FO Friday: In Which It's Actually Sunday

I honestly meant to write this post on Friday, but all of a sudden it was 10pm and I really didn't feel like getting off the couch.

Besides, this thing took FOREVER to dry. As far as I know it's *still* not dry, I haven't looked at it recently. Apparently "real wool" as I called it when Jonas commented that it was taking forever to dry (don't ask me, I hadn't been caffeinated yet) takes about eight years to dry out once thoroughly saturated. More likely it's that I had two layers of cabled worsted weight knitting laying flat on top of itself on a rubberised surface, but we'll pretend that it's just because the rusticness of handspun heritage sheep means it retains water better.

As you may have guessed by now, I have finished my Irish Moss Toque. I actually finished it Wednesday night after writing the WIP post (and then finishing up some casings on a project bag). The top decreases look way better this time, and although it doesn't fold over on the bottom like the pattern calls for, I think it fits me remarkably well. I think it not folding over will ultimately be okay as it's super heavy pure wool knit on needles that are a few sizes down than I would usually use in order to maintain a denser fabric. I also don't think the fact that there are only two repeats instead of three makes it look weird, but I can't see all the sides of my head at the same time so I may not be the best judge.

In just a few minutes when I put these pictures I'm including below into my Ravelry page this will be finished, finished, finished. It's a super quick knit, and like I said on Wednesday the cable pattern is, to me at least, really intuitive. I do have some of the yarn the pattern actually calls for, so I may give this a go and knit it in that yarn to see how it does with a thinner yarn and possibly all the pattern repeats. As it stands now I only used 1 skein of just under 100 grams (116 yds/106 metres) for this one, which means I have another skein to make myself some other fantabulous winter accessories. I highly recommend this yarn if you can get your hands on it as it's lovely to knit and washes up lovely and soft and plump, but retains its rusticness. I think this is the perfect yarn for some rustic but stylish winter outerwear.

Pattern: Irish Moss Toque by Alexandra Charlotte Defoe

Yarn: Gale Woods Farm 100% Finn Wool

WIP Wednesday: Socks and Hats

Well... part of a sock and one hat. Still, I know it's a bit weird to see me with more than one WIP. It happens on occasion.

The sock is yarn that I dyed inspired by one of my favourite football teams (Real Madrid) and their amazing pink/black/white kits they've been wearing all season. They were (until today...) competing for a second straight European championship, and I dyed the yarn while watching them beat their in-town rivals and cast on the sock during their match last Wednesday then knit some more rows on it today. They lost, but I'll still wear my socks proudly.

The colourway is "Real Fans Wear Pink" and the base is my superwash sock base, which is 75% Superwash wool and 25% nylon in a fingering weight.

The sock pattern is from Socks a la Carte by Jonelle Raffino and Katherine Cade. It's a pretty cool book that gives you a bunch of different cuff options, a bunch of different leg options, and a bunch of different foot/toe/heel options that you can combine together to make your own unique socks and hopefully will inspire you to design your own. There's even a cool flip book part in the back that lets you see how the cuff/leg/foot combo you choose will look together.

Since Real means "Royal" and the Real Madrid logo has a crown in it, I went with the top that looks a bit like a crown. Since they're one of the most high profile teams in the world, I chose the cuff called "eyes on you" since I thought it was only appropriate. I still haven't decided on a foot/toe/heel, but I'll let you know when I get there.

Second...return of the stochastic hat. I first posted about this two weeks ago and then subsequently finished the hat. However! It was way too small even for my tiny head, so I knew it wouldn't fit a regular-sized adult. I left it alone, figuring I'd finished what I needed to for the challenge, but over the weekend I found myself project-less and having just completed another Turn-A-Square to use up some acrylic I bought for a different project (more on that when I talk FOs), I ripped back and re-started this hat. This time I changed some things.

