Mom’s Lumio Hats

These Lumio hats are a ridiculously quick knit. After seeing my store sample hat, my mom wanted two for dog walking. One in black, and one in blue. I’ve previously made her a black and a blue cowl, so she wanted one to match each of her cowls. My parents have a Great Dane named Bosco and she wanted these hats for when she dog walks. This yarn has reflective bits in it, so people can see her at night (not that they would miss the dog…)

 

She also requested no pom pom on the hat (it still looks cute without the pom pom) since she sometimes puts her hood on when it’s extremely cold (which kind of defeats the purpose of having a reflective hat, if she’ll put on a hood… but anyhow)!

 

I knit up one on the evening of January 1st, and the other during the evening of January 2nd. I used my 10mm addis (16”) – which I love, and they were way too fast to knit. The blue hat is 81g and the black hat is 87g. I knit them both to the exact same length, so I am not sure why one hat weighs 6g more than the other. That kind of baffles me. Maybe one I weaved in more in length on the ends, or something.

I hope she likes them!

Color Affection

I started my Color Affection Shawl back on July 17th, 2013 with my knitting group. We started this shawl as a knit-a-long. More than half of our group worked on this shawl, and we’re about 13/14 maybe even 15 of us in our group. I got side tracked from it, working on smaller projects between starting it and finishing it, and then buying the wool shop back in September, kind of made my life a tad busier. My goal was to finish this in 2013. I came close to finishing it in 2013. I worked on it like mad for the last few days of the year (after finishing all my teachers gifts, and a few store samples that I had to do). However, I ran out of yarn on New Years Eve with 60 stitches left to cast off (At the end, there was over 425+ stitches in the edging).

I was in luck… I had in my stash, a 10g skein of an orange hand-dyed sock yarn that matched part of the Colinette Jitterbug Ginger Cinnabar that was in my shawl. However, I only found the skein on New Years Day, so I was able to finish casting off, and block my shawl. I thought I had enough to finish the edging. I needed in reality enough to make a 2” edge, as the pattern calls for, but I managed to get in 1 3/4” but… while I was doing my last few rows, I weighed the yarn after each row to see how much I used per row, to make sure I had enough to finish. I guess somehow I miscalculated by 60 stitches. But that’s ok… I managed to save my project with some miscellaneous matching almost to a tea, yarn.

At first, as soon as I cast-off, I hated this shawl. Not because of the color, because the color is stunning. I hated it, because, even though I did the yarn-overs at the beginning of each row as a lot of Ravelers have done, the shawl curled along the edge as it was extremely tight. It wouldn’t lay flat and I wanted to chuck it across the room in frustration. I did not notice this when I was knitting it. I can’t even describe what I mean. I probably should have taken pictures before blocking it.

My only hope was to block it. After blocking it, the shawl has redeemed itself a bit, luckily. It seems to be okay now.It still seems tight along the top edge, but blocking seems to help it lay flat. I wet blocked it on foam mats (first picture in this post) over night. Once it was dry in the morning, I un-pinned it.

Using 4.0mm (US6) needles, and Colinette Jitterbug yarn that I had in my stash since I owned Robyn’s Nest (my online yarn shop from 2007-2010), I used one full skein of the Ginger Cinnabar (orange) colorway, I used 0.85 of a skein of Elephant’s Dream and I used 1.13 skeins of Lobster Pinch (red). I still have 3.87 skeins of the Lobster Pinch and another full skein of Elephant’s Dream (blue) but the only one I had 1 skein of was the Ginger Cinnabar. If I would have realized that I needed more of the 2nd contrasting color, I would have used the Elephant’s Dream as the 2nd contrasting color instead of the Ginger Cinnabar and put the Ginger Cinnabar as the 1st contrasting color.

I don’t think I’ll knit this one again, once was enough.

Top Width: 75”
Bottom Width: 86”
Height: 16”

Lumio

 

We just got in this awesome reflective yarn by Schachenmayr. It’s called Lumio. What a neat idea that it reflects in the dark. This is a good idea for people who dog walk or who walk outside at night. Might need to make a bunch of these for the dog walkers in my life. The blue hat above is a store sample and I didn’t realize but I only knit it to 7” long before decreasing at the crown when the pattern had said to knit until 7 3/4”. I only realized after, but the hat still fits my head well, and it was for a store sample, so I didn’t mind that it was 3/4 of an inch smaller than called for. That hat without pompom is 75g  and the pompom weighs 43g for a total of 118g. The black hat below, is for me, I decided to knit up another one, for those cold mornings waiting for the school bus to come pick up the boys. I went with black because it matches everything. The hat itself without the pompom is 91g (I knit it to the actual length the free pattern on the ball band calls for) and the pompom weighs 37g for a total of 128g.

 

Very quick knit & the yarn is nice to work with. Making the huge pompom was fun too! I had to cut out circles out of cardboard to make this pompom, the pompom maker I had at home was too small for this size!

Katia Ushuaia

 

 

I recently decided to try out this new super bulky yarn that we got into shop, Katia Ushuaia. I decided to knit up the free pattern that Katia put out, the 7-41 Cowl. I knit it up using US 15 - 10.0 mm needles, and it took 1.33 skeins. We got in every color of Katia Ushuaia and I wanted to see how it knitted up. The free pattern is here as PDF.

This is a fun thick & thin yarn to work with. And I just love this color way (color number 603).

You can find my project on Ravelry here.

The Faces of Quentin

 

Just a little Monday Morning smile for you. Quentin’s been obsessed with wearing these silly glasses and walks around the house making faces. Here’s a few that I just love. HAPPY MONDAY!

