Busy Bee

I hope everyone had a wonderful New Year's Holiday. I did, although it was particularly quiet this year. We went over to my sister's house, in the middle of Oregon, for a late Christmas visit. Lots of snow and good family fun. It's good to be home though!

Because of the snow, the drive was even longer than normal, which left me with lots of car knitting time. I love car knitting time! My husband gets car sick if he even thinks about reading in the car, but I can knit or read all day long. The best part is that I don't even have to feel guilty about not waiting on the kids hand and foot because they have to be strapped into their car seats and I can't really reach them from the front. Sigh. Yes, car knitting is lovely.

My car knitting this time was particularly productive. The first thing I finished was the hat I mentioned starting in my last post.

Pattern: Noro Kureyon One Ball Wavy Gravy Hat, Yarn: Noro Kureyon, colorway 153

This pattern is super easy and the size is very flexible. I knit this one in the suggested gauge and ended up with a hat that fits my 4 year old, but that also fits my big old head. As a matter of fact, I liked it so much, I knit another.

Pattern: Same, Yarn: Plymouth Boku, colorway 2

This yarn is a little thinner than the Kureyon, so I knit this one on size 7 needles instead of 8. As you can see, it fits my 2 year old really well, but again will stretch to fit my head, although it is a bit more of a beanie on me than the other one.

On the way back, I decided to give mittens a go. I found "The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns" at Goodwill while I was in Central Oregon, so ended up using its mitten pattern.

Pattern: Mittens from The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns, Yarn: Crystal Palace Fjord, colorway Circus

Overall, not too shabby. Last week I picked up this yarn because I loved the colors. It's also really soft and makes lovely mittens.

Again, I liked the results so much, I decided to do it again. These are the next size up for the next size up girl.

Pattern: Same as above, Yarn: Same as above but colorway Violets

Lest you think I am some super-human, super-fast knitter, here are some points to consider:

1. The hats require remarkably few cast on stitches.
2. The mittens are for very tiny hands.
3. I finished the mittens at home.
4. If I was looking at my knitting, I was not looking at the icy, snowy roads. Since I hate icy, snowy roads, looking at my knitting was encouraged.

Next I plan to sew a ribbon on the mittens that can be threaded through the girls' coat sleeves. If I don't I can just about bet that we would be down at least one mitten by the end of the week.

Did anyone else have mittens with a cord connecting them that ran through their coat sleeves? My grandmother always did this with the mittens she made for us when we were little. I remember it being really itchy though, so I thought ribbon might be a little nicer. We'll see how it goes.

In other news, as I mentioned above, we had late Christmas with my sister last weekend and I received a very exciting gift.

I had never heard of this book, but I have to say that it is fantastic! It contains a great history of all knitting from the Ara Islands, with some excellent pictures and patterns. My sister found this at the Goodwill too. Lucky me!

My husband has really been enjoying this one too. Unfortunately for me, rather than getting excited about the Ganseys, which is what I am thinking about making for him, he is more interested in the Fair Isle stuff. He actually said he wants me to knit this vest for him.

This picture doesn't really show the fact that this is 6 colors of really tiny yarn. Not too bad though, I suppose. I'll put it on the list...way down on the list, but on the list...