:
i hope you aren’t getting bored with this ongoing project of mine, because there’s more yet to come! i’m certainly not sick of it, which i find surprising, considering i’ve been working on it for almost three months! yikes.
when we left off i was working on the sleeves:
i’m not sure why they take longer to knit. i know part of it is correlated to the sighs i got whenever i thought about knitting the sleeves. but finally i finished! i was asked to show the front of the sweater, which i had been avoiding photographing… the back was a lot more cohesive and pretty, with a lot less yarn ends hanging about. you can see the striping between the two dye lots in this picture, and also my ‘steeking zone’ in front.
blocking, in the daylight, on the radiator. trying to speed along the process so i could get to the fun stuff: steeking!
once again, i used eunny jang’s tutorial for a crocheted steek. i looked at some other techniques, but i still felt most comfortable with this technique, for the majority of the reasons eunny lays out: it is the most secure steeking option, especially if you’re working with yarn less ‘grabby’ or less naturally felting than the yarns originally used for fair isle steeking. and it is more of a natural extension of the knitted fabric than the sewn steek.
so then i sewed down all of the crocheted edges and here we are now:
and those edges look so much better than the rest of them!
i decided to knit the button band separately and then graft it on at the end. when i have tried to pick up stitches from the garment, i am never pleased with the result. i always pick up too few or too many, which affect the edges. so i’ve cast on 350 stitches, and i’m hoping to work a shawl collar along the top. just the act of casting on 350 stitches is time consuming! and i was doing that while the oscars were on, so i kept getting sidetracked in the middle and having to re-start the count.
i want to do afterthought buttonholes, but i haven’t found a tutorial for a description that i find satisfactory. i might just wing it as i have a fairly concrete idea of how to go about it. but i think somewhere along the line i heard a mention of elizabeth zimmerman having an afterthought buttonhole technique, only i can’t find it in any of the three EZ books i own. so i might try to dig that up before i just wing it.
this may very well be my best documented knit of all time. what are you guys working on?
a little over two years ago, i finished a big striped sweater for jake (and here’s the link to the ravelry project page). even then i knew that there was too much space between the buttons (which led to gapping), and my button bands were a bit too long, which warped the front of the sweater a bit.
so i grabbed a zipper (a dark brown parka zipper, 28″ long, to be precise) from a fabric store, and as we were settling in for a two day marathon of watching harry potter over new years eve & new years day, i thought it might be a good time to pull off this alteration. it was a good plan, as it turned out. it took me the majority of both days to finish up, which i wasn’t really expecting.
the sequence went as follows:
-i picked out the sewn bind off (a bit of a time suck right there)
-pulled out the original button bands (122 stitches)
-did some maths to cast on a different number (114 stitches. only an 8 stitch difference, which was rather less than i was expecting, but that’s how the maths worked out)
-knit up both button bands
-grafted/kitchenered them on to the body (both a tidy aesthetic, and it allowed me to disperse the stitches quite evenly)
-hand sewed the zipper onto the new button bands
-did a little dance
this is SO MUCH BETTER. it has to be really really cold for jake to wear sweaters, but hey, guess what? it’s been really really cold around here recently. i’m so glad it’s not gapping anymore. it made it look like the sweater was too small, but it actually fits him quite well. and i think he’ll wear it more frequently with the zipper in.
but because this was one of my very earliest sweaters, there are still things i kind of wish i could change… is the neck too big? i’m not sure i’m crazy about the way it looks fully zipped… should i try to pull that out and tighten it up too? and why did i choose to use that bright green for the crocheted steek edge? it’s too flashy when you can see the inside of the collar! i’m thinking about picking up some narrow chocolate brown ribbon to sew over it. or am i getting too detail oriented here? what do you think? and now i’ve got those beautiful buttons, attached to nothing! i’m thinking of knitting down some of my naturals/oatmeals/browns in a colowork cardigan. maybe it would look lovely with those?
FO: turn a square <–ravelry project page
pattern: turn a square
yarn: paton’s classic wool, moss heather, leftover from slow news day, and some manos del uruguay de-stashed from a friend.
needles: US size 6 (4.0mm) and US size 8 (5.0mm)
this was a quick and mindless knit that i cast on for to have some movie theater knitting when we went to go see catching fire (sooooo good! i had low expectations based on the first movies and my love of the books, but i really really loved this movie. are any of you hunger games fans? anyone else see catching fire?). it served the purpose beautifully, used up some partial skeins, and jake got a new hat to boot!
FO: mistake rib hat
pattern: of my own devising
yarn: various. berroco ultra alpaca, and ultra alpaca fine, and some unknown worsted & aran weight orangey-reds.
needles: US size 6 and 8
another scrap busting project! i brought my crate of scrap yarn when we went to the family farm for thanksgiving, and this is what i worked on. i made it up as i went along. i cast on 88 stitches, knit a 1 by 1 rib for as long as i could stand it, because i knew i wanted a brim long enough to fold back. i switched to larger needles and mistake rib (row 1: *k1, p3*, row 2: *k2, p1, k1*). i am totally enamored of my decreases… so tidy! i had to rip back quite a few times, trying to get the color transitions just right. i really like what i ended up with.
and…. the last knit of 2013! finished on the last day of the year!
