Grace Lace Beret: My Proudest Knitting Moment so Far

What? A hat that turned out well? Yes! Probably because sizing isn't so much an issue with this one...

Not too long ago I finally set up an account and started poking around on Ravelry. I want to have so much more time to spend there! This had been on my to-do list for a while and the final push was wanting to learn more about the Grace Lace Beret, which a classmate of mine had started up.

This hat is so cute! And so in-style right now, which is an added bonus for sure. It was also going to teach me a bunch of new things, namely how to knit lace!

This beret starts with a cast on method that I had never even heard of and that Lauren wasn't even super familiar with. To start, we crocheted 65 stitches with waste yarn. Then we picked up 60 stitches from the back of the chain using the main yarn and knitting needles. Basically, we knit into the humps on the back of the chain. When we pulled out the waste yarn after knitting the band, it left a very cool looking and stretchy edge.

For the lace I mastered slipping stitches and I learned the double decrease (slip two stitches together as if to K2tog, knit one, then pass the two slipped stitches over).

This was also the first time I've knit from a chart. See? So many new things. Here it is:

I'm proud of this hat and it's been a lot of fun to wear. My only complaint is that the band has stretched out and now it's a bit hard to keep on my head. I just bought some black elastic thread though to sew into the inside to tighten it up. I'll post an update about how that works after I've given it a try... fingers crossed!

Yarn:
Louisa Harding Grace (50% Merino, 50% Silk)
506/110 yds skein DK
2x Burnt Orange (12) -- though I really think this is more of a dark pink than an orange

Materials:
US4/3.5mm double pointed needles (for band)
US9/5.5mm 16" circular needle (for hat body)
Crochet hook
Stitch markers
Darning needle

Hats: 2, Carmen: 0

I've been wanting (and trying) to make my dad a hat for quite some time now. The first one I tried out back in the day ended up HUGE and silly.. gauge is really not my thing, especially then.

So, once the tea cozy was done I figured that should be my next project to bring to class. Since I wanted to learn something new beyond just choosing the right needles and yarn, I chose the Snappy Hat pattern from Picnic Knits for its cables and multi-gender potential.

Cables! I'd looked longingly at cabled pieces and at the knitters making them for some time, always assuming they were at a skill level way beyond me. Luckily I had Lauren to convince me otherwise and show me how simple cables really can be.

I chose an acrylic yarn in a nice rich brown since my dad is sensitive to wool and, of course, I wanted him to be able to actually wear it, some u-shaped cable needles, and got to it. It looked nice when it was done!

Unfortunately, the hat won again...


Yarn:
Berroco Comfort Chunky (50% Super Fine Nylon, 50% Super Fine Acrylic)
100g/150 yds skeins
1x Bitter Sweet (5741)

Needles:
US10.5 (6.5mm) 16"circular needle
U-shape cable stitch holder

I was bummed to have another hat that was just too big but I quite enjoyed knitting this and wanted to do some more cabling before I moved on to something else. So, I dug around in my stash and pulled out a really great skein that I brought up from San Fransisco. (It was bought for me as a birthday present while I was living there, but if I remember right it was from a great shop called ImagiKnit.)

This yarn was a bit more feminine and the skein a bit smaller, so I figured I'd try for a hat either for me or a girl friend. Here's how that turned out:

I'm happy with how it turned out! Besides one thing... it's way short. Like... barely will cover my ears. The hat wins again!

Hats: 2, Carmen: 0.

If only I knew a child that I could give it to...

Yarn:
Malabrigo Chunky (Kettle Dyed Pure Merino Wool)
3.5oz/104 yds skein
1x Stonechat (173)

Needles:
US10.5 (6.5mm) 16"circular needle
U-shape cable stitch holder

Mom's Tea Cozy: My First Class Project!

When I was first signing up for the Intermediate Knitting Class at So Much Yarn I knew that I needed a project to work on. I actually struggled a bit with this (strange, considering that now I have so many things I want to make that I have a hard time remembering them all). Maybe it's because I hadn't knit anything in more than a year...

Then it came to me. I'll knit the tea cozy that my mom had been asking about practically forever and that I'd be denying her all that time. I started searching around online and finally came across a pattern for Grandma's Traditional Tea Cosy posted on Keren's blog teabythesea. This was a pattern she wrote based on an actual 80+ year old tea cozy of her grandma's and I loved it!

By making this cozy, I learned how NOT to knit with multiple colors -- that is, I learned to pull the loose strands of yarn tight (but not too tight) across the back to make each column pucker. The entire cozy is knit in garter stitch so it's really pretty simple. It took me a long time to finish though since you change colors every eight stitches and I was just getting back into the swing of things.

It does require some sewing, since you knit two pieces and then sew the seams. This makes it simple to fit the right pot though, since you can leave holes for the handle and spout. This was my first real experience with mattress stitch.

