knit and tonic

California, Caps, Hanging Upside Down and Tapping Fingers.

Being a California resident, I never know what people in other parts wear on their heads.

All I know is, that people here will wear whatever they can on their heads for any reason at all. Like 72 degrees. Or for waiting in line at the Department of Motor Vehicles.

Girlfriend, when I went to pick her up at school yesterday, was wearing her water bottle on her head. I kid you not. (Balancing was more like it, but I had to squeeze that fact in.)

I am always surprised when I go to other places where cold weather during winter is the norm. I see all manner of colorful and inspired stuff. 

That is why I decided I needed to break out the needles and just cast on for something textured and different from my norm. Usually, I stick to stuff that I can wear to the gym during the summer, say, a nice stockinette slouch cap for a gig on the Stairmaster. Or, oh, a jaunty beanie to wear at the cantina when there's a cloud over there.

But seriously. I have no clue, folks. But I'm trying.

This one is an attempt and something that looks a little like polka dots but it is more like honeycomb. I'm using Madelinetosh Pashmina and another Madelinetosh that I have to identify that is in the same weight. I knit this much in about four hours. It's an easy and fun slip-stitch pattern. Right now, I'm trying to figure out the best way to close the top. This is bottom-up. 

Maybe that is why I'm having such a hard time figuring it out.

I'm not a fan of hats that have texture or color work and then the designer cops out at the crown, just sticking stockinette or stripes on top where are all the shaping happens.

Knitting top down, sometimes, feels like hanging upside down.

In real life, I don't like hanging upside down.

In this other life, I do.

I think it is sometimes easier to start at the top and work the design in as I increase. It's kind of like backing into math. I have a weird math brain. I tap my fingers when I do math. I touch my fingers together as if to count, under the table when no one is looking.

I'm too lazy to re-design this to be top down.

So I will try to figure this out.

Goodnight.

Making Gifts

I have a problem knitting for others. I am too worried about so many things when I make knitted gifts for others. I would rather knit gifts for other knitters than for those who do not knit. I don't know why. I think it might be because many people think that we "whip up" stuff. I don't whip up stuff. It takes me a long time to think about what the perfect yarn choice would be. I think about whether or not they would use the item. I think about whether or not it will fit them. I think about it all. I don't mind it if it takes me a long time to knit something for someone else. I just don't want my gift to become a burden for them.

Back in the day before I began to knit again, about 12 years ago, I crocheted a baby blanket for a friend. I went to the local big box store and picked out pastels. I crocheted little squares and connected them in a wonky, un-informed way, and gave it to her. She loved it. I remember, though, going over to her house when the baby was about six months old and spotted the blanket in the baby's bassinet. It was falling apart. Embarrassed, I pointed it out and said that I could fix it for her and the mom pushed it down here and there as if to hide the flaws on my behalf. I'm not sure if she thought she had mistreated it through use or if she was trying to save me from my own distress. I ran into her a few days ago and I still feel the sting.

But giving out of love is good. Even if it's a risk. Like this pin cushion I made for a friend. My stitches are wonky (and she's practically a master stitcher). I under-filled the thing with walnut shells (but he's still cute). She may never use it (yet it's okay with me, he'd probably fall apart if she did). 

So there.

BTW: I've knit my sis leg warmers (not a Christmas gift since we're not exchanging. I'll take her in the back room to give them to her when we have our Christmas gathering this weekend). I also made a headband for my niece and am thinking of making some fingerless gloves for Girlfriend. HWWV? He *might* get socks if he is a good boy. NEWSFLASH: He just emailed me from the next room saying he wanted a certain memory card. Therefore, no socks. Gotta love technology.

Productive Again.

Funny how this blog thing works for some people. I remember starting to write this several years ago and next thing I know I'm writing a book and then another and then another and then another. The world is a mighty interesting place to live.

My husband found a new career from this blog as well. He's now a working photographer (not full time though) and is doing nicely. I asked him to take photos for me and he discovered that he enjoyed it and everything happened from there.

Which brings me to the old addage about the cobbler and the fact that his kids and wife have no shoes.

He's so busy now that I'm relying more and more on my own photographic skills (none), not to mention, he's in a land far, far away and won't be home for another week or so, so you're gonna get pics from me via Instagram. All of them will be in front of or near my lovely, but gaudy, gold mirror, to boot.

So, I finished the cap. The Big Pom-Pom Vehicle. The one for Girlfriend. Notice her teeth. She yanked four of them out in the course of one week. All of them from the backseat of my car. This backseat is her favorite tooth-yanking spot second to her seat in class at school. In her fourth-grade year she pulled out at least three sitting there. But this last bout was so fast and fierce we had to put I.O.U.'s under her pillow. Do any of you have kids who don't ask others to pull their teeth out? I think her dad pulled just one out of all of the ones she's lost.

The fourth tooth that came out that week was different though because HWWV forgot about it and when she reminded him in the morning that the tooth fairy hadn't arrived, he just wrote out another I.O.U. and handed it to her. Kids who lose a lot of teeth at once are expensive these days. (I used to get a dime. But then, my mom would fold an entire origami house with furniture and hide the dime under the couch . . . . Girlfriend used to get two-dollar bills, but then when the molars started to come out, we upped it to fivers and wow. I know of kids who get 20 bucks! Don't get me started on that subject, please. Oh, and thankfully this is a knitting blog. Imagine if it were a parenting/breast-feeding/vaccination/insert-another-contentious-subject-here type of blog. Oy.)

I also knit myself a sweater. It was sort of an accident. I taught a class on top-down raglan construction without a pattern and the Berroco Remix was so fast and easy to knit with that I knit that sucker in practically 10 hours' time. The Remix is an odd mix of nylon, cotton, acrylic , silk and linen, and you wouldn't think it'd be soft or wearable based on that list, but it is. The put-ups are generous (I knit the entire yoke portion with just one ball!). So generous that I knit this in a reasonably generous (for me) 38" circumference with just FOUR balls. And you know me by now: Oddly, I hardly ever wear sweaters, but wish I could. This one, however, is fun and I'm all over it!

Cap info: Two skeins of HiKoo by Skacel Collection, Inc. Simplicity in blue and green. Just a basic top-down beanie that I did on the fly with stripes. Fun and easy.

BTW: Girlfriend just told me that another tooth is loose.

BTW2: She gets her cast off next week. Her arm is healing well. Thanks for the comments and notes asking about it.