This is mostly a knitting blog. Sometimes pictures of things I've made, sometimes not. I'm a guy who knits, I usually attend a men's stitch 'n' bitch on Monday nights, and I prefer natural fibres to artificial ones. I have a love-hate relationship with bamboo yarns: I love what they can do and how they look, I hate how they are made. I've been knitting since about 2003, though I really didn't get into it until 2005, while convelescing with a broken leg. I must have discovered something good, 'cause I'm still knitting years later.

Tuesday, June 30, 2015

Water, Water, Everywhere. . .

I finished a project the other night, the fourth iteration of the Spiral Staircase shawl. This one in Mad Color Fiber Arts sport weight, called Wicked. The colourway is Rock Lobster. I love the way it looks in real life, with bits and pieces of lighter and darker red. I want to knit with this yarn again. Luckily I bought several skeins of her stuff at the New Hampshire Sheep &Wool Festival!


After I finished that, I sat on my bed with the contents of two bins emptied over the comforter. I looked, I prodded, I felt and sniffed and held various colours up to the light. Nothing. Nada. Zilch. I looked at the pile of yarn in front of me and cried, "Oh no! I. Have. Nothing. To. Knit!" No, seriously, I have nothing to knit! All that yarn and nothing to knit! Yarn, yarn everywhere, and not a string to knit!

OK, seriously, I have plenty of things I can knit. I just don't feel like knitting them right now. Sweaters? It's too hot. Another Spiral Stair? Um, can I do something different before I do the fifth iteration of that? The awesome hats for a couple I know whose marriage is now recognised in their home state? Yeah, but the pattern is a finicky Fair Isle, and I want to be wide awake when I attempt it. Besides, in order to do it I have to do some (cue scary music) math! Math is hard!

Later. . . .

OK, I've cast on the hats I'm making for my newly recognised married friends. Doing the math is a lot easier than I thought it would be. I mean, 96 stitches divided by 24 is. . . 4! Easier than I thought, especially when I used my trusty phone calculator. Phew. Besides, I can do the ribbing and the foundation before I start the persnickety Fair Isle stuff. Well, it's not really Fair Isle, and more like stranded knitting because it isn't a traditional Fair Isle pattern of circles and squares. It's bears! I'm making the Polar Bear Hat, by Susan J. Flanders, and which is distributed by Three Kittens Designs, which can be found on Ravelry. I'm making Grizzly Bears instead of Polar Bears, because I have brown yarn, rather than white. Besides, my friends are more like Grizzlies at this point than Polar Bears. I'm using MadTosh Vintage, in colours Celadon and Betty Draper's Blues for the hats, and Whiskey Barrel for the bears. I'll post some pictures when I have more than some ribbing (because, you know, 2x2 ribbing is SOOOO interesting to look at!).

Much later. . . .

These are the colours I'm using for the hats.
Betty Draper's Blues, Whiskey Barrel, and Celadon.

These are the hats so far. I'm making the ribbing with US 6 needles, the stockinette part on US 7 needles, and the stranded knitting part with US 8 needles. Which is why I can have both hats going at the same time (never mind that I have multiple sets of all three sizes).
At the top of the celadon hat, you can see the beginnings of the bears' feet. There will be four bears walking around this hat. As with all stranded knitting, it's always a question if the finished product will fit an adult head. You see, these two guys who are getting these hats are on-line friends, whom I've never met in meat-space. But I love an adventure, and adventures in knitting are the best kind!

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