Flossie's socks

After seeing my knitting socks for the boys, Flossie took the opportunity to persuade her mother to knit socks for her. After nearly a year Julie decided that sock knitting was not for her and handed them over to me to finish.



The yarn is the very pretty Regia 4-fadig color in colour 5025. Regular sock recipe knitted on 2.25mm needles over 48 stitches.

A brand new...

...wolf cub.


Adam joined the boy scouts this week. He had been about to burst with excitement before the first meeting, and was constantly taking every opportunity to point out ways in which he was already acting like a boy scout.

Today the local pack did a fund-raising popcorn sale outside a local supermarket. Adam went along for one shift and had, apparently, a wonderful time. Now he is counting the days until the first scout camping trip.

Lizard progress

I have continued to work on my lizard ridge patches. I am loving how the colours develop through the pattern.

I have 16 squares done out of 24 required. I have 4 balls of Kureyon left and I think I will also make some patched out of the scraps from the other squares. It's nice mindless knitting, but with the short-row pattern being enough to keep my attention. I can do a square an evening, so progress is pretty quick...but I dont want to finish this just yet so will be starting another project shorly.

The first in our new series: Large Vegetables

These came in the farm box this week - the boys though they were hilarious!

Yoda hat: more of the same (and pattern)

There is no point having a mother who knits, if she can't knit you both Yoda hats...




Knitted Yoda Hat
Finished size: 18-21” stretched to fit child or small adult (fits me!)
Gauge: 22 sts/4” on 4.5mm dpn or circulars
Yarn: Rowan Pure Wool DK in Shade 020
Quantity: 1 ball (125m /126 yards)



Hat:
Cast on 88 stitches and join to knit in the round.
K2p2 rib for 1.5”
Knit every round for ½”
Knitting the forehead wrinkles - this is “freeform” . I knitted 3 ridges as follows:
Row1 and 2: purl 22 stitches knit rest of round
Row 3 and 4: knit round
Row 5 and 6: knit 2 purl 18 knit 2, knit rest of round
Row 7 and 8: knit round
Row 9 and 10: purl 22 stitches, knit rest of round
Knit all rounds until hat measures 5” (more if you have a bigger head!)
Start decreases as follows:
Row 1: (k9 k2tog) repeat
Row 2: knit
Row 3: (k8 k2tog) repeat
Row 4: knit
Row 5: (k7 k2tog) repeat
Row 6: knit
Row 7: (k6 k2tog) repeat
Row 8: Knit
Row 9: (k5 k2tog) repeat
Row 10: (k4 k2tog) repeat
Row 11: (k3 k2tog) repeat
Row 12: k2tog repeat
Row 13: k2tog break yarn and thread through remaining stitches. Secure.




Ears - Knit 2 the same. Following a suggestion of some of the knitters I knit the latest ears with the yarn held double which made them stiffer:
Cast on 11 stitches leaving approx 12” tail.
Knit every stitch working back and forth.
Knit 3 rows
Next row increase by knitting into the front and back of the first and last stitch
Knit 1 row
Next row increase by knitting into the front and back of the first and last stitch (15 stitches)
Knit 7 rows
Decreases as follows:

1. Knit 6 k2tog knit 7 (14)
2. knit
3. Knit 6 k2tog knit 6 (13
4. knit
5. Knit 5 k2tog knit 6 12
6. knit
7. Knit 5 k2tog knit 5 11
8. knit
9. Knit 4 k2tog knit 5 10
10. knit
11. knit
12. Knit 4 k2tog knit 4 9
13. knit
14. knit
15. Knit 3 k2tog knit 4 8
16. knit
17. knit
18. Knit 3 k2tog knit 3 7
19. knit
20. knit
21. Knit 2 k2tog knit 3 6
22. knit
23. knit
24. Knit 2 k2tog knit 2 5
25. knit
26. knit
27. knit
28. Knit 1 k2tog knit 2 4
29. knit
30. knit
31. knit
32. Knit 1 k2tog knit 1 3
33. knit
34. knit
35. knit
36. Knit 1 k2tog
37. k2tog break thread and draw through stitch to secure. Hide thread by weaving through purl bumps

Finishing
Weave in ends.
Use cast-on thread from ears to secure to hat at sides. I sewed the ears with a slight fold so that the top of the ear was slightly forward of the bottom of the ear to create a floppy appearance.

