The pattern details are here.

I love it! It took a lot of blocking (hot steam from the iron) to get the front to straighten out and become a perfect square. I hope it stays that way with use!

I've run into one issue while crocheting this pattern: because the front and back are both solidly-colored, it's not possible to use yarn scraps of various colors. Even partial skeins have to be quite substantial to last all the way - about 30 grams of each color. I'm trying to limit myself to my stash of Tahki Cotton Classic as much as I can, and I've arranged a few trades on Ravelry to supplement what I have in matching dye lots. But I will need to buy a few new skeins as well. Not necessarily a bad thing :).

Five potholders, front and back (plus last-minute runs to the yarn shop, plus blocking, plus tags, plus photos...) is not something I can whip up in a weekend, unfortunately. I only wish I was that fast with a crochet hook. I felt a ping of pain for every pattern I tested which ended up on the chopping block. Tick-tock-tick-tock, every second is precious.

But despite this, I couldn't bring myself to settle on something "meh," nor did I consider dropping out. Any time I think, "Maybe I can't do it this year," I just look at the potholders I got in the swap the last time around. Hello. I still love you.

With that in mind, I lined up some excellent potential patterns, which I listed in my last post. What made them excellent, in my mind, is a combination of prettiness and a near guarantee that they would work in my hands (no time to waste, see above). And while I gave many of them a go, at the end I settled on something completely unexpected.

Meet motif #6 from a Japanese book called "Handmade Crochet Book." I purchased my copy here on eBay. The store, Pomadour's Craft Café, has an amazing selection of Japanese crafting books and supplies. I've always been very pleased with the customer service, too.

My choice of a potholder pattern from this book was completely unexpected because the book was originally purchased for the purpose of crocheting this beautiful scarf I saw on Posie Gets Cozy. But after trying a number of potholder patterns without an "a-ha!" moment, I suddenly remembered, "Hey, didn't that scarf book have some interesting potholders?" Ta-da!

Please pardon our wrinkles; we aren't yet blocked.

The pattern is lovely, delicate, and simple. I only need a chart for the first few rounds. After that, the rounds build upon one another in a very logical way. This is especially helpful because I've had to add 3 additional rounds to meet the minimum swap size requirement (6") - piece of cake.

For the back I'm using an old standby from the 2009 swap: Solid Square (#149) from 200 Crochet Blocks. I'm making it all one color, though. I haven't yet decided about the frilly edging, whether I'll make it the same color as the potholder back, or a third color all together.

And now that I've settled on a pattern, I will crochet like a maniac! The deadline awaits! Onward!

It's actually not that complicated! Who knew?!? (Though I feel a bit like a dentist.)

I am corralling my Tahki Cotton Classic leftovers from the 2009 Crocheted Hot Pads and Potholders Swap, so I can participate in the 2010 edition (on Ravelry, on Flickr).

The deadline is near, so I don't have a lot of time to muck around. I'm contemplating the following patterns:

• Tried to look pretty potholder, after seeing Lauren's.
• Circle of Friends hexagon, crocheted by kelp! (I actually don't know the source of the pattern, I should ask Kelly)
• Your nana's potholders designed by the Crochet Mistress herself, Maryse.
• Stir Me Up Potholders designed by Mintyfresh Erin. The spiral lover in me is drawn to these like a fly to a light (though my current selection of Tahki Cotton Classic is not super conducive to making pretty versions of these, I think).
• The gazillion different patterns in 200 Crochet Blocks and Beyond-the-Square Crochet Motifs (but I'm trying to stay away, because I inevitably get sucked in, and try way too many options).

I am trying to find a friend for this beautiful yarn (Madelinetosh tosh sock in Magenta), so I can knit the gorgeous Transition Gloves. I had seen the pattern before, but my interest heightened tremendously after Grace at the Kathryn Ivy blog knit these gorgeous ones.

I'm having a hard time picking something that will make a nice contrast, but won't be white/cream!

I am working on two FO posts :).

How about you?

Pattern: Moderne Baby Blanket from Mason-Dixon Knitting.

I made small changes to the pattern as I went along, based on the amount of yarn I had available. But the overall construction is true to the original. The only notable change is that instead of knitting the border, I crocheted two rounds of SC: the idea of picking up hundreds of stitches only to bind them all off three rows later terrified me.

Needles: US 6 circs, INOX express and KnitPicks nickel-plated Options.