For one thing, I'd run out of the red yarn when I got to the crown shaping, so all of a sudden there was a hard grey line against the red. It didn't look as bad as I thought it would, but it still wasn't what I wanted. For another I knew I needed to be sure to control the floats. So, what I did was rip back to where I'd joined the ribbing together, then knit 10 rows straight in grey before jumping in to the stochastic pattern at row 11. I've now knit 11-25 in the stochastic pattern and will begin the crown decreases in straight red. Hopefully I have enough. I'm playing yarn chicken right now. I'm hoping to wrap up the crown decreases tonight or tomorrow.

WIP Wednesday: Stochastic Knitting and a Sewing Project

This week's WIPs are a bit different than some week's WIPs in that they're not my typical crafting project.

First, a colourwork hat. Which isn't at all out of the ordinary for me, but the "pattern" is definitely not my typical thing.

A bit about what this is. To start, the pattern is more or less based on the Turn A Square Hat by Jared Flood, which is sort of my go-to standard hat pattern at this point. It's a great unisex hat with an easy construction (except the Channel Island cast on, which I find beyond tedious and almost never do), it's basic and easily modified, and it's free. All wins in my book. The yarn is stuff I pulled out of my stash that I've been "saving" for "making random hats"...which is my way of justifying not getting rid of the yarn. Good thing that's finally paying off. The grey colour is most of a ball of Lion Brand Wool Ease leftover from a Fourth Doctor scarf. The red is Knit Picks Wool of the Andes left over from a sweater I made my mom a few years ago. None of that is odd.

What's odd is the "pattern", which I keep putting in quotes for a reason. The Knerdgirl Knits podcast (you hear about them alot around here!) is doing a cool event this year that's a year-long bad-ass women craft along. Four times (two months each) this year, they're doing a set of challenges to celebrate women in STEM (science, tech, engineering, and math) fields (of which I am one). This round is the Women in Tech/Education KAL, and one of the challenges is to knit something with a stochastic pattern generator that Kris (Geknitics on Ravelry) found. The very complicated explanation that I don't understand behind it can be found here, but suffice to say that this uses all sorts of computer math formulas and generates random patterns of colourwork depending on a variety of things you input. It basically generates them on the fly and you then knit the block of stitches, hit next, knit the next block of stitches, hit next, etc. I should warn you that I hear the site only works in Firefox (which I happen to use), so visit at your own risk or whatever. It's pretty fun to not know exactly what's coming next or what this is going to look like when it's done, actually. That's not normally at all how I roll, but the way the pattern generator works it's making it very easy.

It's going slowly because it's colourwork and I have to sit at my laptop so I can generate the next steps, but it's a worsted weight hat, so it shouldn't take too much longer. Any rate, I need a project to take to geek knitting night at the LYS tomorrow, so I want it to be at a place where I'm knitting straight red and doing crown decreases by then, otherwise I'll have to bring the laptop with me, which I don't want to do.

Second...a sewing project. I'm making the top left dress from this Butterick pattern for my first day of grad school classes.  It doesn't look like much yet, but I'm hoping if I can squeeze out some time this Saturday before I go on a work trip and then maybe the weekend after I get back, I can make real progress on it. It's allegedly an easy project, and I don't think it should be too much more work. I just had to stop because I need to think about lining fabric and buy a zipper.

Anyway, just for funsies, here it is in progress!

 The long piece is the skirt. The contrast pieces go on the midriff. And the bodice pieces are the things you can sort of see on top. Here's hoping I'll have something more tangible to show you soon!

Finished Object: VERY EXCITING FINISHED OBJECTS!!!

I just finished the second in a series (currently there are only 3 designs, but that’s just because I haven’t created the 4th one I have planned) of Game of Thrones/Song of Ice and Fire inspired sigil hats!

They look like this!