May the Force be with you.

If anyone knits one of these I would be interested to hear about it!

The hat: finished it is

Following extensive preparation during Clone Wars, and various viewings of the Star Wars DVDs, I have finished the Yoda hat. Here is Finlay being like Yoda...


I made up the pattern, and it took me one afternoon and evening to knit it - which is good as I have at least one more in my future!

Its knitted in 4.5mm needles in Rowan Pure Wool DK in shade 20. The hat took 1 ball with a few yards remaining.

So, now to cast on number 2!

Lurid socks

Very lurid socks for Finlay. The usual recipe with a rib cuff and plain feet. The yarn is Regia 4-fach Ringel color in shade 5048. I got this at the yarn swap with the Knitting Meetup.

Despite it being over 95 degrees outside Finlay is insisting on wearing them!

End of summer

We had friends over for a BBQ so the boys made lemonade with the last of our lemons.



I still can't get over having my own lemon tree - there was one outside the rental I lived in when I first came the the US and it seemed so exotic. I had tried to grow citrus in my conservatory when I lived in the UK but never with any success - so was thrilled to find a tree loaded with lush lemons in arms reach of my porch. When we bought this house almost the first thing we did was plant a lemon tree and an orange. The lemon is doing better and we get a reasonable crop these days so I almost never have to buy a lemon.

Klaralund complete

I finished my Klaralund sweater and I thinkI'm more pleased with this than I have been with any sweater for a while. Of course the lovely Silk Garden yarn helps, but the fit and style of this make it a really wearable garment...or at least I think it will be wearable once fall arrives here!


I started knitting this in the UK on vacation, and had finished the knitting before I came back - so total knitting time less than a month. I lightly steam pressed the pieces before sewing it together. Although the knitting is mostly stockinette I dont seem to get bored of knitting it in the lovely colours. The sides have actually matched up pretty well although I made no effort to match them. I did have concerns about the horizontal stripes, but I chose a more delicate colour of the Silk Garden to minimize the stripiness, and I think that worked well.

Details: The pattern is Klaralund from the Cornelia Tuttle Hamilton Book Number 2. The pattern comes with an errata which I found rather confusing because although there are additional sizes, they are replacements for the original sizes rather than additions. I actually knitted a combination of the 41" and 42" sizes. The pattern is really straightforward and easily lends itself to modifications.

The yarn is Silk Garden in colour 268 and used a tad over 11 balls (rather than the 12 called for in the pattern). I seamed with sock yarn as the Silk Garden is rather breakable. I spit spliced the joins so no ends to weave in.

A resounding thumbs-up for this sweater.

A ride in the woods

Over the long weekend we discovered a new (to us) bike trail. We drove out to Pescadero Creek State Park and rode the Old Haul Road Trail.

The trail is an old logging road that runs five miles between Portola Redwoods State Park and Pescadero Creek Park. The trail is quite hilly and we made it half-way there before turning back. When I say "hilly" I mean for small boys who found it rather hard work, we had to walk up quite a lot of the uphill grades, but they did enjoy the downhills!

The trail is shady and was pretty cool, we didnt see much wildlife, but given the noise the boys make that is probably not surprising! There was not much other traffic on the trail.

The whole area was logged until the mid-1970s and there is a lot of evidence of logging.

On the way back we stopped at one of the view points off Skyline:

A large part of the area off the West side of Skyline Blvd is Open Space preserve, and various state parks.