Yarn Good--Hat Not So Much

Here, finally, is a picture of the red hat—the challenging, demanding, red cashmere blend hat. It looks good on the bear! I would let him wear it, but I think I will take it to Minnesota with me and see if GD#1 likes it. It will look good with her long black hair. I had so much trouble with the sizing on this hat that it has turned me off on tams. After I frogged it and resized with some mean decreases on the top, it turned out to be more of a slouch, but not as pretty as my Le Slouch hat. Not a pattern I will use again! My gauge was right-on, but the finished sizing was way off. It didn’t, however, turn me off on Lion Brand Cashmere Blend. I liked it so much I immediately made another hat with it to get the bad taste out of my mouth. I love this yarn! We’ll see how it washes and wears….

The second hat with Cashmere Blend is pink, cute and holey. I did some k2tog’s and yo’s to give it a little personality, and I like the way it turned out. The pattern will be on the new website (which will launch soon) along with some of my other patterns, all now downloadable as a .pdf file—a neat addition by The Supreme Web Master. If anyone wants it now, just email me at knittykat@sbcglobal.net, and I will send it to you.

Hats are great rainy day knitting projects. Yesterday we had storms with lightning and wind. The second time the computer went down I gave up and turned it off. If you can’t work, what else is there to do but knit? I had just picked up Happy Feet at Costco, so the knitting was in time to the beat. It doesn’t get any better!

Getting There

Never mind....I have just removed a link to my new blog until the person designing the site gets a chance to make it receive comments properly. Thanks Ina for letting me know about the problem.

I have finished the long, brown skinny scarf. Just plain garter stitch in brown Moda dea Cache’ with a sparkly copper thread running through. It is pretty and warm (Minnesota here I come). Also finished the first STR Bunny Foo Foo sock (photos next post), and the red cashmere blend tam as seen here.

O-hhhhh the tam—it did give me such a fight! I followed the “Cashmere Tam” pattern that is going around, and can be found here. Where it says to knit 32 more rows after the rolled band and ten increase rows—big mistake! It was so big that it fell down around my ears and hung down my neck in back. I’m sure there is a rap singer around who would think it is quite fashionable (yeah, I know that’s not the way he/she would say it). For me, I looked like an orphan in a hand-me-down hat. So I frogged, and frogged, and frogged some more. After an hour of rather tightly decreasing the top, it was more to my liking. If I hadn’t been bored to tears—real tears—with the whole project I would have done a more polished job of finishing the top. But I was just glad to close it up and throw it in a drawer. It’s going to take a cool down period before I’m ready to wear it without wanting to rip it apart or dispose of it permanently. Some projects are like that….

I Have My Priorities Straight

Have you ever seen anything like the bendiness in that needle? This is why I love Comfort Zone needles. They bend beyond reason. The second photo shows the same needle resting and straight after its ferocious struggle with my hands while knitting Bunny Foo Foo. It is ready for another fierce row. I have been using this set of size #2s for two years and they still keep ticking along. CZs never leave marks on my fingers, or make my hands ache. Love ‘em!

I am in the throes of a knitting quandary, what to do, what to do. I have only so much time to knit between tax clients, before we leave for GD#1’s college graduation in Minnesota on April 28th. I finished one scarf, but I need the other scarf too, and I need the hat, and I need the socks. I think I can get everything finished, but it is going to require knitting like the wind after April 15th.

I believe DH thinks I’ve been slacking off on the accounting and taxes, but I don’t call it slacking off when I knit during phone calls or after one client leaves and before calling another in. I call it efficient use of time. Also, knitting while doing computer research, and knitting during morning planning meetings is a resourceful use of time, and not the least unprofessional. Geesh, why can’t men get on board with these things? It’s as simple as this, knitting makes me happy and relaxed, and taxes don’t. I wonder if it would seem more acceptable if I knitted an illusion scarf with a picture of a 1040 on it. I’ll have to work on that…right after April 15th.

Hiccupped And Died

That’s what my computer did. It was very sick and its demise was sad. The CD drive stopped working, then the USB ports, then it whimpered through processes until it gave one last hiccup—and drifted away. There is a new, shiny computer in its place, which is also sad in a way. The other had served me well for six years—a long time in computer years!

After the better part of three days reloading all the software in the computer I then discovered Vista…. The word Vista, makes one think of mountains, streams and valleys filled with flowers. Microsoft Vista—not so much. I would like to know who devised this new attempt to finish off what’s left of my mind. I am taking it personally. Microsoft has moved everything, changed everything, made all those things we are used to doing and seeing, disappear at one fell swoop, MacDuff! I can’t even figure out how to insert my Jack Russell Terrier wallpaper, and that’s serious!

Knitting was on the back burner during the struggles with machines. I did, however, finish Rhodonite STR, and cast on for Bunny Foo Foo. I wore Rhodonite today and DH said they are the prettiest pair of socks I have knitted. Just wait until he sees the Bunny. Bunny Foo Foo has become my deliverance in the last few days. What would we do if we didn’t have knitting to relieve stress? Whenever the battle with machine became unbearable, I would pick up Bunny and knit a few rows. This will become known as the war that Bunny won. The knitting is good, and life is good.

Bunny Is In The House

Little Bunny Foo Foo has arrived. I think it is my absolute favorite STR, and that’s saying a lot! Just look at the photo—at the bottom the little belly is fuzzy white, the back is a soft brown, and at the top the ears are pink, to form a perfect bunny yarn. I am finishing the toe of the second Rhodonite sock this evening, and will cast on for Bunny. While I am knitting, I will be thinking of Kathy who is going on a STR fieldtrip this weekend. Can you imagine—a Blue Moon Fibers hunting trip. Kathy, I hope you “bag” a lot of yarn. What fun!

I have also reached another multiple project bottleneck. I currently find myself in the middle of the Oro y Vino scarf, the Flair sweater in emerald Swish, and another Le Slouch hat in red cashmere blend. I really don’t like to hop from one project to another, so why do I do it? I think having yarn around makes me want to knit all of it at once. Also, I just got a new electronic row counter that counts rows on three projects. Well, there you are—I have to have three projects going to see if it works. Right?

I am really pushing to get all three projects and the Bunny socks done before we leave on our trip the end of April. I can do it.

I Did It Again

I said I was finished with hats for a while. But there was this hot pink Louisa Harding cashmere blend yarn sitting on the shelf and I wondered, hmmm, what can I do with that? Immediately my blue hat with the lace edge popped into my mind and I struggled with the idea of knitting yet another hat for all of 30 seconds. I guess it is okay since it is such a quick knit, and I only have three or four projects on the back burner right now, so it seemed like a quick way to destash.

I was supposed to be knitting the Something Red sweater in blue for a KAL, but the sweater is not going to survive I’m afraid. Have you ever started a project that was fraught with problems from the start? A couple of minor mistakes in a project do not put me off, but when every other row contains some deficiency, I have to rethink the whole thing. Something Red in blue was extremely flawed, and I decided that it was better to find another use for the beautiful blue wool. While I was still in the failure funk, knitting a lacy little pink hat was just what the knitting doctor ordered.

I have put the blue wool aside and picked up jade green Swish from Knit Picks to knit Wendy Bernard’s Flair sweater. I feel revived and sure that this project will be a success—and all it took was another hat.

Also nearing completion—STR in Rhodonite, and a skinny scarf in Oro y Vino Malabrigo. And the knitting goes on....