Hat Done

The girl does not seem to be a hat person. It came out just as I'd hoped though, apart from the fact she won't keep it on her head for more than 1.5 seconds. There's certainly enough yarn left for matching mittens, so with just two more World Series games to watch (cross fingers) I can get those done.

Big and Fast and Beautiful

I have be-hatted my son for the winter, but no hat for Dizzle yet. I decided I wanted a bulky, colorful yarn for her hat. But alas, none in my stash. Whats a girl to do? Spin her own. I grabbed "Lantern Festival", the offering from Hello Yarn's fiber club for the month of July. Here it is all pre-drafted:

And here it is all spun up. There are 2 batches, the first 2.5oz I did watching the Sox win game 7 against Cleveland, and the last 2.5oz was done during naptime yesterday afternoon.


Attention mothers who are spinners: Not only to babies (still) like watching you pre-draft colorful roving (please note: mobile babies REALLY love it, to the tune of grabbing and helping a little too enthusiastically), you can also spin up a whole bunch of yarn during naptime if you are content with big fat singles. Who knew I could go from roving to knitting in 24 hours. I may have a new favorite spinning method. Talk about instant gratification.

Specs: 5oz Corriedale, "Lantern Festival", really not too bulky, about worsted weight (?) I got 450 yards out of 5oz, which seems like a lot. It is so hard to make my hands spin fat yarn. I split the top lengthwise into quarters, and predrafted it as you see above. Slapped on my biggest whorl, increased the take-up so I had to keep my hands off of it as I spun, and even then I positively could not prevent myself from drafting it down further. I was shooting for pretty fat and while this is fat for me, its not quite as fat as I like. Regardless, its still perfect for a hat and is knitting up very prettily.

State of the Spinning

I haven't posted about any of the spinning I've done in the last several months. Carole did WIP `em out Wednesday this week, and I'm sad to say my knitting WIPs don't look very different from the last time I posted about any of them - the hazard of spending short amounts of knitting time on large projects, I suppose. So I'll show you my spinning instead.

First up - Flames Superwash from Rachel, who now has an Etsy shop so you can get her good stuff too. This is about 4 (maybe 5? can't remember) superwash wool, I got about 500yds of dk/light worsted out of it. It is very soft and fluffy, and Rachel's dye job was so good that this blaze red/orange didn't bleed a single drop of dye when I washed it - amazing. This may become a little sweater/coat for Dizzle .

Next Up Rambo! My first true woolen, long-draw spun yarn. Fiber is from WoolyWonka's exotic fiber club, and the prep was exquisite. Still working on this, as the last spin night my shoulder started acting up after sitting and long-drawing for 3 hours.

Lastly, I finally busted out the Grafton Fibers batt I bought back at my first SPA attendance. I brought it to the Topsfield Fair spinning bee this week, and won a 3rd Prize ribbon for my little navaho-plied sample. (for a better recap of that night with photos, and to congratulate the Blue-Ribbon winner, go see Cheryl's recent post).


PumpkinBoy, upon seeing my ribbon and the yarn, petted the little hank for a minute and asked "Did you win for it being the littlest?"

PumpkinFamily is off for a week of fall-style R&R on Martha's Vineyard as of tomorrow, so I'll be disconnected for that time. Have a great week, and GO RED SOX!!!

Spidey Chart

Thanks for all the great comments on the hat - it makes me happy that so many of you love it and want the chart. That said, you can get it (in gif format) here from my Flickr page, or if you want it in excel format email me and I can forward it to you ADDED 8/2009 - I no longer have the excel chart (computer blowup). You will also need to print out Adrian's Generic Norwegian Hat Chart for the detailed knitting instructions, details on sizes and yarn weights. All I did was fill in the squares on that. Someone else, who must also be the mother of another big Spiderman fan, already beat me to adding it to Ravelry, so it can be added to your queue if you like.

We Call Him Spidey

Well, its hat-making season again. Not to be confused with hat-wearing season, which is much longer and starts a bit later in the fall.

I had planned to haul out the handspun and have PumpkinBoy choose the makings, but then I got to thinking he might like something more than a plain old ribbed brim handspun hat (and I also got to thinking I'd like to knit something more fun than that, truth be told). He's moderately into pirates, so I pulled up Adrian's "We Call them Pirates" and asked him what he thought. His eyes lit up and he said "Can you make it a Spiderman hat?" Here is the result. I pretty much just took Adrian's chart and recharted a Spidey and web design on it. It was really fun coming up with the chart, and the knitting was pretty simple, apart from the fact that I seem to have lost the ability to follow a chart. PumpkinBoy is pleased.




Project Specs:
Pattern: Spidey Hat, chart my own, chart template/pattern from Adrian
Yarn: Dale Falk for black and red, Elann Pure Alpaca for Blue, lined with Lionbrand Microspun in black to keep the itchies away
Needles: #3 for hat, #1 for lining
Notes: Love it! See above.