Yarn: Gedifra Korfu (white 2025, light green 2011, dark green 2068) and Classic Elite Sundance (Peacock Feather 6249). Both yarns are 50% cotton and 50% microfiber, about 85 yards per ball. Though the yarns are similar, they are not exactly the same. (And, of course, I prefer the discontinued Korfu. Of course.)

I'm not sure how much of each color I used. My scale weighs in the finished blanket at 1 pound and 10.5 ounces (750 grams), which comes out to 15 balls of yarn total. The finished size of the blanket is about 38.5" x 30", just a little bit larger than specified in the pattern.

The blanket is hefty, but it didn't become the sort of suffocating monster I once envisioned. It's actually quite soft, fluffy, and cushy! Despite Gedifra and Sundance label instructions (both yarns indicate machine-wash cold, dry flat), I tossed the blanket into the washer and dryer. I think the dryer helped with fluffiness :).

Someone asked if I tested each of the yarns for colorfastness before knitting them all together. I hadn't. I didn't anticipate any big surprises because dye did not come off on my hands while I was knitting. In the end, Classic Elite Sundance did bleed a little bit onto neighboring light-colored sections. But not enough to make me worry about ruining future washes.

What I like the most about the finished blanket are the tidy lines between the different blocks. I found myself paying a lot of attention to that as I was picking up stitches, making sure that the connections would be as straight as possible. Since half a stitch or an entire stitch is lost during the process, I often picked up one more stitch than the pattern specified. I also like that the back side of the blanket looks almost as neat as the front!

  

(click for bigger)

I enjoyed knitting this blanket, but I'm not sure I would knit it again. Each section is connected to the one worked before, so very quickly the project becomes a giant undertaking: not easily maneuverable, and not at all portable. Garter stitch compresses greatly in the vertical direction, making noticeable progress that much slower. I think knitting something like the mitered square blanket is easier for me, since it's worked in manageable parts (but not so many that the seaming would make me go bonkers). How about you?

The second reason is my stubborn insistence that I will have enough yarn, regardless of how much (or little) yarn I actually have, and how wrong I am about the sizing (see above). Baby knits are supposed to be stash-busters, right? So... if I have one ball, even if it's only 87 yards of worsted weight yarn, it will be enough for a 2-year old size!?! Even if I'm not stash-busting, I will buy only one or two skeins of yarn, thinking it should be enough. I can be such an idiot sometimes.

My latest habit is to acquire precious skeins of handspun (which are typically available only one skein at a time anyway), and try to morph them into winter sweaters for all those friends who are expecting in May and June. So, sized somewhere in the 12-months range. This is a FAIL every time. One skein of handspun, typically created from 4 ounces of fiber, will NOT be enough for a 12-months-sized baby sweater! (But newborn sized? Definitely!)

And yet, I persist.

It's exactly what I first tried to do with this gorgeous handspun Polwarth yarn (approximately 220 yards, 5 stitches per inch on US 6 needles). The fiber was dyed by David at Southern Cross Fibre, and spun by my talented friend Stacie (see more handspun goodies in her Etsy shop). The colorway is called "Budgie."

The yarn is incredible. It's my first time using Polwarth (check-mark in the using something other than merino box), and it feels like cotton balls - fluffy and squishy, while at the same time having a nice density, too. Stacie spun it brilliantly, with slow transitions from one color to the next. If you read Stacie's blog you'll see that she puts a lot of thought into the way she spins her yarns, envisioning specific variegations and transitions before she even starts.

It was easy to become mesmerized and hypnotized while knitting this yarn. Honestly, I wouldn't take back the four or five hours I worked with it for anything - they were a pure joy. But soon enough I realized that I wouldn't have enough to finish the baby cardigan I had started. Close, but not quite.

My typical solution would have been to rip and knit a smaller size. But I have a specific recipient in mind, and her baby boy is due in May - a newborn-sized cardi won't do her any good during the sweltering New England summer. I hemmed and hawed and decided to stripe the Polwarth with another yarn: Classic Elite Princess in Ladylike Leaf (3497). I've had this yarn in the stash for what seems like forever.

The 2-row narrow stripes were inspired by a stripey baby cardigan that Elinor recently finished. I was also encouraged by Brooklyntweed's Alberta vest, in which he combined solid and handspun yarns with beautiful results. Honestly, if I had the option, I would have preferred to knit the whole sweater from handspun. I was (and still am) worried that the solid, bright lime green detracts from the more subdued and sophisticated Budgie, that the intervening lime stripes hide the gentle color transitions of the handspun yarn.