And a fun added touch? I learned how to make i-cord for the first time to make the flowers on top. Here it is:
She loves it, by the way. :D

Yarn:
Tahki Stacy Charles, Inc. Cotton Classic (100% Mercerised cotton)
50g/108 yds skeins
2x Color No. Dark Olive (3609)
1x Color No. Burgundy (3432)
1x Color No. Light Milk Chocolate (3203)

Needle:
US 6/4mm 24" circular needle (though straight needles would totally work too)

Not bad for my first project back, if I do say so myself. ;)

Early Projects

Now that the introductions are out of the way, I wanted to share some of my older projects, namely the ones I knit before I started the class. I wasn't keeping track of this stuff at all while I was knitting it, so some has gone missing or been forgotten and I know next to nothing about yarn or needle sizes. Here is a good handful of things I pulled out of the depths of the closet! It's a pretty interesting view of the thing I tried to teach myself, I think.

Up there you can see my very first scarf! It's not the FIRST thing I ever knit, but close. Really simple: garter stitch all the way through. Some kind of wool, rich brown with some gold undertones. It's a bit wonky... stretched out through the middle, a snag or two, and a tail coming loose at the end. But I still wear it today! It's just so darn versatile.

At some point I started poking around Knitty.com and fell in love with quite a lot of the projects I saw there. Most of them were just too complicated for me so I window shopped. Eventually I decided to tackle this headwarmer. Not quite a hat, more than a headband. I hadn't even heard of short rows before this, but I learned them anyway!

I love alpaca yarn. Especially baby alpaca yarn. It's so freaking soft! Want to see what started this love? It was this dark red wavy ribbed scarf; another one that I still wear today. This was one of my first insights into the fact that complicated-looking patterns often aren't actually complicated (yesss!). My one complaint is that as it's stretched in length, the waves have become less apparent.

Then I started seeing thing in stores and thinking, "I could totally knit that!" Sometimes I was totally wrong. Didn't mean I didn't try! A few winters ago I found some fun cowls at the Free People store downtown. This was before the cowls were all the rage and I thought they were super interesting. And how hard could a simple tube be? Probably pretty darn easy for someone who knows which yarns and stitches make which kinds of fabrics. I didn't totally crash and burn with this one, but I never really wore it either.

One more for tonight. Another example of the complicated-looking ≠ complicated deal. I think the pattern was called something like Berry Stitch Scarf, though I haven't found it again. I knit and knit and knit on this thing and it's suuuuper long. I was just having a good time and didn't want to stop. I wear this one sometimes too, though it's honestly a bit cumbersome at times.

That's it for tonight! Coming up next: back to school knitting. I'm going to go through the projects I've made since starting my class. Yay!

Casting on...

A handful of years ago I picked up Knitting: Learn to Knit Six Great Projects from Klutz and proceeded to teach myself to knit from scratch. Today, I'm a total knitting expert! Not really, but I'm working on it.

After Klutz helped me to learn how to cast on, knit, purl, and bind off, I snooped around the good ol' internet for patterns that I could handle. Pretty much any pattern that wasn't solely made up of CO, K, P, and BO was quickly rejected because I was sure it was practically impossible to figure out and I'm pretty sure Klutz hasn't published Learn to Knit Six MORE Great Projects yet.

I knit up some decent scarves from these patterns, some that I still wear now, and figured out that dishcloths are great for trying out new stitches and designs (Mom and Grandma were grateful for that).

Eventually I moved on to trying to learn more from tutorials, written or in video form, about how to do some fancier stuff. Namely knitting in the round (ooooh). I figured out how to do it! Not super well, but still. It turns out that gauge mattered a lot more for the things I wanted to knit in the round and gauge is definitely NOT my strong suit.

Fast forward some years and after not picking up needles or yarn for probably about one of those, I signed myself up for Lauren Lindeman's Intermediate Knitting class at her wonderful shop in Seattle, So Much Yarn. Ever since June of this last year I've been there most Wenesday evenings working on projects, learning new skills, getting inspiration, meeting great people and asking a ton of questions. I love having this class as a part of my life.

I love having knitting as a part of my life, too! I like following patterns and watching the yarn turn into fabric. I love yarn and learning more and more about all of the sizes, shapes, colors, materials, etc etc etc. I like having something to keep my busy while watching TV, talking on the phone, or listening to a podcast. And I like being able to give the people who are important in my lives something that I spent my time and thought on and that I'm proud of.

And now I find myself here! Inspiration for this blog (and for starting the class at So Much Yarn this summer) came from the wonderful and talented Lenny of The Emerging Addiction and The DIY Experiment. I see it as a great way to keep track of what I've made and which needles/yarn/accessories I've used to do it. I think it could be a great place for book and shop reviews too.

It's like my own little notepad. If I'm lucky, someone else might actually read it. If you are that someone, welcome!