Born to knit

In the Pink!

Last year for Christmas Johanne was given some lovely handspun yarn.
The spinning was a joint effort made by Wendy and L-B and the yarn had a lovely shine and feel to it.

Some of the fibre that was used was tencel, hence the shine.
And it was pink. Very pink. Johanne LOVES pink.

For nearly a year the two skeins have been waiting for a decision.
What do you make with bright, shiny, soft, handspun, merino-tencel yarn?
Well, this is what Johanne came up with:

A hat that would really show off the yarn.
The pattern is free and can be found here. It´s called Odessa and was designed by Grumperina.

The pattern really calls for beads – but the yarn was so beautiful in itself that it didn´t need beads.

Now Johanne has to get back to knitting the Carolina bolero that has been left sitting in the knitting basket for a week or two.
Because Johanne has reached the stage where you have to knit 80 repeats of lace around the body.

In order to finish it in time for a special occasion she needs to do eight repeats a day.
But seriously, does anyone think that she´ll really pull that off?
She even has doubts herself. And you can hear her muttering to herself:
– Well, it would be a different matter if only the yarn was pink...

Last Christmas

Johanne made these last year as a Christmas present for one of the children´s
nursery teachers. The pattern is one she made up as she went along,
but of course it is a very traditional Swedish/Norwegian one with the star.

Now, nearly a year later she can´t remember if she has already shown them
on her blog, or not.
But if she can´t remember the blog readers won´t remember either,
she reasons. Hehe.

Right now she´s busy knitting more Christmas presents for other recipients.
Though if you´d like to see them unwrapped you´ll have to come back
after Christmas.

In the meantime, here´s an early Christmas present for all Ye Faithful Blogreaders.

It´s a Free Hatpattern.

The yarn is pure cashmere bought at the Hipknits stand at Ally Pally.
But you can probably use Malabrigo, too.

Gauge: 18 stitches= 10 centimetres (about 4 inches) using needles 4-4,5
The hat measures 56 centimeters and fits Elise, who is nine years old.
And she specifically requested the ear flaps.

Start by making the earflaps.
Cast on three stitches.
Purl the first row (wrong side)
Increase two stitches at each side on every knit row until there are 25 stitches in all.

Cast on 20 stitches between the two earflaps = 70 stitches. This will be the neck.
Knit back and forth and increase two stitches on each side three times = 76 stitches

Cast on 24 stitches for the front = 100 stitches

Knit until it measures 12 centimeters at the back, from the cast on edge between the earflaps.
Now start decreasing 10 stitches evenly on the next row.
Knit two rows.
Continue to decrease 10 stitches on every third row until you have 30 stitches left.
Decrease 6 stitches on every third row three times = 12 stitches
Decrease 3 stitches, knit two rows.
Decrease 3 stitches and pull the yarn through the last three stitches and it´s nearly done!
Now it just needs a simple crochet edge.

Elise wants you all to know that she loves this hat and that it would
make a great last minute knitted Christmas gift for someone who
suffers from cold ears.