At the very least, there's no chance I will run out of yarn ;). And I'm happy with that option, this time around.

 

I wanted to share with you the way in which I work 2-row stripes when knitting flat (back and forth). This is a technique I picked up from Vivian Hoxbro's Shadow Knitting, eons ago. It results in a very neat chain stitch edge along both sides of the work, even the one where the color changes take place. The edges can be left as is, seamed easily, or finished with a button band, etc. The rules are as follows:

1. Do not cut the working yarn after every stripe; instead, it will be carried up the side of the work. This goes without saying, but sometimes it must be said :).
2. On every single row (right- and wrong-side) slip the first stitch knit-wise, and purl the last stitch. One exception: work the first row after cast-on without special treatment (knit all or purl all stitches).
3. Make you color changes on right-side rows. To do so, pick up the new color from beneath the old. I think of this as bringing in the new color from the right relative to the old. (If this is not clear, knit a swatch: you'll be able to tell right away if you're doing this right.)
4. At the beginning of your right-side rows (where the color changes take place), keep the stitches artificially loose. They edge will get quite tight if you don't.
5. Take the slipped stitches into account when you plan your pattern: you will be losing 2 stitches in width if you slip the edge stitches.

I so much wanted this project to work out. Though the adorable baby model is hard to ignore, I think the sweater and hat are very cute on their own. My choice of yarn, however, was disastrous. Elann.com Lara, which I've used once before (in a supporting role), would be wonderful for a summer tank, or a flowing scarf. It is slinky, silky, and drapey. It is not substantive, stretch-proof, or immune to snags: a good baby sweater it does not make.

In addition, the pattern is written... awkwardly. That's the best word, I think. Along the lines of Debbie Bliss patterns, if you know what I mean: hats knitted flat, many small pieces where there could have been only one, and weirdly-placed seams where it would have been simpler to just make two separate pieces. I don't think it's without hope, but I know if I were to knit this again, I'd alter how the whole thing is constructed.

Anyway, why speak ill of the dead? Instead, let's talk about a much-needed upgrade. I was so bummed by this Tugboat coat not working out, and a bunch of other misbehaving knits, that I wanted to knit a "sure thing" next.

Harvey Kimono | Natural Knits for Babies and Moms by Louisa Harding

See, this one has a cute baby, too!

Though I've leafed through Natural Knits for Babies and Moms before, it caught my attention recently when Danielle knit the Harvey Kimono for Elinor's baby, Odysseus. Elinor nonchalantly mentioned, "He wears this a lot because it is so easy to get on and off," and that was the "sure thing" moment for me.

Now that I've given the book a second look, I actually like it quite a bit. It has a lot of true basics: very simple pullovers, cardigans, vests, dresses, booties, and hats, in sizes from newborn to 12 months. They are not embellished, overly complicated, and are constructed in a straightforward way. I think such patterns are good to have in one's knitting arsenal: sometimes it's tricky (and annoying) to add all those "extras" when the whole sweater is, like, the size on an index card :).

Another thing that really piqued my curiosity in this book is that the majority of the projects, including the Harvey Kimono, are knit using Green Mountain Spinnery Cotton Comfort (80% wool/20% organic cotton, 180 yards/2 oz. skein). What is this yarn, and why is it used so much? Have you tried it? I had to find out.

I bought two skeins in a Ravelry destash, in the Maize colorway. At first appearance the yarn looks and feels a little crunchy and nubbly, almost like Rowan's Summer Tweed. I haven't tried knitting with it yet, but I'm definitely looking forward to it! I'll let you know what's so special about it :).

For this Harvey Kimono, though, I'm using another "sure thing": Kraemer Yarns Tatamy Tweed DK in Walnut. I first learned about this yarn from bestitched Diana, who's used it for items big and small, always with resounding success. In fact, this very skein came to me from the bestitched stash itself. Its claim to fame: one of the few non-wool tweed yarns on the market, and it's very hardy in wearing and machine washing and drying.

I don't know why it took me so long to try this yarn! It's lovely all around: pretty to look at, behaves on the needles, and makes a great knitted fabric. It's not overly drapey, nor particularly stiff, and in many ways resembles the look and feel of wool blends. On top of that, my knitting gauge using this yarn matches that of the Harvey Kimono pattern, so I've had to make no modifications to the pattern at all. Another "sure thing," contributing to this project's success. A sigh of relief - I was due a little break!