I completed the Stark hat on Monday (this is the aforementioned hat that I knit on a US5 instead of a US3…it’s comically large and was almost a bit tragic, but I think it's all going to work out) and yesterday I did the final seaming on the Lannister hat. Next up (the yarn came this morning as I was on my way out the door and I didn’t have time to snuggle it) will be a Targaryen hat and then Night’s Watch. Potentially I will also create a Greyjoy hat and maybe Tully or Martell (probably Martell, given the content of the upcoming season of the show). All the hats are created with a base of Knit Picks Palette and the sigils are done in this AMAZING yarn that Knit Picks stopped making (but I snapped up all of it that I could and still look for the sales on Ravelry) called Imagination Hand Painted. It’s a fingering weight and has the most amazing tonality. It’s this yarn that inspired the sigil projects in the first place. I saw what they referred to as the “Castle Walls” colourway and thought to myself that I needed to find a fantasy theme to use it for. The more I thought about it and the “Treasure” colourway, the more I realised they needed to turn into Game of Thrones somethings. This yarn is BEAUTIFUL and the variegations are coming through wonderfully and I am in absolute love and I hope you all like them, too!

I have hopes that they can turn into things besides hats, but for now I want to make a bunch of hats before the premiere of season 4.

I’ll keep you updated on how things are going, and I’ll get them listed on my commissions page as soon as I’m ready to say these are good to go.

WIP: Exciting New Projects

If you read a few of my posts a few weeks ago while I was on hiatus from the sport weight 4th Doctor scarf, you may have heard me allude to a new exciting project.

Well, it’s done enough that I can share it with you!

Inspired by my recent Frostfangs hat, the AMAZING Knit Picks Imagination Hand Painted Fingering Yarn in all manner of colourways with exciting fantasy names (Castle Walls, Ruby Slippers, Treasure), and my supreme love of all things A Song of Ice And Fire, I have created…..

Game of Thrones House Sigil Hats!

I got the pattern drafting done a few weeks ago for the Stark, Lannister, and Targaryen sigils (I plan on making the set of patterns available for purchase as soon as I’ve knitted up a hat for each of them just to make sure the pattern is right), and I was waiting to finish both the Frostfangs Hat and the 4th Doctor scarf before I got started. The background yarn (MC) is Knit Picks Palette since I had such fun working with it in the Frostfangs hat and since I knew the weights and gauge would match up well. Plus, it’s great for colourwork, and even though these are knit in intarsia and not stranded, I thought the Palette would be the best choice just because of colours and yarn weight matching. Plus, you all should know by now how much I love Knit Picks. I began with the Stark hat (since I always begin with the Starks, and since it’s winter, and since I had a skein of Palette in Ash that was just sitting around). The ribbing takes forever, as it did with the Frostfangs hat, but at least I opted not to do the extra 40 rows of stockinette as a liner on this hat. I may need to line it with fleece or something just to keep them warm enough, though for anyone who doesn’t live in the frigid north like myself, these will probably be okay, as the Palette is a 100% wool yarn and the Imagination is mostly wool with a bit of nylon, just like the Chroma. I will evaluate that later. I learned the hard way that I have to work the piece flat and then seam it, since I hear rumours that there are ways to work intarsia in the round, but I am unable to captivate the mystical energies that allow this to work out. I’m working on size 3 circulars with a CO of 180 stitches. I marked of 61 on each side and have the pattern centered with the remaining 58 stitches. The Imagination yarn (that statement never stops being funny to me) I chose for the Stark sigil is the “Castle Walls” colourway. Unfortunately, Knit Picks is clearing out this yarn and all you can get is the "Treasure" colourway at this time. It’s absolutely beautiful and from the moment I saw it I knew it needed to become the direwolf symbol of House Stark.

Over the weekend, I completed the sigil portion of the hat and I wanted to share the photo with you. I think it turned out well, especially for something I drafted myself, and I hope to make some gloves and possibly scarves (though, scarves in Palette will take me about 40 years, so I’ll either have to find some comparable yarns in worsted or sport/DK weight to work with or just not make scarves). I also plan to make these hats for some of the other houses. It’s my hope that I can have several completed in time for the Game of Thrones season 4 premiere coming up at the end of April, but 5 rows of the sigil (10 rows of the straight stockinette) take me about an hour. I’ve completed the ribbing and 51 rows (up to the decrease) thus far, and I’m 15 hours in. It’s not quite shaking out to be the almost 40 hour investment that the Frostfangs hat was, but my confidence that I’ll be able to just knock out 15 - 20 hats in the next month and a half (especially with a lot of RL business going on) is starting to dwindle.

