Fiber Arts Friday: Felting the Big Hat

Hubba liked the Big Hat.  It was a little loose, but it wasn't ridiculous.

He wore it for a couple of days.  I thought I was ok with it, but as your comments came in last week, it made me want to felt it even more.

So I took Hubba yarn shopping.  :-)

It's true.  He actually went with me into a yarn store and chose a yarn he would like to have a hat made out of.... so one day, he will have a different hat.  But don't worry about his head getting cold.  He already has an alpaca hat that fits him properly and a cotton hat that he loves but I dislike very much.  :-)

So I attempted to felt the Big Hat in a bucket of hot soapy water.  All it really did was slosh soapy water all over my feet.  :-/

While Sunday was a very nice day, it is still winter so I wasn't keen on getting myself sopping wet.  So I set it aside.

The next day I ran it through the wash with a load of towels... which brought horror to my knitting group's eyes.  But it worked.

The hat is thick and sturdy.  It fits suggly.  It perhaps could have been a tiny bit longer.  Which has me thinking about making another big hat.

I'm calling this one a good save.  :-)

Oh, and I no longer have to figure out how to take a photo of me in the mirror...

:-)

Happy Fiber Arts Friday!  Be certain to check in with everyone else over at Wisdom Begins in Wonder.

Fiber Arts Friday: A Simple Hat??

When I ripped out my bandana cowl a couple of weeks ago, I was traveling and still had plenty of knitting time ahead of me, so I decided to cast on a hat.

I've made this pattern a couple of times... back in my baby hats for adult-sized head days.  :-)

The pattern is written to be made flat, but I prefer to knit in the round.  So it's probably best to say this hat was inspired by that pattern, because honestly I didn't really follow the pattern all that well.

Hmmm.... are we uncovering something here?  Oh, no.  We already knew that engineers don't follow directions very well.  Even if I'm not practicing, I am still recovering.  ;-)

Anyway, the detail isn't exactly as designed and the hat looked more like a bucket than it's supposed to, but I thought it was still pretty cute.

Then I blocked it.

Gently, mind you.  No pins.  No stretching.  I just soaked it, layed it out flat and turned the edges down.  I thought it would help even-out the stitches a little.  Which it did, but geez... big hat, Big Hat, BIG HAT!

It's really hard to take a picture of yourself in the mirror
when you can't see because your hat is too big.

Seriously, what is up with me making big stuff lately?  Remember this gem??  Ugh

I'm afraid this one may be frogged too.

Maybe it's the yarn?

It's nearly 4 skeins (including what's in the hat and used to be in the cowl) that is left over from the Plumber Sweater I made a while back.  It's a soft, commercial, alpaca yarn.  I really like working with it.  But I think no matter how much I want to finish it off, it wants to stay in my stash.

Although, I am sorta thinking that a turn in a hot soapy bucket of water with a plunger might serve as a warning to the 2 1/2 skeins waiting to torment me.  ;-)

Happy Fiber Arts Friday!  :-D

Just for Fun

A friend in Minnesota wanted to see how Clementine is growing up, so I took my camera out to see what I could capture...

I captured the "puppies" showing off.

Wonton beating up Noodle

 These girls love, and I mean LOVE, to wrestle.

Can you see the smile on Wonton's face?

Posing for pictures

The Alpaca Dog likes to get in the middle of it too.

He's the small dog now, but he's still the top dog.  Wonton still has a smile on her face. :-)

And of course I got a few shots of Clementine and her friends.  :-)

Clementine with her momma, Kocoa and Daisy

All of our girls having breakfast together

Apple wants to make sure we don't forget that she is cute too

Clementine be four months old next week.

We'll be asking the vet to come out in the coming weeks to make sure all of our "pregnant" dams are in fact pregnant and to give everyone their annual vaccinations.

We are also starting to make plans for breeding Noodle next year.  We will have her hips and elbows certified.  Then, assuming all is well, we plan to breed her in November-ish.

Fiber Arts Friday: Spinning Llama

I have spun Huacaya Alpaca, Suri Alpaca, Paco-Vicuna and Baby Camel so llama was the last of the domesticated camelids I had to spin.

I picked this batt up at the Estes Park Wool Market last spring.

Much like the Paco-Vicuna I spun in November, this llama has a beautiful color variation.

It is softer than I expected and quite easy to spin even though the batt had a lot of vegetable matter in it... so much actually, that I'm seriously considering moving that picker higher up on my to acquire list.  :-)

The final result is 2 ounces and 79 yards.

I'm not crazy about the little curlie-ques in this yarn.  I think they are there because I was trying to pull out the VM on the fly and therefore continued to treadle.  Oops.  That being said, it was a nice fiber to work with and I would like to spin llama from a roving sometime. :-)

Be sure to check in with the other Fiberistas over at Wisdom Begins in Wonder because it is Fiber Arts Friday!

Thinking and Writing, but not Posting

I have a lot of things going on in my brain... as evidenced by the 90 drafted blog posts I have.

But I have not been posting much.... as evidenced by the 5 weeks of only FAF posts.

Some of this is because I've been getting ready for going live, now live and in the midst of hyper-care with a software tool that I've been working on for the last several months.

Some of this is because I don't talk about my client's business here.

Some of this is also because I think that Project Management, in and of itself, is not very interesting to write about.

And finally some of this is because I've been working on some things that I'm not ready to talk about yet.

Some of these things are evolving, growing and developing.  So I am hoping that I will be able to move some of my thoughts and ideas beyond the draft stage soon.  :-)

Fiber Arts Friday: Peaceful Knitting?

This was supposed to be a small bit of peaceful knitting to get me through the end-of-the-year-crazy-ness.

I was using a much smaller yarn and needles than the pattern recommended.  I did a swatch and made some adjustments to the pattern.

I'm not entirely sure when I started to think that something wasn't right. But I kept knitting, trusting in the edits I had made.

Finally on Saturday I decided I had to try it on. I moved the cowl from the needles to waste yarn. I used a crochet hook because I was traveling and am certain that tapestry needles are not allowed in the carry-on luggage.  For the record a crochet hook works, but it's much easier and faster to do this with a tapestry needle.

My suspicion was confirmed... my cowl was huge. :-/  The finished cowl is supposed to be about 12 inches long from the top to the point. At the time of this photo it was about 18 inches and 75% complete. So frogged, it has been. :-(

The Bandana Cowl is a lovely pattern.  It is exactly what I wanted...  very simple but with enough short-rows to keep it interesting.  I enjoyed working it and am sad that I did not do this pattern justice.

I will make a few more adjustments next time.  Or perhaps, I will just use the recommended yarn and needle size.  ;-)

Please be certain to head over to Wisdom Begins in Wonder to see the wonderful-ness that everyone else has been up to for Fiber Arts Friday.

Fiber Arts Friday: Swatching

I've had and idea for a project in my head for quite some time.  It requires hand-spun yarn, which I finished spinning last summer.

I had been pretty convinced I would use the linen stitch, but I wanted this project to be simple and reversible.  So a review of my stitch catalogs and a few swatches later, I think I have a plan.

Happy Fiber Arts Friday!