Operation Christmas Child two

The hat and gloves for the second shoe box are done.
The gloves gave me problems. I had to keep adding rows to make them longer. I am surprised how big the hands of my 11 year old daughter are. Her thumb is almost the same length as mine.
She choose the hat pattern, I searched free hat patterns for Aran yarn on Ravelry. She then picked this one, it is called short-row wavy hat. Because I used a tweed yarn there are no waves on the hat.
It has a very interesting construction and is knit back and forth.

I am not sure what the yarn is. I got the yarn from my friend Johanne a few years ago.
I do know it is 100% wool and looks slightly felted.
I used exactly one skein for the gloves and the hat.
We think the yarn could be Rowanspun Aran.
I have been looking on the internet to find a shadecard with a colour match but I have drawn a blank. The colour is also very hard to capture on camera. It is a beautiful deep purple.
Now I have to finish off both shoe boxes.
Next Monday I will take them to my daughters school and then they are on their way to make somebody happy, or I hope so.
It has been fun to knit a few small projects. I decided against a scarf, the shoebox would have been to full.
I started another knitting project, The Lady February Sweater. Again I came accross this pattern on Ravelry. I am using stash yarn, yeah, yeah. I have 17 balls of Jaeger Extra Fine Merino Aran in 552 Dahlia. The colour is a lovely reddish pink.
More about progress on that in a few days.

Operation Christmas Child

Schools around here take part in the yearly Operation Christmas Child. Every year we have enjoyed picking little gifts to put in a shoebox and until this year we used to buy a hat, scarf, gloves combo from a supermarket.

This year I thought I should knit a set.
I certainly have enough yarn.
I had bought a ball of red chunky yarn in Switzerland.
I was testing it for Sylvi. It is a good yarn and deserves consideration. I bought it in the Manor department store it is their brand.


The blue yarn is Wendy Merino from my stash. I surfed Ravelry for some free pattern and based the hat on this pattern.
I checked the cast on for the mittens but did the rest by eye. I frogged the first mitten because I thought it was to small. I used my own personal toddler for size. Because she is small I knew I had to size them up. We are aiming at an age range for 2-4 years. I hope whoever gets this shoebox will be happy with all the contents. We had fun choosing sweets today. Our local high street has a new old fashioned sweets store.
Another store had the little finger puppets.
Both shopkeepers asked us if we were shopping for the shoeboxes!
I will now attempt to knit a hat and maybe scarf and fingerless mittens for a teenager.

Frou Frou

The week has flown past again. Where did the days go?
I finished knitting the sleeves last weekend. I knitted them in the round and actually took them out and about with me.
Then Monday and Tuesday was spent with the neckline border and finishing touches.
I got the Frou Frou pattern with a magazine called The Knitter. It is a new magazine and has lovely pattern aimed at a more experienced knitter. Frou Frou has been taken from Sublime Pattern book tough.
I used Rowan Fine Milk Cotton yarn. It is a nice 4ply yarn that my local yarn store sells. No other reason really. I also wanted to try the yarn.
I needed four balls of yarn. I wish I had knitted the sleeves a few rows shorter and then I would have used only three balls. The colour I used is called Sherbert.
My LYS had a nice blingy button to go with it. Miss T loves a bit of bling.
Yesterday we went to see Debbie Bliss, Miss T did a photo shoot for her new book. Miss T wore a dress knit with a lovely organic yarn. Can't wait for the book and yarn to come out in spring.
Miss T was much better modeling for Debbie than she is for me.
I can barley get her to stand still for 2 seconds.
But I don't have an assistant and a baby groomer.
Not that she needed much grooming!

Frilled to bits

After I finished Decimal I went and got Frou Frou out again. I was stuck somewhere on the right front.
I had increased the length on the back and had to incorporate the extra rows in the front and recalculate the slant decreases.
Forgetting the pattern at home while I went to Switzerland did not help. I abandoned Frou Frou and started Decimal.
I like knitting frills. I love the way knitting works. My oldest daughter used to love them to. There was a time when all her knitted clothes had to have frills.
I like the ones on Frou Frou, they look like little pleats.
I started the sleeves yesterday. I first knit them as it is stated in the pattern. But then I thought I should knit them in the round. I frogged them and started again. With a little luck I have two finished sleeves by the end of the weekend.
We are booked into a photo studio to have a photo done off all 18 grandchildren. Hope the photographer gets them all to look at the camera at the same time! We have so far not managed at family parties.

Decimal

My Summer knitting for 2009 is done.
I finished Decimal last night. I am very happy with the result. It is a good fit. I knitted the Medium size, I used Rowan Cotton Glace in Excite. I knitted the pattern as stated. The same amount of rows etc. In the end I used about 10 3/4 balls of yarn.

I think the pattern is well written and had no problems with it. Only the neck button border took some thinking and ripping. I used my usual end of row technique. I always slip the first stitch of every row and I always knit the last no matter whether it the pattern tells me to purl. I learned to knit this way in school. I do it so automatic I don't think about it. Decimal uses a similar edge stitch. I was not sure how many stitches the designer wanted me to pick up along the edges.
I am happy with the result, I think I did it as was intended.
My yarn store had lovely matching buttons to go with my yarn.
I need to sort out my hand knits and store this one away until spring 2010.
Yes, in case you are wondering, I did have my hair done. My first ever high lights. I am still not sure if I like them?