Finally finished!

Whaddya think? It's so warm. And just in time, too! The weather is due to be warm-ish tomorrow (in the mid-60s) but then will drop back to more seasonable temperatures. Next up is a hat for Chief Baby Brother!

But now it's time to work on my second thrummed mitten so that when it gets cold again my fingers won't freeze.  G'night :-)

~mz

Giving in to my Fair Isle obsession

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Originally uploaded by mzundercover

This is a hat I'm knitting for myself. Found the chart in my 1000 Great Knitting Motifs book. Decided to repeat the chart twice and put a row of dots between them. It's hard to see the color. It's a beautiful blue called Oceanic from Jamieson's. I may very well be able to finish the knitting on this tomorrow. Fingers crossed! I need some new wool hats to battle the cold of the "frozen tundra." Winter is here!

~mz

More Fair Isle hat knitting

I'm really diggin' this Fair Isle knitting.  See?

This one is totally for me.  I like how the pattern is emerging.  I've noticed several mistakes (like using the wrong color in the wrong place here and there) but I like how it is turning out.  I'm actually knitting the hat in the reverse of how the colors are displayed in the chart I'm knitting from (so what is white on my hat is blue on the chart and vice versa).  That sometimes makes it a bit of a challenge (for me anyway) because my tendency is to knit what I see, and sometimes my brain doesn't want to make my hands do the opposite!  I'm thinking of knitting the Fair Isle chart once more before decreasing at the top of the hat. 

Here's what the inside of the hat looks like:

I'm using the Two-Handed Fair Isle technique I picked up from Philosopher's Wool.  It's a very cool way to knit with yarn in each hand, and weave in your yarns as you knit so that you don't have long floats on the back side.  My technique isn't perfect yet but I'm enjoying the process, and I'll definitely enjoy a nice warm hat.  Which I totally need since temperatures have plummeted here lately.  There was frost on the ground this morning.  Winter is here, regardless of what the calendar says!

And with that, I better get going.  I am looking forward to my first day of Shaun T's Insanity workout, and then definitely some knitting on my sweater so I can compete in NaKniSweMo!

Until next time!

~mz