Knit Notes

I have a new finished project to show you!  Knitting has become a very favorite way for me to have something to work on when watching the scenery go by as we are driving, or watching a recorded show, or following a YouTube channel.  Plus, fabric and yarn can very often be found together, so that's a bonus when we are going places.  My yarn and fabric purchases are kind of like souvenirs.

This is called the Easy Ombre Slouch Hat, designed by Paul S. Neary.  Available for free on Ravelry.  Thank you Mr. Neary!  If you aren't familiar with Ravelry, it's a huge online knit & crochet website that is full of patterns (both free and purchased), yarn info, and a whole community of knitters.  It's a great resource.  But I saw this hat sample originally at The Knotty Lamb Yarn Shop. I really liked this shop, there was a lot that interested me.  The only bad thing about it was that I didn't find it until the last day that we were in the area.  We stayed at a winery not far from Forest Grove, and went there a few times to use wifi at a coffee shop.  I had decided that I wanted to re-visit the method for color-stranded knitting that I had learned about 35 years ago and hadn't used it since.  The woman working in the shop showed me an example of this hat and told me that it was what they used to teach a beginning class on colorwork.  This is the type of stitch that is used in Fair Isle knitting, a knit style often placed on the yokes of a sweater with several colors.  Anyway, I bought the 2 colors of yarn that I liked, Georgia Pink and Pewter gray, and put the project in the queue.  The yarn was very nice to work with, it's a House DK weight by The House of a la Mode.  And I was able to order a pretty furball that matched the gray from FFFabuknits on Etsy.  I do wish that I had used a smaller needle size for the cast on and ribbing, just to tighten that edge up a bit more.  I do have quite a bit of yarn left over, and maybe I'll see if I can get another color that would go with the pink to make another hat.  What would you think of a dark blue?