 

Cameo Scarves

I decided to make the teachers Christmas gifts this year. I was going to be ambitious and make all 16 gifts that I was giving out, however, in the end I only ended up making 6 scarves and the other 10 gifts got a store bought gift, with some chocolates. I ended up running out of time, which is why I didn’t end up making all 16 of them, otherwise I would have.

The Cameo Scarf is a very fun & easy pattern on the back of the ball band. It’s not listed on Ravelry, but it’s by Estelle and available free as a PDF on their website. Above left is Quentin’s daycare coordinator, Fatiha & on the right is Quentin’s teacher Karlene.

It’s knit up using 10 mm needles and it took me an hour each scarf (I timed it out of sheer curiosity). Above left is Quentin’s teacher Stella and above right is Quentin’s teacher Tina.

It’s a great project to make for a gift and I’ll probably make up a bunch more of these in the future. Above left is Mackenzie’s Kindergarten teacher Mme Françoise & on the right is Sean’s grade 1 teacher Mme Catherine.

The rest of the support staff that I gave gifts to (Bus driver, Elementary school office staff, lunch ladies, Sean & Mack’s after school daycare teachers/daycare staff), I got them an adorable picture frame snow globe (that resembles this one) with some chocolates. I also gave the teachers along with their scarf, a snow globe & chocolates. Everything was well received & I even got an email from a friend of mine, who is also a lunch mom at the school, that the snow globes were a huge hit. Brownie points well received.

What did you do for teachers/daycare Christmas gifts? Curious to hear about what you did!

The 1st Day of Winter

Google thought of us knitters on the 1st day of winter this year. Awesome homepage google!

The Calvillos

Yesterday, a local kitchen accessories store was having a book signing for Anthony & Alexia Calvillo for the new cookbook they have out. A Calvillo fan, I had to go check it out. (Ok, it’s more than a fan-thing… it’s a slight crush-thing).

The Calvillo’s are very nice. They live in my neighborhood, and Sean took swimming lessons with their daughter Athena back in 2010. I got his autograph back then after weeks of chickening out in the family locker room after swimming lessons.

Quentin was playing shy with the Calvillos, it was cute. Their daughters were there as well while they were doing the signing. Since I came towards the end and it was quiet there, we chatted for a bit. It was a very cool afternoon, and I cannot wait to try some of the recipes in their cookbook.

Jada

My cousin Caryn, the amazing Sun News Host of Right Now with Caryn Lieberman, asked me to knit up some hats for her adorable 3 month old daughter, Jada, after seeing the one that I made for Maya. This is what I came up with:

 

I whipped up another Roar (without the spikes) hat, and added a flower instead, just like I did for Maya’s hat. The flower is curtsey of my awesome friend Eugenie, who kindly made the flower. I added the flower via a button to the hat, so that the flower is removable. Here is my projected on Ravelry. After making two of these hats, I still have plenty of yarn leftover to probably make another 2-3 hats if I have any more little girls to make some for. The entire hat is about 32g of yarn.

 

I also made a Pompom Bear hat for her. My ravelry project is here. I absolutely love working with Berroco Vintage (this one is the colors line as they have a solid line as well). It’s a washable yarn, acrylic/wool/nylon mix, which is a durable mix. The hat used up 39g and each pompom is 5g, for a total of 49g (half a skein). I didn’t knit the hat to the 7” as written in the pattern, as I find that it makes it too long/tall and looks a bit big, so I knit this one to 6”. I have made this hat twice before, once knitting it as written in the pattern and knitting up a 2nd one with some alterations (for Quentin when he was a baby).

Jada looks adorable in both hats. I hope she wears them well! Now off to go tackle some WIPs that are long over due to be done!

Recipe for a Handmade Winter

Thanks for sharing this with me Vicki!

Vintage Habs

 

The boys asked me to knit them a scarf. They wanted them done for yesterday. (Why isn’t it done yet mom?) I saw these 3 nice colors at work that reminded me of the vintage Habs colors. Out of 3 skeins of Berroco Vintage chunky in a red, white & blue I got 2 scarves & 1 hat. Have a look…..

 

The scarf was knit up on 6.5mm needles. Cast on 130 stitches, knit long-ways to leave ends for fringe. Sean’s scarf on Ravelry here & Mack’s scarf on Ravelry here.

 

Since Sean’s been wearing a cheap hat from a store (tsk, tsk on me), I decided to knit him up a hat in the leftovers from the scarves and hat just enough to make him a matching hat. All three projects were a quick knit. The hat is knit up on 5.0mm (band) and 6.0mm needles (rest of the hat). Details are on Ravelry here. I really liked this hat pattern, and can see myself using it again in the future.

 

Vote for Me!

I got nominated (not sure by whom) for one of the Top knitting blogs! Please take a minute and go vote for me! THANKS! (Knit & Purl Mama ... obviously!) The winner will be announced on December 17th. I thank all my readers for their support over the years, without you guys – this blog wouldn’t be possible.

Quentin’s 3rd Birthday

  

Quentin turned 3 on Saturday and we threw him a party on his actual birthday. I can’t believe my baby is 3 already. Time surely flies by way too quickly. He had a fun party and got spoiled by family & friends. What a lucky 3 year old!

Arm Knitting

I wanted to try out arm knitting, which a client called me about. She wanted to know what yarn was suitable, told me which video to watch, so I did, and asked for my recommendation of a yarn to use for it. So I set out on a hunt. This is the video I watched:

I grabbed 2 skeins of Berroco Vintage Chunky, in a color that I liked, and tried it out.

It was a neat idea. I had fun doing it. My husband looked at me funny while I tried to do it. I had fun. I do think however that Vintage Chunky double stranded is not thick enough to do this project, you really need a super bulky yarn for it. I might have something in my stash at home that could work.

I might try this again, with the proper yarn next time. If you make one, let me know how it turns out! Here is my project on Ravelry.