Or it could be that I'm knitting up a storm, but all my projects are hanging in mid-air - I'm not certain whether to keep going or frog, if what's on the needles today will still be around tomorrow. Whether the sizing will work out after all, and if all those bumps could be erased by blocking. Yup, that's exactly where I am today.

The cute baby got me. I mean, just look at him! But somewhere between choosing the wrong yarn, altering the pattern for a different gauge, and trying to make sense of very awkwardly written directions, I'm not sure whether this will be a keeper.

Moderne Baby Blanket | Mason-Dixon Knitting | Gedifra Korfu & Classic Elite Sundance

Behemoth. I'm probably 95% done, but those last five rows (not to mention the border!) are taking forever. I need a helper just to maneuver it on my lap! I'm also increasingly conscious of the blanket's weight, though I'm too chicken to actually weigh it. I'm guessing the final weight will be somewhere between 1.5-2 pounds. I think it will work better as a play mat than an actual blanket. Once I finish it, heh.

Estonian Socks by Nancy Bush | The Ultimate Sock Book by Vogue Knitting
Paddington sock yarn, Mocha's Fiber Connection, from the 2009 NH S&W

This sock pattern is one of the few I could find written for tiny-gauge sock yarn. We're talking 9-10 stitches per inch, yikes! The socks are truly beautiful, but I'm afraid that they might be too narrow for my grandma! I have to think about what to do next.

Another handspun baby Thorpe! I'm pretty sure that handspun + Thorpe is the most perfect combination ever... of anything... in all of time. Unfortunately, I was off in the sizing and it fits... me! Not a baby! Kind of snugly, but I can get it on my (23" around!) head. Sigh. Have to think about this one, too.

So, I'm knitting furiously and hoping that some of these projects come full circle and get to stay. I would love for these to become four FOs to share with you :).

I know you are anxious to find out the two winners of the book copies! They are Heather from Ontario, Canada, and Rebecca from Andover, Massachusetts! Congratulations, ladies! Please enjoy!

I will leave you with a picture of beautiful, drool-worthy handspun:

None of it spun by me, but the talented artists at Crown Mountain Farms, Pigeonroof Studios, and A Tree Hugger's Wife enable my handspun obsession just fine ;). I'm amassed quite the collection, right?!?

And if you still want more, I have two copies of this book to give away!

• To enter, simply leave a comment on this post!
  
• Please use a working e-mail address. If I can't get in touch with you, you can't win!
  
• One entry per person.
  
• Comments will be closed Sunday (February 7th) evening.
  
• Winners will be chosen randomly and notified via e-mail.

Good luck, and I hope you enjoy my review of this book!

Comments have now been closed, and the two winners will be notified shortly. Thank you for participating!

Pattern: Rickie's Sashiko Pillow from the Purl Bee, using the white Hana-Zashi No. 12 sampler.

Your comments exactly mimicked my own feelings about this sampler. Josiane wrote, "I really like how the pattern reads in so many different ways: flowers, circles, flowing rivers," and Punkin commented, "When I look at your embroidery I see circles but when I follow the colors I realize they are in waves. Fascinating." Yup. That's pretty much how this whole thing started: I kept looking at the Purl Bee photo and each second my eyes were seeing something different. And I definitely saw circles at first. It was so interesting; I had to make it!

Threads, etc.: as I mentioned, I just bought everything the Purl Bee told me to buy :). No creativity whatsoever. The one thing I did alter was to use a simple overlap closure for the pillowcase instead of a zippered one. Laziness was one reason, but mainly I don't like hardware (zippers, buttons) on my pillowcases.

The Robert Kaufman tencel linen I used for this project was amazing. Crisp and textured, yet soft and drapey. It pressed exceptionally well, and stood up to a seam ripper like a champ. I won't even mention the beautiful color! It was also my first time sewing with 100% cotton thread. Such tight, crisp stitches, and no complaints from my sewing machine!

 

To those of you considering Sashiko, I say, just give it a try! Buy a sampler and some threads, and you'll find that it's remarkably simple. The little plump stitches will win you over in a heartbeat ;).

Because that's just the way I roll, especially when it comes to knitting. The words 'appropriateness' and 'seasonality' do not exist in my knitting dictionary.

