A Christmas Nautilus + A Break

The fiber guild’s last meeting of the of the year is a break from the usual routine. We have a potluck and play white elephant with handmade ornaments. For the potluck, I brought pumpkin spice cookies. For the ornament exchange, I decided to go cute - weird cute - and made a nautilus.  Actually, I made 2 of them because I wanted one for my tree too.

I used the Nautie pattern from the Spring 2006 issue of Knitty. To get a smaller version, I used leftover DK and sport weight yarn instead of worsted which made nicely-size ornaments. I’ve got the full list of mods and changes here if you want to make your own. Both the Nauties are about 5.5” from the back of the shell to the tip of the tentacles. You can’t miss them on the tree. I still have to embroider 2017 on the one I kept, but that shouldn’t take too long.

Now, back to the exchange. I’m glad I went with the nautilus instead of a more traditional idea. The nautilus got a lot of laughs and ooh’s and aah’s. It was also “stolen” a few times which did make me happy too.

The nautilus’ are far from last FO for 2017, but the others are still a secret. I’ll share them with you next year when I come back from my holiday break in mid-January. Until then, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year. Maybe it be full of beautiful yarn!

Monogamous Knitting For The Win

I did it! Two and a half weeks of monogamous dedicated knitting turned into cabled scarf and a matching hat. It’s nice to know I can still speed my way through a project or two every now and then. Why the rush? The scarf and hat were gifts for a friend visiting over Thanksgiving and I wanted to give them to him in person. Nothing like a hard deadline to light a fire under under your butt.

I spent way too long trying to pick out a pattern which is part of why I cast on at the last minute. Nothing seemed quite right, and I was just about to give up and design something myself when the Palindrome scarf popped up. Easy reversible cables? Yes, please. I knit this pattern way back when as a newish knitter and was pleased with the results then. And I’m pleased again with this latest version. The only difference this time is that I made a few mods. The scarf started and ended with 2.25” of ribbing. I added an extra cable repeat for width. Plus, cable twists happened every 8 rows for a looser cable.

I can’t leave out the yarn’s wonderful contribution either. Normally, I wouldn’t choose Ultra Alpaca for a cabled project because the alpaca/wool blend wouldn’t have the same crisp texture as a 100% wool yarn. I wasn’t worried about that in this case since the purls would be “hiding” and not acting a background for the cables. The blend created a beautiful textured fabric that is perfect. And warm. Did I mention warm? The main reason I picked a wool/alpaca blend was that it’d be worn through winters with regular snow, wind, and freezing temps.

And because the weather required it, I made a matching hat. I did end up coming up with a pattern for this beauty at the last minute. My original plan was to have both the scarf and hat finished before he arrived. That didn’t quite happen. In fact, I knit most of the hat in front of him and figured out the crown decreases on a drive through the mountains.  Then I gave it to him mere moments after weaving in the ends. The look on his face was totally worth it.

I am absolutely smitten with this hat pattern. So much so that I’m writing it up with a few more sizes so I can knit at least one more for myself or as gifts. I’m all for versatility. In the meantime I’m getting on with the rest of my gift knitting and making. Since monogamous knitting has been working for me, I’m going to keep it up. Thankfully, the rest of my projects are on the small side so I won’t get bored and can power through.

The Pattern: Palindrome Scarf and a hat pattern I’m writing up
Yarn: 3 skeins Berroco Ultra Alpaca
Needles: US 7 (4.5 mm) circulars
Dates: November 5 - 24, 2017
Scarf details @Ravelry
Hat details @Ravelry