Variegated Yarn

A young male co-worker was fascinated with the bright variegated yarn I was frogging and wanted a hat made from that yarn. I took advantage of the opportunity to try something I've wanted to do for some time. I wondered how it would look to make a hat with two strands of variegated yarn where the colors matched up. So I knit up hat that way, and only had to "cheat" a couple times to keep the color changes matched up. This hat has a ribbed brim, and is knit with the twisted stockinette stitch with some purl stitches at intervals.



Then I knit up a hat with the color changes of the two strands at odds with each other. This hat has a garter stitch brim, and is all twisted stockinette stitch.



They're both great. I can see them on toddlers at a playground, making it very easy for Mom to keep track of her kids. I'm curious to see which the young man prefers.

--ed. He chose the first hat, where the two strands of color match up.

Pidge Precursor

Denise posted about the Pidge pattern and I did a double take.

I had unearthed a very similar picture earlier in the week, except it was of me nearly two years ago, and I was wearing a similar "unique and elegant" piece of knitwear. I know that picture is old, because my hair is shoulder length now, including the bangs!



Both items are loom knit. I think the Pidge is double knit on a double rake; mine was made as a flat piece on a round loom. I wore mine quite a bit, since my winter coat is wool and itches my neck. The mini-scarf is definitely comfortable, but I didn't think it was worth writing up a pattern for. I pinned mine closed, though I do like the buttons.

So, knit a short scarf, with two button holes (eyelets) near one end. Wrap the mini-scarf around your neck matching up the corners in a point, figure out where the buttons should be and sew them on. Use any yarn you like. I used a single skein of an orphaned novelty yarn that was on clearance in the Fall of 2005. (My cost was $2.00, not the $275.00 - $425.00 on the 3Fe site.) If you want more details on how I made this, let me know.

Negative Progress?

I spent most of the day loom knitting today, a rare treat! And I think I now have four rows less than when I started. I knit and ripped, knit and ripped. It's a process of writing down what I did, then doing what I wrote, and finding the mistakes. It's days like this that makes me question my sanity, or at least why I try to figure out new techniques for the looms. I thought I'd come home today with tons of knitting completed, ha ha ha! But I think I've got it worked out, and it'll be perfect this time for sure. Hmmm, what can I procrastinate on so I can do a little more knitting tonight instead?

Felted Tweed

A few weeks ago, I posted about my experiments with knitting tweed looks. I finally got around to felting those pieces, and here is how they turned out.

Here is the tweed where the placement of the yarn colors is controlled on each stitch:



And here is the tweed with the two colors laying where they will at random:



Again, they both are fine, it just depends on what look you're going for. Neither technique is easier or more difficult than the other.