I finished this stocking during the first week of January 2010, about two years after I had finished Walter's matching one, and one year after I had re-committed to knitting this one. Small details, really :). Maybe the hiatus was good, as I had forgotten how much I love these fantastic kits from Judy's Colors.

Pattern: Judy's Colors St. Nick Christmas stocking kit.

Yarn: Raumagarn 3-ply wool yarn.

Needles: US 4 Susan Bates 16" circular needle and dpns.

Favorite detail: all the applied i-cord! I especially loved the three rounds of i-cord at the top of the stocking, which I knit as a spiral. Least favorite detail: the shaped intarsia heel. Thank goodness for blocking. Also, every time the motif would change from spirals to golden flowers and back, there would be 4 yarn ends to weave in. Generally this would be a total bummer, except this is such a sticky wool, and weaving in more than an inch of yarn wasn't necessary.

My St. Nick, and his Red Velvet, side by side. Adorning the yarn cabinet, of course :).

My latest brioche adventure involves a follow-up vest for my mom. She loved the first, and immediately asked if I would knit a second, a little bit shorter. I took a few weeks' break (it was a lot of stockinette), and started scheming. My mom kept repeating that she wanted slimming vertical lines. Knitting a large vest in tight ribbing, like 2x2, would land me in a mental hospital. Seriously. Besides, I don't find tight ribbing over a curvy body particularly flattering, vertical-ness aside.

So, I kept thinking of other ways to add a strong vertical dimension to the vest, and ended up mixing wide ribbing with some brioche, which doesn't draw in as much as true ribbing would. I blocked my gauge swatch under tension to reveal all the peaks and valleys of the stitch pattern (just like blocking lace!), and intend to do the same with the actual vest pieces. I drafted the pattern using the post-blocking gauge, of course.

I'm using Cascade Yarns Eco+, in Spruce (8462). The yarn is very soft and fluffy, comes in giant 250 gram skeins, and knits up quickly at 3.5 stitches per inch. No complaints except that I find it very unforgiving to any stitch or tension imperfections: they all show.

My idea to use a variation of brioche stitch for my mom's vest was also influenced by a book I recently purchased: Knitting Brioche by Nancy Marchant.

I found this book interesting in the same way I found Reversible Knitting interesting (my review here, the blog tour stop here): it's a complete tome devoted to one particular knitting theme. Both books develop their own language for explaining the techniques, both provide detailed instructions and step-by-step photos for knitting the elements, both contain superb stitch dictionaries, and finally provide some intriguing patterns at the end. What sets Knitting Brioche apart, for me, is the author's integration of brioche-based stitch patterns into the real world: pages upon pages of special cast-ons, bind-offs, selvedges, increases and decreases... everything you'd need to take a stitch pattern, and plug it into your favorite garment or design idea.

This book opened my eyes to the brioche family of stitch patterns. Brioche is not a one-trick pony - there are dozens of variations, sixty documented in this book alone! In addition, Knitting Brioche is a fantastic reference for reversible and multi-color knitting: the stitch patterns are photographed front and back, and, if relevant, in multiple color variations. I'm really impressed, and Knitting Brioche proudly joins the rest of my knitting reference books. In the extended entry I share some tidbits from the book - techniques, stitch patterns, clothing patterns - to give you a sense of what you can expect inside.

A quick hello from beautiful and sunny Miami, Florida! Where, of course, I'm hard at work knitting a baby blanket. It seems to have become "a thing" - a mitered blanket in Belize, and another when we were in San Francisco. This time around I'm knitting the Moderne Baby Blanket from Mason-Dixon Knitting.

The miles of garter stitch seemed so mind-numbing when I was back home, but are downright perfect now that I'm actually on vacation.

I'm using some leftover Gedifra Korfu and freshly-stashed Classic Elite Sundance, basically the same exact yarns I used in the Ribbons Baby Blanket. Not too many mods, except fewer stitches/rows here and there, to make the most of what I have in the stash. I'm much further along than the photo above would lead you to believe ;).

I might even be done before I return!

Rickie's Sashiko Pillow, from the wonderfully inspiring Purl Bee, was such a project for me. I saw it, and there was nothing I wanted to change. About 3.5 seconds later, all the project ingredients were in my shopping cart, and I was at the front door asking the mailman if he had a package for me.

Sashiko embroidery was completely unknown to me until I saw this pillow, but embroidery in general is probably the first needle art I ever learned. Cross-stitch, satin stitch, French knots... I don't know the proper names for all the stitches, but I learned them all in Home Ec. in elementary school. I remember making elaborate samplers, and decorating the edges of handkerchiefs, then being graded on neatness and consistency of stitches.

