Brighter

The days are getting longer and even the gray days seem less gray. I'm a big fan of February. After all the holiday craziness, people seem to have found their footing again. Things seem "regular." Sometimes there's snow, but here on the east coast, we know that spring is right around the corner. Oh, and it's my birthday month so there are flowers, and treats, and good wishes.

The best part though, is that it's still great knitting weather. You can still whip up a pair of mittens and know that you can wear them right away. But if you are going to knit mittens in February, they should be pretty and hopeful. Kind of like these:

Pattern: All the Water by Kristin Kapur
Yarn: 1 skein of Blue Sky Alpacas Suri Merino in "Sky"
Needles: US size 7 (knit on 2 circulars)

Never one to pass up a good bandwagon, I jumped all over Kirsten Kapur's "All the Water" Mittens as soon as she published the pattern. It's a fun fast pattern and the Blue Sky Alpacas suri merino knits up like spun cloud. My distracted knitting didn't do justice to the pattern--there's a stray cable on one mitt, a too-short thumb on the other--but I love them nonetheless.

Cozy

My dear neighbor and I did a sweater knit-along for the kids.  Here's mine--nothing too fancy, just a warm gray sweater that the kiddo loves.  I love this pattern.  It's mindless and easy but is nicely proportioned for kids.  I've made a wee one out of cotton, but love the way it looks and feels in the Nature Spun.  It softened up so much after a nice warm bath and it was easy to block away the fact that one sleeve was a 1/2" longer than the other. 

Pattern:  Child's Placket Sweater from Last-Minute Knitted Gifts

Yarn: 2 skeins of Nature Spun worsted in Charcoal

Needles: size US7

KAL: 12 in 12

So I stared a little KAL over on Ravelry--we're calling it "12 in 12"-- 12 kid sweaters in 12 months.  Totally doable right?  And imagine, my kids will be so well-clothed by this time next year.  My friends with new babies will be so grateful and think I am a knitting genius... etc...  

A rule for this KAL that applies only to me is that I must knit as many items for my daughter as I do for my son.  The 6yo has very strong opinions about pattern, color, and texture.  The 2yo just wants some more goldfish crackers.   Guess who usually gets more sweaters?

Want to join?  Check it out here.

Making Progress

The hoodie of a thousand tiny cables is coming along nicely. The back is done and I'm about halfway up the front. But even with the slick addis, it's still not something I can do full-time. I still need a mindless stockinette project or an instant gratification hat/mitten project.

I find I work on it during the week--when I take a break at lunchtime, or for an hour or so in the evening. And is is looking yummy. The Rowan All-Season Cotton has just enough stretch and softness to make knitting tiny cables with cotton bearable. And it has has a nice almost-rustic texture that makes me think ahead to evenings by the water in the summer months ahead--a nice visual in the dead of winter.

It's not easy being this green

It was an impulse buy, I'll admit it. I saw Hello Knitty's fantastic version of the February Lady Sweater and decided I had to make the exact same thing. I was sure that as soon as I got the yarn, I would tear into it, cast on immediately, work on it until the wee hours of the morning until it was done. So I googled and ordered up 4 skeins of Araucania Nature Wool and when I opened the package.... it was GREEN.
And then reality set in. I don't wear a lot of green and when I do, it's of the forest or mossy variety, for good reason. I held it up to my face and it was not pretty. Instantly, I turned a strange shade of yellow. It's a stunning color--just not on me.

I tried to entice 6yo daughter--wouldn't she love a sweater in green?

No. Blue.

She said "I don't want to be disappointed, so can you please make it blue?"

So, down the pecking order it goes.... to little brother.

I would love to re-jigger Anny Purl's Cardigan for Merry--it seems like the perfect color for such a project--and I wonder if, by making it out of worsted instead of sport-weight yarn, I would end up with a 2-3yo size jacket. I'm off to the Ravelry forums to seek advice.

Second Hat Down

The kids are now officially ready for winter.  In the second-to-last -day of Christmas Break, I whipped up a quick hat for the little guy yesterday--loosely based on Tiennie's "Norwegian Star Earflap Hat"--except without the earflaps.  I'm not a big fan of how the earflaps look on his giant noggin so I did some ribbing instead.  

This was a fun, quick one and I have to say, I loved they yarn--soft, warm, and slightly fuzzy thanks to a bit of alpaca.    

I made the ribbing extra wide to serve almost like an earwarmer headband and I eliminated all the knit rounds at the top to give the hat a more squared-off shape--kind of like the kid's head.

Unlike my picky daughter, the little guy will wear anything I knit up--hats, scarves, mittens and sweater of any color or material.  

However, also unlike the 6yo, at 2.5, it is impossible to get a

 picture of him unless he's asleep.  So here is a more accurate depiction of the hat at work.

January, bring it on.

Light Bright

There are some color combinations that only a 6 year old girl can love.  Here is one of them. Because I was letting her pick out her own colors, I picked a pattern that I could knock off in a day or so--also, it's cold and the kid needs a hat.  A while ago, I had queued up Knitty's "Center Square" and after a little gauge math, I was off the the races.

I started by knitting it on two circulars, but the tangle of 

cables and yarn started to really annoy me so I just wrestled them onto one 24" circular until I got to the crown decreases.  I have to say, I wouldn't really recommend that--it made for unpleasant tight knitting that never felt fun--I just wanted to get to the end.  It was a little small after I finished, but I'm hoping blocking might help with that.

Though I like the colors she picked out, I'm not crazy about how they look together in this pattern, and in the process of knitting it, my addled brain figured out why.  Artists and other color experts will instantly tell me where I went wrong, but it took me a while to see that though the blue and pink are very different colors, they are very similar in color value.  That means they have a similar amount of white in them and therefore, next to each other, they don't really create much contrast.   Interesting lesson learned and filed away in noggin.  After a break from the colors, I'll whip up some matching mittens, per her request.

Center Square, Knitty.com

One skein each Cascade 128 in Powder Blue and Cotton Candy

US size 10 needles