FO: bough
pattern: bough
yarn: takhi yarns sedona in dark olive, leftover from jake’s big bear beast (which, by the way, i just finished some alterations on, so probably a post about that quite soon!)
needles: US size 4 (3.5mm) and US size 6 (4.0mm)
there’s not as much to say about this one. i picked the pattern for a friend, thought this yarn would suit his style! this is a fun knit, though the twisted rib did seem to drag on and on for much longer than i would’ve thought. i made no changes. i like the single column of alternating knits and purls on either side of the ‘bough’ pattern, it adds a texture that i like and never would have thought of. and you know how i appreciate a tidy decreasing in a hat (see above!).
there is at least one knit that i very nearly finished this year, but it still needs some finishing touches. i anticipate it will be the first knit of the new year!
how was your new years eve? we spent ours very quietly. i just finished listening to the harry potter audiobooks, so now we’re working our way through all of the movies! we paused order of the phoenix at midnight, and cheers the new years in with our glasses of wine. i hope you guys had lovely new years eves.
cheers to the new year!
old navy sheepy sweater – thrifted necklace – j. crew chambray
marshall’s red pants – l.l. bean bean boots
i hope you guys had a really great christmas! or at least a fabulous december 25!
i didn’t get all of my quick knits up in time, but i still have a few leftover, tucked in my metaphorical pocket. so i might toss a few more posts up with those in the near future. but now we are in the final week of the year (eep!) so i have to do a bit of work ahead of me to get all of my FO’s up before the new year, as well as my end of year wrap-ups!
what’s going on with you guys?
jones new york blouse – j. crew belt – anthropologie skirt – topshop green tights – thrifted boots
christmas season is in full swing over here! as usual, i am deeply enamored with our christmas tree! for the first time, we managed to get a tree that is small enough for our short ceilinged apartment. usually our tree will be bursting out of the corner it is allocated to. this time, it fits! there’s even room for some presents!
we watched our usual movies while putting the tree together, but we also listened this swedish christmas music. anna has posted it multiple times before, but this is the first year i’ve bothered to download it or listen to it, and i was totally charmed and won over almost immediately.
i made my first cookie press cookies! spritz! the recipe called for a LOT of flour, and they were very difficult to press. after the first three dozen, my forearms couldn’t handle it anymore and i had to bring in jake’s fresh strength to use up the rest of the dough. sheesh! i might try a recipe with less flour next time in the hopes that it’s friendlier to my forearms. they were delicious, though! i find my sweet tooth is the hardest to resist first thing in the morning. a few cookies are so good with the first cup of coffee.
what are your favorite things about the season? any new discoveries sweetening your life?
does the pattern on this guy look familiar?
a bit like this?
i was test knitting the pattern for the incomparable chronographia!
FO: what the frack-tal? <–ravelry project page
pattern: sierpinski’s beanie
yarn: berroco ultra alpaca light in fennel colorway and king cole merino blend dk
needles: US size 4 (3.5mm)
i love a good colorwork hat! and i’ve always loved blue-green paired with yellow-green. so pleasing! this is a fairly easy knit. the most challenging aspect is the extra long floats that occur on certain rows (like the widest part of the big blue triangles). since i used lower contrast colors, i could wind them periodically on the really long floats. it’s something to think about though, if you opt to use higher contrasting colors, like the original, where that little wind would probably peep through. if you use a nice woolly yarn, especially a fluffier/halo-y yarn, winding will be unnecessary, as they will grab onto each other and felt almost immediately. the other aspect of the long floats that can be challenging is simply keeping the float loose enough to maintain the correct tension. my very first attempts at colorwork, years and years ago, were puckered little messes until i learned to loosen my floats. so it’s good practice, but it might be challenging if you haven’t dealt with longer floats in colorwork before.
this pattern would be good for any math nerds you might know. because who doesn’t love clever and attractive nods to their passion displayed in their clothing? i know i do!
it snowed a couple days ago, when i took these pictures. first snow of the year! it was gone within 48 hours. thank goodness, as i don’t think i’m quite prepared for real snowfall. is it snowing where you are?
and indeed it is. we had our first frost last week, and i am suffering mixed feeling about it. on the one hand, the hoar-tipped greenery is quite pretty, and freezes should be bringing an end to my autumnal allergies, with have been especially active this year. but on the other hand, we started filming all of the external scenes for pops episode 8 so that we wouldn’t have to film outside in the frigid freezing ridiculous cold. only, we’re starting to have to do that anyways. in october. yeesh.
FO: winter is coming <– ravelry project page
pattern: the humble sock goes toe up using the elongated corded rib pattern from sensational knitted socks
yarn: wooly wonka in colorway winterfell (hence the name of the socks)
needles: size 2
mods: well, this is a mash-up pattern. i prefer to knit socks toe-up, two at a time, although i don’t use the two circular needle method, just grab 8-10 of my scads of size 2 double pointed needles and switch back and forth between the two socks. i feel that i have more control knitting toe up, in terms of using yarn up evenly, making the two socks identical, avoiding second sock syndrome (i have two or three single socks hanging around my wip basket). but i miss the gusset from top down socks. short row heels without a gusset always feels like it’s really pulling at the heel. this is the first time i’ve tried the instructions from the humble sock goes toe up. they aren’t the only toe-up with gusset pattern out there, but they were definitely the first ones i ever saw!
these have rekindled my interest in knitting socks, and i’ve already cast on for another pair (the hermione’s everyday socks that i mentioned). however, i’ve worn these twice since finishing them, and it’s reminded me of the reasons i am ultimately less of a sock knitter. while i love the ability to create useful objects, the soles of these are felting after two wears… which feels a little defeating. i guess socks just have a smaller lifetime then other knits, and if i’m going to knit socks, it’s just something i’ll have to get over.
thrifted hat, shoes – handknit swallowtail – j. crew teal cardigan
forever21 dress – target belt – topshop tights
this shawl is one of my more frequently worn knits. it’s really hard for me to know in advance which knits are going to get a lot of wear and which aren’t. logically, i can look back at this and say ‘ah, yes, it is a quiet and flexible neutral that compliments much of my wardrobe’, but i can’t seem to look forward and think that way.
also, you can probably tell, but i looove these shoes.
what’s going on with you today? got any insatiable crushes on new purchases?
ifandany 