In that respect, Sashiko and I were always meant to be together. After reading Mari's Sashiko tutorial and learning how to make a quilter's knot (both at the beginning and end of work), I was cruising! In reality, embroidering a Sashiko sampler is as simple as playing connect-the-dots, or creating a paint-by-number picture. So easy, so relaxing! The Purl Bee carries a nice selection of samplers, but you can buy them elsewhere, too, such as on eBay.

Though other projects intervened, I was done with my sampler pretty quickly!

 

It's very wrinkled because I washed it to get rid of the blue guide marks. Now to press it, and sew it into a little pillow case. I have a feeling this part of the project will take a bit of motivation... groan! :)

Adorable, right? This is an exciting time: so many of my friends are expecting! But the sad reality is that while I want to give something handknit to all of them, I can't shower each and every babe with a handknit blanket.

PSA: Should you want me to knit your baby a blanket, please have him or her at a time that does not coincide with the births of other friends' babies. Thank you :).

With these hats I was hoping to accomplish the seemingly impossible: knit something tiny teeny, but still incredibly special. Handspun will do that to a gift ;).

Pattern: Thorpe (link opens a pdf file) by Kirsten Kapur of Through the Loops Designs. See it on Ravelry.

Yarn: Sock Hop Yarn, Good Vibrations colorway, from Crown Mountain Farms. Each hat used up about 100 yards (only 100 yards!) of this hand-dyed and handspun superwash merino yarn. One skein of sock yarn was pretty much perfect for making two of these hats, with only a few grams remaining.

The contrast yarn is Louet Gems sportweight, 100% superwash merino in Indigo (16). This yarn is now thrice "leftovers" - I originally purchased it to make a pair of socks for my dad, then the leftovers found their way into this hat for Walter, the leftovers of which were used in knitting the Pod of Cetaceans Cardigan, and now those leftovers ended up as trim on this little baby Thorpe. And I still have a few yards left ;).

Needles and gauge: I used Inox dpns, 3.00 mm (that's about a US 2.5). Using those needles, this sportweight yarn knit to 6.5 spi and 10 rpi in my hands.

I obviously had to modify this pattern a bit, both for a smaller size and thinner yarn. Luckily, a top-down hat pattern is incredibly easy to modify as you go. I increased until I had 88 stitches, then knit even for 4.25" before beginning the garter stitch portion. This resulted in a hat that is about 13.5" around and 7.25" from crown to where the earflaps start. When I knit the second hat, I made it a hair more shallow (the first seemed a little too long to me) by knitting even for only 3.75", so the finished hat was 6.75" deep overall. Oh, I used Kathryn Ivy's modifications for a jogless join in garter stitch, and it worked out perfectly.

Pattern: Top Down Bonnet with Anime Character by Adrian Bizilia of Hello Yarn. See it on Ravelry.

Yarn: Hand-dyed and handspun superwash merino in the Retro Kitchen colorway from Missy, A Tree Hugger's Wife on Etsy. This was a custom order that I told you about a little while ago. Yup, it's the same yarn! Knits up stripey, as it ends up! Each bonnet used up only 65 yards of this yarn! The contrast yarn is Louet Gems sportweight, 100% superwash merino in Crabapple (26).

Needles and gauge: I used two US 5 circular needles to knit this project, an Addi and an Inox Express, I think. My gauge was 5.75 spi and 9 rpi.

Those of you who remarked that this bonnet looks a lot like a sock toe are precisely right! It's knit as you would knit a toe-up sock. So, I started with the inimitable Judy's magic cast-on, and followed the pattern instructions for the smallest size. When time came to knit the garter stitch border, I knit a few rounds even, and worked an i-cord bind-off using the contrast color. Two i-cord ties later, and voilà! I wasn't sure how to measure the finished dimensions of this hat, but it's about 6" from the crown to where the tie starts.

 

So simple, so nubbly, so squishy and delicious. I'm so glad that this type of handspun doesn't allow a complicated pattern, because I was glad to knit stockinette and garter stitch for a change. It allowed me to focus entirely on the formation of the stitches - all different, transforming in color, thickness, and texture right before my eyes. Maybe these hats aren't as impressive as a giant shawl, but I enjoyed knitting them so much. That's why there are four of them, and more to come.