Here is their Skull Beanie pattern knit for one of my step-daughters.

Pattern link

I also knit a neck cowl for my other step-daughter.

Pattern link

I made some other things but I can’t show them yet because (*sigh) I haven’t mailed them out yet.

Thoughts on PolarKnit? Those Polar Fleece stickers are a little hard to remove. It leaves little balls of fleece everywhere – especially if you like to knit with a fleece blanket on your lap. I thought I knit with even tension but some of the ribbing is crooked. I wish they offered more colors. It knits up well-defined cables. Everyone LOVES the fabric it creates – it is soft, spongy and warm. It’s a unique choice of yarn when you want to do up some quick projects.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas! Someone in our family received a cute Christmas puppy.

Everyone gave the puppy a warm welcome.

Cutie!

Yarn Pirate Feb Club shipment “I want candy”

I think I have joined a total of 3 sock clubs this year: Socks That Rock of course (been a member since the beginning), made it into the Loopy Ewe Club which starts this spring, and the Yarn Pirate sock club.

What’s different from the Pirate club is we get yarn – and lots of great accessories like pink circs. But no pattern. The rest is up to us. There is a Yarn Pirate group on Ravelry that makes it all very interesting. We can share what we make with the yarn every month.

Spiral Eyelet

My first take with this yarn was the Spiral Eyelet sock. On size 2.75 at 48-ish stitches, the striping is wide. I really liked the stripes, the eyelets not so much. I wanted a pattern to smear the stripes, mix it up a little. I wanted to do something new to me.

Swirl Socks

So I tinked and started over. And started over. And over. Ended up with a toe up at 60 stitches on 2.25 needles. Stripes are still there, but the change in gauge has certainly affected them. I wish I had those wide stripes back, but frankly they would not fit an adult foot at the gauge I had before.

The pattern is Swirl Socks with a little bit of Wendy’s generic toe up thrown in.

Noro Socks

Another recent knit includes the new Noro sock yarn done in a basic cuff down sock at 56st with a short row heel. I am just at the heel on the second sock. I have adjusted the yarn so both socks are the same, and it looks like I will have a lot left over. So a tip for you – on size 2.25 I think it is – you can go more than 6″ on the top of the sock and have more yarn. I would bet you could do 8″, more if you did not care about matching.

Stella’s Hat

I kinneared myself while driving to catch my new hat in action. It’s Stella’s Hat in malabrigo. Quick knit! I did it while watching the Grammy’s!

I do! This is the Banana Republic Knock off hat that was posted to craftster. It was a quick and easy knit.

I had to break out my button box to find a button for it.

I have a couple special ones. On the left are some glass buttons I received in a swap. On the right are some bakelite buttons I bought at an estate sale.

These buttons were in the same esate sale. The back says “Made in Czechoslovakia.”

And this bakelite bling baby. I think I need to make more hats

Not too many.

Dashing.

Reasonably Hip with the awesome bathroom shot.

Maine Mitts (yeah you’ve seen them before).

Hat for Beaner (Briar Rose pattern).

Working on a pair of Dashing for …someone .. for Christmas. I am not too experienced with cables yet and may be pulling these just a little too tight. We’ll see how the finished mitt looks, then judge for frogging and starting over.

I finished a pair of Maine Morning Mitts for …someone else… but am going to redo one of them. I guess my tape measure was working properly when I completed the first one and then stopped working when I was working on the second. The distance between cuff and thumb hole is off. Oops. Easily fixed. I am happy that the colored stripes worked out to match – I worked hard on that using just one skein.

The yarn for both is Patons SWS, a wool/soy blend. I like its Noro-ish morphing from color to color. The yarn has a nice halo and the colors are great. I picked the pink scheme to complement a hat I knit last month. I do have the tendency to poke the yarn with my needle instead of cleaning pulling it over as I knit. If this is not a single ply yarn, it is *very* loosely plied. I have it on good authority (hi Melodie!) that this yarn does pill.

The brown mitts are to accompany this hat, in progress. The hat is Reasonably Hip in the recent MagKnits. I still need to purchase some plastic mat to create the brim, so the hat is stalled and brimless until then. The yarn here is the workhorse Cascade 220. It’s one of the Heathers line and is a combination of purple and brown, depending on the light.