Knitwear in Action

Chambered Nautilus Hat and an unblogged shorty scarf, Lola (non-knitter) and Lynne in Madison on the 19th. 

Various

Pattern below:  Norwegian Fisherman's Mittens by Eva Skulbru Eriksen. In the wash right now.  Will either go to the VA holiday party or Occupy Milwaukee if they come out man-size.  If not, we'll see then. Kureyon, 2 balls, with various small windings left over.  I followed the advice of another Raveler and made the thumb both narrower and shorter.  Otherwise, as per the pattern except that I made one cuff-up and the second top-down in order to make sure the fingertips would match. The ruler is about 6 inches (15 cm).

Terri Minkin, America's Next Top Hand Model

Pattern below:  Striped Sprite by Lynn Hershberger (ColorJoy).  I was hot to make this as soon as I saw it in the new issue of KnitCircus.  Just look at the first picture in the pattern link!  So Seussian, so chevronic, so clown, so spritely.  Of course I'm not making it as in the pattern.  I don't want it to actually touch my neck, leastways, not the front of my neck, near the Adam's apple.  Instead, I am going for a slouchy pouchy look.  I have about 5 or six inches done now.  The yellow yarn is creamy smooth merino that I got in our Knitting Camp swap this summer.  Shepherd's wool by Stonehenge Fiber Mill, Michigan, USA.  It matches the Cascade 220 Superwash perfectly by gauge and compensates manages to negate the tiny bit of scratch that the 220 has.  Thank you to whomever brought that to Knitting Camp.  Lynn Hershberger the designer, got back to me right away when I discovered that KnitCircus had made a small error in the pattern.  Check out her other pattern in her Ravelry Store.

Pattern below:  Not Yet.  This is another of my own, probably to be incomplete, designs.  It's inspired by the Chambered Nautilus hat that I recently knit and a pair of socks I saw on Ravelry that I may never find again.  I've been looking.  If anything comes of it, I'll blog about it.

Pattern below:  Yes and no.  This hat started out as this: From Russia, with Love: Cable Balaclava by Nikol Lohr. But then, I don't know, I decided to make it a hat. Maybe it seemed too scratchy for under someone's chin and touching their face.  It really is quite nice and thick and springy.  I used thick Kureyon--looking it up . . . didn't have the label anymore . . . Hmm.  It's not in Ravelry's yarn list.  I like it.  This will be a warm hat.  I think it was called Big Kureyon, but it's not as big as what they are calling Big Kureyon now.

Swirling Gauntlets FO and Twisting Hat WIP

I have had this pattern in my Ravelry queue just about forever.  Swirling Gauntlets by Susanna IC I had some fresh yarn burning a hole in my pocket. It is Sugar Bunny, a new yarn from KnitPicks. They are calling it a limited edition. The color is called Platinum, but in some lights it looks like Putty or Sidewalk. It knits up just fine, though. I like it. I don't ADORE it, but I do like it. It's 80% merino and 20% angora. I can't resist angora.  The gauntlets, including my modifications took one ball with  about 2-3 yards left over.  

Oopsie! I knew I had made the mistake, but I kept redoing that row and still couldn't get it. So I finished the whole repeat in the hope that it would look ok anyway. 


Nope, couldn't live with it.

 Figured it out the next day.

Nice fit. 

Modifications: 1. This is not the thumb called for in the pattern. The original only has an opening and no sheath for your thumb. I added my usual 15 stitch gusset, though it was 16 this time because of the 2x2 rib. If you put it where the original thumb stitches are in the pattern, the design will pull too far toward your thumb. You have to move it about 4 stitches further away from the front/top/back of the hand. On the first I used my latest favorite way to increase stitches--knitting into the stitche below a la what's her name, but it didn't work out because of the rib. I went back to the lifted bar increase on the second mitt. looks better. You are viewing the second mitt.

2. Number of stitches cast on. The pattern called for 52. I cast on 56, or 1 extra ribbing repeat. Because of my mistake with the cabling, I was able to see that 52 were a little tight and that adding some to the palm side would not alter the appearance of the design.

3. Needles. I knit the cuffs on either end with size 3 needles (loose knitter here), but I knit the cable section with a size 4 because of the cable. I don't think it would have hurt to go up still another size there. Quite a bit of opportunity for upsizing.

4. I forgot.

This is another hat for the V.A. holiday party that's coming up next month. THe yarn is Plymouth Boku and it comes from a swap. There's one more skein, but I think I'm going to have to go into it to finish the hat. The pattern is Cables That Don't Cable Hat by K Yarns.