FO Friday: Pup Tent

I’ve had a WIP come and go so quickly that I haven’t had a chance to blog about it! Now that’s an achievement.

From the front

 

One of my friends requested a floppy hat for the Holidays. Of course, then she refused to go through the list of patterns that I picked out on ravelry, which made life just that much easier for me. Eventually, I settled on the free Pup Tent pattern. I’m not completely crazy about how the stitch pattern looks, but it works. And it’s not like I’ll be the one wearing it!

Close up of the stitch pattern

I used about 80% of a skein of Valley Yarns Northampton (100% Wool), a crunchy, authentic, wooly worsted yarn. Yumm. After my friend requested a “cool teal,” she picked this skein out of my stash. It’s not exactly soft, and I’m not sure I would describe it as having any drape, but the finished hat is sure slouching pretty well!

From the side- slouch!

I did add an entire extra repeat of the stitch pattern to get that extra slouch. The hat looks funky laying flat, but I think it looks great on! Plus, she has a lot more hair than me, so this should fit nicely on her. I hope!

For more FO Friday posts, check out Tami’s.

Oh, and by the way- my newest design, the Daniela Cowl, is finally up for purchase on the Knit Picks web site here. Knit Picks gives 100% of the profits to designers, plus they offer yarn support, which makes them a pretty awesome company in my book!

Fantastic News!

Sorry for being a day late, guys, but I have fantastic news to make up for it. I have finished the socks! Well, I actually finished the socks yesterday afternoon and didn’t feel at all like blogging more about them, so this is what you get. Pictures…

2 completed socks. as in absolutely finished...

Pictures of finished socks…

heels

and pictures of parts of finished socks.

What I ended up doing is winding my yarn around a book, counting the wraps, and then dividing that in two to make sure I used all of my yarn. I might have squeezed one more round out of the yarn on one sock, but I’m sure my roommate won’t notice.

can you see it?

Unfortunately, this created a break in the pooling/tye-dye look (as I’m describing it for the intended recipient) on one of the socks. At this point, I really don’t care. I’m just glad they are finished!

it's a little more obvious closer up...

As I’m sure you can tell, these socks couldn’t have been finished soon enough. Notice how the ribbing is only about an inch? Yeah, I could only bring myself to do 10 rows. And those rows took EFFORT. Still, these are my plain-jane socks made out of Knit Picks Stroll Blue-Violet Multi (with some solid green stroll for toes, heels, and ribbing at the top) as a gift for my roommate. She better appreciate them.

Tune in soon for a design project. My prediction will is that, although it will be interesting and keep my attention, the yarn will give me no problems. It will come out exactly as I want it, and I will love to wear it (don’t give me that look). Swatches coming in soon!

Finished Object: another hat

I present to you, my wonderful readers, the finished object pictures of my newest hat! It is the perfect slightly in between warm and cold weather hat- I wore it all day yesterday.

So pretty!

You’ll note that I ripped out my decreases last time and added another pattern repeat. It ended up perfectly- it hits the top of my ears now and I had MAYBE two or three yards left of yarn. All in all, that sounds like a happy ending to me. Here’s a link to my ravelry pattern page.

Seriously. No yarn left...

I really enjoyed working on this pattern. Although the pdf is actually handwritten and then scanned in, it isn’t cluttered, or seemingly continuing on and on like some I’ve worked with. It’s just one page with the basic instructions and a chart. Some of the chart symbols are kind of incongruous (should the left-leaning decrease just be the opposite of a right-leaning?) and I don’t remember ever seeing a gauge (even though she referrers to it in the instructions- I guess you just need to divide the st count and total size yourself). Still, it’s a lot better than some free patterns I’ve come across, and I would highly recommend it (just with 1 extra repeat both ways, which was what I did).

What were they thinking?

I also wanted to tell you about something that happened just while I was trying to finish these pictures up. It was a football game weekend, so, by now, I thought I was pretty prepared for the madness. Trust me, I was not. This group brought their little trailer (which was painted with school-themed green and gold stripes) which had, in the back, a flat screen TV, speakers, and a satellite dish. They set up two tent/canopy things and filled them with buffet tables of food. And, my favorite part, about half of them never even went in to the game- they just chilled outside the whole time! Admittedly, it seemed like it was someone’s 50th birthday party, but still. Some people!

