I love knitting for someone. I love taking this big ball of colored yarn and making something you can wear out of it... something someone can enjoy and keep themselves warm. I love putting a bit of me in the knitting -- making my own pattern, my own design, and more than all of that -- I love giving it away. A little bit of "Hey look what I can do" and "Hey, look what I did for you".

A few months ago, I made a snazzy™ hat for Michael (thank's for the photo).

I based the pattern of the hat on this simple pattern that I developed last winter. But instead of knitting it flat and then sewing up the seam, I knit it in the round with a fair isle pattern. The fair isle pattern is one I made up. I used this site to make the custom chart based on the guage. Then I used Macromedia Fireworks to sketch out the fair isle pattern.

• materials:
  • yarn: 3 balls of worsted weight yarn in contrasting colors. I used Lion's Brand Wool-Ease in Black, Wheat and Loden
  • needles: size 9 circular needle. I forget the length on it... probably 11"?
• pattern:
  • Cast on 100 stitches in color A (Black)
  • step 1: Create a 1x1 rib until the piece measures 1 inch. (in other words knit 1, purl 1 across the first row. On the second row knit 1, purl 1 across -- and make sure that the knit stitches are on top of the knit stitches on the row before... same goes to the purl stitches).
  • step 2: Continuing in Color A, knit the next two rows (stockinette)
  • step 3: Begin the fair isle pattern (see pattern below) Each row will use two colors. Be careful when floating the 2nd color behind the work that you don't pucker or bunch the knitting.
  • step 4: After you finish the fair isle pattern, the work should be about 4 1/2 or 5 inches long. If its shorter than that -- knit a few rows until reaching the desired length
  • step 5: Begin decrease: k2tog, *8k, k2tog repeat from * to end
    knit row
    k2tog, *7k, k2tog repeat from * to end
    knit row
    k2tog, *6k, k2tog repeat from * to end
    knit row
    continue in this fashion until 10 to 15 stiches remain (you'll see that the decreased stitches line up to form nice "darted" lines in the hat)
  • Finish: cut the yarn, leaving a 24 inch tail. Thread the tail through the remaining stitches and tie off. Weaving in ends.

Responses[7]

Posted by Jessica on March 12, 2006 2:46:46 PM EST #