For now, I leave you with some photos of the sigil. I hope you can get a sense of the gorgeousness of the Imagination yarn (still laughing) from these.




Remember, if you want one, or if you think you want to purchase the pattern at a later date, please check my Etsy store, my commissions page, and my Ravelry page in a few months and you should be able to place an order.

Finished Object: Frostfangs Hat in Knit Picks Chroma (Midwinter)

As my birthday gift to myself, I wrapped up the Frostfangs hat on Monday morning. The entire hat took me ~30 hours to knit total, which is, in my opinion, a rather long time for a hat. However, the Knit Picks Chroma remained a delight to work with and the Palette did it’s job as a phenomenal yarn for stranding (as advertised).

I did cut the pattern a bit short (though not much), as I thought the hat was getting a bit long. Turned out to be just the right length. Also, with the addition of my 40 extra rows of Palette to add an extra layer of warmth, I did *almost* run out of the contrast colour yarn (I made it though). I definitely have enough Chroma left over to make at least one, if not two, if not possibly three hats, so it’s a pretty good deal if you can buy 1 ball of $10 yarn and get 3 hats out of it.

The best part, I think, is that while the pattern wasn’t written with Chroma in mind, it might as well have been. It was the perfect length to go through exactly one cycle of the colour gradation in the Chroma yarn and I think it looks absolutely stunning. A bit like the northern lights.



I took it for a test drive the past few days here in the -10F (-23C) Minnesota windchill, and with the double layer of Palette plus the stranding across the back, it kept me pretty warm (at least in combination with my hood). I’m not sure I’d trust it at much colder temps than that, but there comes a point where pretty much no hat is going to help you out. If you live in less extreme conditions, this is probably a really great hat all winter long. My only gripe with my decision to use Palette as the foldover colour is that because it is 100% wool, it’s very itchy against my forehead. I have hope that with time and a little wool wash (I didn’t block it because I couldn’t wait to just get it on my head and out into the world) it may soften up and my itching will be minimized.

I leave you with a final shot of the hat in action as it accompanied me on my adventures:

Head Over Heels in LOVE with Knit Picks Chroma

WIP: Frostfangs Hat - Knitting Therapy (or, Tiny Yarn is Maddening)

After a bit of a saga involving the second Who scarf (which, again, I was already tired of dealing with) I got a bit of a break on the insane deadline of end of January, and I decided to make proper use of it by doing fun things.

Back in June, I saw a post on Tumblr about a super fantastic pseudo-Song of Ice and Fire inspired hat, the Frostfangs hat, and decided I must have it. I paid the very modest $3 fee to download the pattern…and I haven’t touched it since.


The problem is that the background variegated yarn used in the pattern is a hand-dyed Tri’Coterie Sock MCN in Glacial (gradient from white to dark blue) that I can’t get anymore. For many people this wouldn’t be a problem, but as I don’t make socks, I don’t work with fingering weight yarn, and I don’t work with anything self-striping, I didn’t really know where to go about finding alternatives. I did round up the required Knit Picks Palette yarn that I needed (it’s been sitting in my stash bin since sometime in July), but I didn’t have the main colour I needed for the hat, so I had sort of abandoned it.

Until the Knit Picks sale in November…

While browsing the sale yarns to see if anything caught my fancy (boy howdy, did it), I came across the Knit Picks Chroma fingering yarn in a colourway called Midwinter.



Midwinter! I thought to myself. Why, midwinter seems perfect for a North inspired ASOIF hat! And while you can see that it is not nearly as blue as the yarn used in the original, I do believe that the striping this is producing is going to be an absolute beauty.