Finished Object: Danielle’s Scarf

I know it’s been a couple of weeks, but I wanted to give you the final update on my sister’s Hanukah Scarf. For those of you just tuning in, I made this using a gorgeous skein of Manos Silk Blend bought at the wonderful Knitting Sisters in Williamsburg. Eventually I settled on a small feather and fan pattern on size 10 US needles. It made a lovely wavy pattern, and the colors (blues and greens and purples) reminded me of the beach, which I thought was perfect. My sister is currently in graduate school to be a Physicians’ Assistant in the mountains, so a little reminder of her beach-hometown couldn’t hurt.

Close up on the stitch pattern...

I finished the project a couple of days before my long weekend/fall break and managed to get it all pinned out and blocked then with minimal drama. While I was home it was pretty gloomy out, so my shots aren’t that good (forgive me!), but I think this scarf came out pretty good in the end.

Another close up

This yarn was pretty spectacular, too. Usually single plies drive me insane with their splitty-ness, but I think this manos just blinded me with the pretty. Also, the openwork lace feel of the scarf lends itself to the kind of single ply, thick-and-thin yarn that manos specializes in. I am VERY tempted to invest in another skein for myself…except I have about twenty scarves already. Crap.

In all of its finished glory!

Lolita Part 2

And here she is- Lolita! I finished her while I was home for fall break during a netflix marathon, and then took her out in the backyard for a photo shoot. Unfortunately, it was a little overcast, so the photos aren’t incredible, but I think you’ll get the drift.

Pretttttttty

I especially love my idea of putting the hat on a flower pot.

In the end I did four repeats of the lace chart before the decreases. The pattern only calls for three (although it suggests four if you have the yarn), but after four it barely comes to the tops of my ears. I have no idea how short the hat would be with only three repeats. If I had more than 50g of the yarn I would probably have done a fifth repeat. Admittedly, I haven’t blocked mine yet- I’m afraid opening up the lace will take away from the zig-zag look that the decreases make. Maybe blocking with make it grow a lot…and maybe not.

Zigging and zagging, like a boss

Additionally, I had a little bit of trouble with the decrease chart. Usually I’m really good with visualizing a chart in my head. Especially after a couple of repeats, I can just see what the knitting was and where it should go- do you know what I mean? The decrease chart took about half of the repeats and turned them into decreases- on some rows…I think. Obviously, I still don’t have a handle on it ;). Of course, it didn’t help that my computer won’t connect to the printer at home (God forbid I think ahead and print off a chart at school), so I had to have the chart in a separate browser window overlaid on top of my netflix window. If you’ve every tried this, I’m sure you can attest that it isn’t the best method… If I ever knit the pattern again I would probably re-write the decrease rounds, just to make them a little more intuitive. Still, it was a nice pattern, and it makes a darn cute hat!

And, because this is yet another football weekend, I thought I would treat you to a picture of the going-ons outside my window. Yes, that is a trailer with a flatscreen TV, speakers, satellite dish, and green and gold racing stripes. Yes, they do have two canopies set up with buffets of food. Yes, I do think it is overkill.

Finished Object: Trilo!

This was another project I squished in during my sick-watching-TV-and-knitting-mania.

Hat! Notice the flower-pot model. Very classy.

I will admit, when I first saw this in knitty I was wondering what they were thinking. It really looked kind of stupid- something you would make that one child you know that wants to be a paleontologist. And then I saw it somewhere else- I can’t even remember where- and started thinking about it. Most of my knit hats are either made for much colder weather than I almost ever get, and the others are the kind of lacy hat you pull on when its in the 50’s and you just DON’T WANT TO BE COLD. It would be nice to have something in between-something that wouldn’t overheat my head every time I walked out the door, but also wouldn’t let ALL of the cold air in. Plus, it is cute. The little fossils grow on you, especially when you are in an environment that is distinctly nerdy and minus almost any contact with children. Here’s the ravelry page with lots of happy-looking people modeling their hats, and here’s my ravelry project page.

Closer...closer...closer...

So, last Fri. night I Cast On with my size 8 options (already put together!) and did the ribbing. The rest of the pattern was pretty much blitzed on a Hulu binge: NBC’s Thurs. night comedies- the Office, Parks and Rec, Community (why does no one watch that show- it is honestly hilarious!), then Grey’s, and I finally finished during Tron: Legacy on Netflix (not as bad as I thought it would be).

Maybe he's a pirate trilobite...I should get him an eyepatch. Arrr!

Except for the fact that I apparently forgot to bobble twice (and they aren’t next to each other…strange) I am quite enamored of this hat. Sure, I’ll never wear it to anything that could be construed as a nice occasion, but it will be perfectly fine for walking around campus.