Fresh off the Needles

The joy of making this latest hat is very close to the amount of joy I have in actually being able to post it here for viewing (finally!!!). This hat is called Mizan's star hat (because of the star like decreases made to cinch the top of it. There are a couple of stories behind this one: (1) I bought the yarn in New York from a store called Downtown Yarns. I asked for something that was unique to their shop (since I'm making yarn my new travel souvenir), and they said that this was hand dyed by a local artist (Jamie Harmon). The striping patterns are unpredictable and so much fun. Very soft wool & angora blend and pleasing to work with too. (2) