Knitted hats in these hot times

This is Katie’s Kep, a traditional fair isle cap knit in nontraditional colors. It’s a freebie designed by Wilma Malcomson and is available on Ravelry, courtesy of Shetland Wool Week. If I’d have knit it in a yarn like Jamieson Spindrift the patterning would have been more crisp and defined. But I am still stashdiving and what I had on hand was Kate Davies Design’s Milarrochy Tweed. It’s a 70% wool, 30% mohair fingering weight with, as its name indicates, a tweed in it. All the colors have flecks of other colors and there’s also some thick and thin going on. I don’t see it as a good choice for fair isle. Blasphemy. Please don’t tell the fangirls.

Still, I think that the hat’s a stunner. And the crown is the star. Literally.

Some of my knit-buds quietly think me a bit goofy for some of my knitting habits. Most of these hats were knit while it was still quite cool. But it can be 90 degrees out and I’ll still be knitting wintry hats.

This next one is another freebie: Kate Gagnon Osborne’s February Hat.

This hat’s very stretchy bottom ribbing is created by starting with a  provisional cast-on followed by K1, P1 ribbing. Once the ribbing is complete, the provisional cast-on is released and placed on a spare circular needle and then the stitches on both needles are knit together. The result is a folded brim. The other result is a rather deep pinched-in round as the ribbing transitions to the body of the hat. But that’s a fairly nice design feature.

I knit the hat and assembled the pompom from Plymouth Yarn’s Worsted Merino Superwash.

Next up is Aki, a freebie designed by Svetlana Volkova. The pattern calls for an Aran weight and I decided to use Dream in Color Classy. Classy calls itself a worsted. But it seems more Aran to me. My sense of this yarn is that it’s a bit stiff. I like it. A lot, actually. But in this interesting ribbed pattern the hat can almost stand up by itself. It will keep someone’s ears and head very warm. A good hat.

I modified the pattern by knitting the first set of ribs on needles two sizes smaller than for the body of the hat. I noticed a bit of a flare at the start in a number of projects and wanted to eliminate that. It worked quite nicely. I changed to a size US7 needle (from a 5) in the first set of all knit rounds. I also extended the first set of ribs by 2 rounds to keep the length of the ribs more uniform.

The crown decreases are abrupt. They take place entirely over 5 rounds. It’s a bit rustic, but it works. At least in a less stiff yarn it would work. Mine sports a top dimple that I don’t care for.

I next tackled another Dream in Color yarn that had been in my stash for years. This one is Calm, rather than Classy. It’s 100% merino, same as Classy, but has a softer hand. I knit Melissa LaBarre’s Winter Waves Slouch Hat. The pattern can be purchased on Ravelry. But it’s also included in “100 Knits: Interweave’s Ultimate Pattern Book, a hardcover published in July of 2018. It’s a wonderful book that I highly recommend.

I am such a sucker for lots of texture in a hat. The crown decreases keep the texture going.

I’ve decided that Winter Waves is mine. Speaking of waves, it’s 89 degrees here with very high humidity and the pontoon boat calls.

The birds of Spring

Waking up to snow on the ground and ice on the plants that rim the lake during the first week of May made us pine for spring. The Adirondack chairs are out. The twigs in the fire pit await a calm day when it’s safe to burn. The boat is in. The kayak launch aid is set (the “H” about 4 feet from shore). The orange halves are hung on the trees waiting for orioles.This dawn looked more like fall. But so beautiful.

We do not have swans on Long Lake. But, wait. This Spring is different. These are definitely Mute Swans. They had the telltale lump at the top of their bill and the bills were lighter than they appear in these photos. They’re the exotic transplant seen most often in Michigan and not our homegrown Trumpeter Swans.

We’ve seen them once or twice before in about 15 years on the lake. But this quartet hung around for more than a week.

We see Common Mergansers regularly in the Spring. But Hooded Mergansers are rare. These guys were a hoot to watch. The males were puffing up their impressive crests and clearly performing for the nearby females. This female seemed unimpressed.

Here’s the pair once the male had chilled out and the female had, apparently, changed her mind.

We do not have Red-Breasted Mergansers on Long Lake. But, wait. This Spring is different. These are definitely Red-Breasted Mergansers.

It’s the male’s punk hairdo that’s the big give-away. And the female has some of the same fly-away look going on.

We have a number of warblers that put in appearances on Long Lake. But we do not have Yellow-Rumped Warblers. But, wait. This Spring is different. These are definitely Yellow-Rumped Warblers of the variety formerly known as Myrtle. You can tell it’s the Myrtle variety rather than the Audubon variety because the chin-strap is white rather than yellow.

And, yes, there is a yellow splotch on its rump. It was just such a fluttery critter that Steve couldn’t get a photo of its rump.

There was a time when Myrtle was its own species. And the somewhat similar Audubon warbler, with less distinct coloration and a yellow chin strap, were considered to be a separate species. The two species were merged by the birding universe’s powers that be. They are the only warbler that can digest the waxy berries produced by myrtle and bayberry bushes. They aren’t a rare warbler, at least not during migration. But we’ve never seen them here before.

Wouldn’t that gray, black, white, bright yellow make a great colorway for a yarn? Or an interesting way to find (or free) your fade?

It’s just not your normal Up North Michigan Spring. In so many ways, it’s not a normal Spring.

Irresistable Colorways

I really like Blue Moon Socks That Rock. I love the way this fingering weight yarn knits up with a good sturdy twist. Hardly ever any narly bits to cut out and deal with. But, this skein?  Well, this skein was a challenge. Several years ago I ended up with it via my guild’s brown bag swap. Pick a bag. Open it. Keep it or steal from someone ahead of you. Apparently no one wanted to steal this from me.

I ended up with 800 yards of this Blue Moon Socks that Rock. That was an expensive and generous offering for a brown bag swap.  The aptly named colorway is Muddy Autumn Droplets. I just could not figure out what to do with it and it languished in my stash until the coronovirus started rearing its ugly in early March. It wasn’t just the colorway. It was 800 yards of it.

I thought I’d wind it to get a full view of its barfworthiness.

Hmmm. Looking so much better. Those droplet blobs in the skein started looking more tameable.

I could not be happier with how this turned out! It’s Justyna Lorkowska’s wonderful freebie Close to You. Thousands of Ravelers have knit this beauty. My Muddy Autumn Droplets version is my third. Check out my more sedate versions here. I once blocked the lace section and another time decided against it. This time I lightly steamed the shawlette and left the lace a bit closed up and bouncy.

The only problem with my new Close to You is that it only used up 420 of my 800 yards of Muddy Autumn Droplets.

Reading in one of the main Ravelry forum soon after finishing my new Close to You, someone mentioned a pattern specifically designed to soothe the savage variegated beast. It’s Bristol Ivy’s freebie, Sallah Cowl. Sallah was published in Knitty in 2012. Ivy’s write-up on the pattern says: “Every knitter has a skein of wonderfully hand-painted and variegated sock yarn in their stash that they don’t have any idea what to do with. The colors — beautiful, vivid tones that meld harmoniously in the skein — clash horribly in any project they try. So what’s a knitter to do?” I don’t think that Muddy Autumn Droplets even melded harmoniously in the skein. But the pattern sounded like just what I needed.

This pattern, which is knit flat, used a new-to-me easy technique that made it even more appealing. All wrong side rows are worked on a US size 10  needle. All right side rows are worked on a size 5 needle. Some folks put both needles on the same interchangeable cable. But I decided to break out my straights and just use one size 10 and one size 5. Sallah is knit on the bias, in a twisted rib, and is finished off with applied I-Cord.

I had a great time knitting Sallah. But I admit to being daunted by the finishing. Between the directions in the pattern and Ivy’s supplement on her blog, I was successful in blocking Sallah to the required parallelogram. It took some significant tugging and a serious dunking. The fabric is very stretchy. That made the task easier than I anticipated.

You fold the end you started with (where you see my yarn butterfly ) to the left point.You fold the end you finished with (where you see the ball of yarn) to the right point. The pattern directs that you use mattress stitch to seam the cowl closed. Quite a few Ravelers have been stumped by how to make that mattress seam look neat and to keep it from gathering up. Taking a look at many of the Ravelry projects shows that not too many negotiated that successfully.

I took the lead of a few of the Ravelers, endorsed by Ivy as she answers questions about the pattern on her blog, and joined the seam with I-Cord. I used two needles and picked up the same number of stitches on each side of the seam. Then I worked the applied I-Cord connecting the cord by working through the stitches, using one from the front needle and one from the back–as you would for a 3-needle bindoff. I think it worked remarkably well. It also echoes the top and bottom I-Cord detail.

Here’s Glass Head modeling the cowl. I’ve already worn and enjoyed this drapey colorful cowl.

Sallah used up 330 yards. I declare Muddy Autumn Droplets put to rest and to good uses. The remaining small yardage is now relegated to my fingering weight oddments bag. It may yet appear as a dress for one of Evelyn’s dolls or stuffed buddies.