I haven't really been knitting that long -- a couple of years -- and while my technique has improved immensely my grasp of reality is shaky as ever. Luckily, I think I'm not alone in this -- it appears that a lot of knitters get all pumped up in the summer months about what they'll be knitting as gifts for the holidays, and then wind up knocking out a series of hats and scarves at the last minute if we're determined. Ah, delusions of grandeur! It's not that I'm not productive, I just wind up re-knitting or I get sidetracked ... or both.
So, yes, I'm in scramble mode at the moment. For the past week or so my living room has been strewn with yarn and sundry items for gift-making, not to mention a few WIPs and FOs. I actually had completed a cute little shrug for my sister this past summer, but it wasn't quite right. So I sat scrutinizing it for a bit trying to decide whether I'd re-do it, and if so how, or just knit something else. A hat seemed more likely to see the light of day, at least before Christmas, so I dug out that chunky handspun (posted earlier) and embarked upon a hat, a floppy beret perhaps. Pattern? Nooooo.
I knit up a square in stockinette, and then did a few rows of 1x1 ribbing. I stitched up the seam about halfway, and out of curiosity pulled it over my head to find that it was tight on the noggin. Figuring that there was no way for this to turn into the hat I had originally envisioned I turned the half-hat upside down. Now I had a sort of medieval-looking cap with full ear coverage. So with this inkling of inspiration I frogged the part I had seamed, and put the square on smaller DPNs and continued in the round. After having closed up what I thought was the top of the hat, I tried it on again flipped the top of the hat to the back of my head. Lo and behold, a fancy bonnet!
This is lab work, here, people!
My join had been a bit sloppy, so I needed some kind of finished edge to class things up. I snooped around free patterns online and found a simple knitted flower. Perfect. I twisted up a couple of cords for the ear flaps and I tell you it's divine. I am in love with this bonnet. I hope my sister loves it, too. My roommate thinks it's weird, but he concedes that if he saw a girl wearing it, he'd think it was really cute. I like blurring that line of weird & cute, so, like, um, mission accomplished!
Are you throwing or attending a holiday party this year? Any ideas/tips to share?
I always think it's a great idea to bring take-away food storage (for casual, family-settings only). That way the host/hostess isn't left with loads of dips and cookies and pie clogging the refrigerator. Everyone can take home a little sampler for later. This is also a brilliant idea for the big holiday feast -- one of my uncles shows up every year with a large assortment of disposable food storage containers. It's a wonderful contribution.
Getting off to a questionable start here, though I am no stranger to the once-a-month posting habit. On the bright side, I can never be accused of delivering TMI, right? Maybe, sometimes. Moving on.
I am at a crossroads. I have never intentionally felted a self-knitted object before. OK I've never even accidentally done it, so I'm a bit wary. I just finished a top-down raglan cardigan with poofy half sleeves made of Noro Kureyon. I didn't follow a pattern apart from conforming to the basic one-piece top-down raglan approach. I spent about a month knitting the sweater, the last few days being intense knitting benders. It was heaven. So I got the buttons on this past weekend after washing and blocking, and when I tried it on the cardigan was a bit large. Like I'm about a size 10 and this sweater is a 12 or 14, which is to say it's roomy in the bust area.
Knitters are familiar with Kureyon and it's sometimes subdued, but usually not subtle, striping action. The colorway I bought featured deep red, dark brown, camel, purple, lavender, deep olive and tan. I'm not a striped sweater kind of girl, but I tell you I am in love. So to discover my circus sweater doesn't fit perfectly has me perplexed. I was pretty much resolved to selling the cardigan on Etsy when I went to bed last night. It's super cute, but it takes a special kind of person to appreciate its cuteness I think. Unavoidably I find myself wondering how I might "fix" it. I hate to disturb the seamlessness by cutting up the sides to remove a couple inches; too much brute force for my taste. So I've been mulling over the possibility of felting. Will I lose too much length? Will the fabric be too dense? Do I even want a felted jacket?
My next steps are to present this question to knitting forums I
frequent and to knit up a swatch for test felting. And while I haven't
got a sense of the community here at VOX yet, if you, dear reader, have
any insight into my dilemma, by all means leave a comment. In the
meantime, my cardigan
continues to be a WIP.
