What's Next?: January 2012

It's been awhile, I know. I had to stop posting for a bit, because everything I was making was a Christmas gift for someone. I realize that it is now a month after Christmas, but honestly, I'm STILL working on Christmas. At this rate, I should finish Christmas 2011 sometime in January 2013.

As I have mentioned before, I have four girlieques. The two towheads who have been the subject of previous blogs, and my nephews two, rapidly growing up daughters.

Wait ... these are wrong.

Here ... this is better.

Improv Hat

I really wanted to make something for the older two for Christmas. After a lot of searching, I settled on slouch hats and skinny scarves. I kind of liked this hat, so I downloaded the pattern, found out favorite colors, picked (bought) yarn, and took off.

Treisur Intrigue Yarn

Their mom, who is absolutely one of the best at helping with the perfect information at Christmas time, let me know that Maddy tends to lean toward blues. A trip to Knit Happenz yielded this find.

Add size 8 and size 9 circular needles and I was ready to try. Now, something I need to work on is this whole adjusting a pattern to allow for different gauges of yarn. The pattern called for a yarn that used size 6 and 7 needles with a smaller gauge. So, without REALLY knowing what I was doing, I just ... picked 60 stitches as the right number to cast on.

I read the section on making sure not to twist the yarn when joining together. I checked to make sure that I had not twisted. I double checked. I triple checked. I knit about an inch and a half and realized... I had twisted. Lesson learned, it can't be fixed. I took it all out and started again.

Then I reached this section.

Round 1: *k8, m1 ; continue from * to end of round (90 stitches)
Round 2: knit
continue in stockinette stitch until hat measures 8.5". Since you are working in
the round, you will just be knitting(no purls)

Pretty straight forward, right? Well, maybe not if you have never read a pattern, but if you have read a few, this is pretty simple. Just knit 8 stitches and then on the 9th, add a stitch. That way you end up with 90 stitches. Except, I started with 60. And oh yeah, I READ IT WRONG!!

I went all the way around and added a stitch at every 6th stitch. (you know ... add a stitch at 9 if you had cast on 80, so add one at 6 if you cast on 60 ... I know, that makes no sense ... but it did to me at the time). Then I knit all the way around.

THEN I completely lost my mind. I got in my head that I was supposed to repeat round 1 and 2 until I got to 8.5". No, it doesn't say that. I have no idea where I got the idea. None. No clue. About the time that I got to 140 stitches on my needles I began to get the idea that something might not be right.

So, if I wasn't following that pattern, and I had this much done, it was time to go find a pattern that I WAS following. I realize that sounds crazy, but I was not about to take all of this out and start all over. Christmas was coming whether I was done or not!