So, I ordered it. Two skeins, in fact. Despite the fact that I won’t need more than half a skein for a hat. I figured, this deal is pretty good, and what if I want to put them on Etsy? So I bought two. (I have since bought a similar colourway (Wildwood) at yet another Knit Picks sale…bless those people.) And then it sat. Because I was busy making these 4th Doctor scarves and all that business.

While I was waiting for yarn to arrive as part of my great yarn saga of 2014 (which seems to have ended a bit more poorly than I hoped it would), I needed an interim project. I had cast on and done 2/3 of another Elvhen Triangle scarf, just to have one around since the other one I have belongs to me and I’m offering them for sale, so I should probably have a stash. The Lion Brand Homespun I’m using for them (what the pattern called for) is making me ANGRY though (knitting with that yarn is a wholly frustrating experience) so I might try to find an equivalent yarn that doesn’t make me want to throw it across the room. That’s a tangent though. Regardless, I had 2/3 of one done and I took a break to cast on for the second scarf before I finished it, so I put it on hiatus in the ottoman.

And then I didn’t have the red yarn for the Who scarf.

I knew that I needed to start something else while I was waiting because Minneapolis was embroiled in something called a “Polar Vortex” and I was basically housebound for five days without the yarn I needed. But, instead of doing the responsible thing and going back and finishing the ETS, I did the fun thing and looked at my stash and said, “Frostfangs!” So I pulled out the Chroma and I pulled out the Palette and I pulled out my circular needle kit and I set down to get to work.

…four hours later I had attempted knitting approximately 8 swatches, decided that I hated tiny needles, reinforced my hatred of this circular needle kit where the needles *unscrew* as you are knitting and then the yarn gets snagged on them (which is, I learned, 4000 times bigger of a problem with tiny yarn), went to the store to get proper circular needles because the damned kit needles made me actually have to cut the yarn off of them, finally cast on and knitted like 20 rows (which is an unsatisfying length of hat when you’re using fingering weight yarn!) realized it was moebiused, tried again, worked very hard not to moebius, moebiused anyway, took a break for the night, started over AGAIN the next day, and managed to make it through the 40 rows of stockinette grey for the lining and a bit of the way into the actual pattern (over the course of 12 hours of knitting…TINY YARNS) before my new red yarn arrived and I had to take a break.

But! Despite the setbacks and despite the fact that usually when I think “knit this hat” I’m figuring a one or two evening adventure at most, I couldn’t stop thinking about this project the whole time I was working on the scarf. I just really wanted to finish this thing.

Then, yesterday, when there was a lot of fallout and a bit of frustration, all of which ended in me saying I needed to not knit this scarf for a while, I made the decision to take a break on the scarf until I finish my Frostfangs hat. Three more hours of work yesterday and today, and it’s looking pretty fantastic. I just really can’t wait until I get it done. I’m in LOVE with this chroma yarn (it’s making me want to actually knit socks), and the Palette really is the greatest for stranding and fair isle work. The only problems I’ve got are that it sort of takes FOREVER to make a hat out of fingering weight yarn, I feel like I might run out of Palette (despite the fact that the pattern says I shouldn’t even need a whole skein)—that’s my fault, really. I did add quite a bit of extra at the beginning to the bits where you need to fold under to the inside though. I live in Minnesota. One layer of fingering weight wool/nylon between me and the outside world is a bit of a joke—and the NEAR CONSTANT ENTANGLEMENT of my yarn balls. If anyone has any good methods of working Fair Isle without constantly needing to stop and get your yarn balls out of their tangled up knots, please send them my way.

Best yet, though…this pattern has inspired me to draft some of my own patterns (alluded to previously). Also in the Knit Picks sales I picked up a bunch of different colorways of Imagination Hand Painted, and I can’t wait to start putting some logos on some hats/scarves/gloves. Problem is, I might need to use a yarn that’s NOT Palette as the base, since Palette takes FOREVER to knit up.

Anyway, here’s the WIP as of this morning. Can’t wait to share the finished product with you all!