March 2008 Archives

Yarn: Lana Grossa Multicot (50g; 80m; 60% Cotton, 40% Microfiber). 2 balls in #39 Purple, 1 ball in #1 White. (Purchase here.)
Needles: US5 and US7 dpns
Notions: Stitch markers, tapestry needle

Gauge: 18 sts x 24 rows = 4" on US7

Size: Fits adult head 21" and larger! This hat is 8" tall.

Skills: knitting in the round, paired decreases, chart reading, intarsia

First, knit the lining. Start with US5 needles; using a provisional cast-on and waste yarn, cast on 90 sts. Place marker. Join and knit in stockinette for 26 rows.

Switch to US7 needles and p 1 row. This is your turning row. K 6 rows, placing a second marker between the 45th and the 46th st. This marks the middle/front of your work, and serves as reference point for your intarsia work. All intarsia will be knit in stockinette stitch. Begin pattern chart of 25 sts x 19 rows.

Having finished the chart, k 1 row, removing middle marker.

Adjust any loose stitches on your intarsia work. Turn hat inside out and use the tapestry needle to anchor all loose ends firmly into the inside of the work. Trim all ends to 2". Turn hat out. Fold lining in at the purled turning row, so that the purl sides are facing each other, and thus covering the back of your worked intarsia.

Next row: Undo about 4-6 sts of the lining at a time, and knit 1 lining st together with 1 hat st.

Knit 9 more rows, placing a st marker every 15 sts (6 total). Continue with decreases according to chart. Cut yarn, leaving a 6" tail. Thread tail through remaining 6 sts, draw tight and secure. Weave in end into the inside of the hat.

Block and wear with vegan pride!

© 2008 Mary Joy Gumayagay and Indus3ous.com. All rights reserved. This pattern may be freely distributed as long as the pattern, images, text, and this copyright notice remain intact and no profit is made from its distribution or use. Read extended copyright here. For pattern assistance please post in comments below.

According to a couple of climbing friends, this here hat is not a hat, it's a tuque. Granted, they were Canadian/Irish, and James has indicated that his mission in the world (of climbing, at least), is to make everyone aware that these things, these tube things you put on your head to keep it warm? These things are called "tuques". Pronounced "two-k". So in honor of you, James and Carole, this post is named thus.

The tuque is your standard pattern: knit up from the bottom with decreases.

I made paired decreases, a break from spirals. Plus, BFF has deemed spirals "too girly", whatever that means. He has no idea. His next "tuque", the one with "@S!*#&", will have spiral decreases. Subtle revenge is sweet.

I knit in a lining. In part it's because the knit side is much smoother against the skin than the purl side; in part to cover the intarsia to prevent clumsy man hands from snagging on the the yarn. The hat's stayed in decent shape so far.

I'll be honest and show you a closeup of my crappy intarsia! You'll notice the tight tension on the y descender, and how much better it is toward the top. Intarsia's a little difficult to master, but challenges are good. I'm not about to embark on something complicated (hello, Miss Pamela and her Piers pullover), I just thought I'd give it a try. Also? I ripped this thing out quite a few times and walked away from it. Almost tossed it into the Aegean. It was frustrating but well worth the effort.

Here's the tuque back home in Germany. Don't let that momentary sunlight in the window fool you! It's been snowing for 7 days now and we're jonesing for the wonderful sun in Greece...

Pattern to come shortly.

It's been snowing since we returned from Greece! Goodness! Whatever happened to spring?

Part of BFF's birthday present (Greece being the big one) was knitting a hat he'd requested for the last 3 months. It wasn't an ordinary hat, no no; it was this particular beauty that he wanted, ever since we watched some biathlon event on tv and a German athlete whizzed by wearing a purple hat with an embroidered Milka logo.

"I want one of those," were his precise words. "Sure," I replied. It took a serendipitous trip to a nearby yarn store that was closing to get the yarn; an almost accurate match in color. I had some leftover cream-colored yarn so I decided to use them together, even though the purple yarn was a cotton mix and the cream yarn was a wool mix. (BFF won't know!) I had to explain to him that in knitting, each letter is made of v-shaped stitches; there was no way I was going to embroider this over knitting.

So.

You'll notice my knitting says "Soy..." Well, I did indeed chart the word "Milka" in script style and showed it to BFF, who approved it. But when it came time to actually knitting it, he changed his mind. "How about Soya?" he asked, so out came the pen and grid paper (actually, I did it in Adobe Illustrator). A few minutes later I had a new chart, and I actually had him pencil his signature on a piece of paper to approve it. (Clients. You know, get them to sign off on a project before they change their mind. You'll save a lot of trouble on your part later on.)

This is the back of my intarsia. It took me a few days to figure out how I was going to do it. Should I strand the yarn all over the hat? Should I cut 4 long strands of yarn and use one for each letter? In the end, I used one strand and knit with it across every row. On odd rows I worked the yarn from right to left. On even rows, I left a long loop of yarn and knit with this loop, then pulled the excess yarn through the stitches. As well, to avoid having a visible tension between side stitches on each row, I anchored the working yarn two stitches from the intarsia. This technique is by no means original; Rick Mondragon (the current editor of Knitting Magazine) first documented it. A better explanation of this technique is blogged about here.

Pardon the lighting, I knit the hat while in Greece and didn't have time for props and proper lighting and blah blah blah. I'm about to join the lining and hat stitches together. Don't be like me and put the lining stitches on needles and attempt to fold them into the hat. First fold the lining in, then undo the provisional cast-on 4-8 stitches at a time. I poked quite a few holes in the hat using my dummy method!

Here's the finished birthday hat on my birthday boy! He wore the hat all throughout the rest of our stay in Greece, and he received many compliments, from climbers, on it. Now he wants a hat that says "@$!*#&". Oh shitsky, what have I started?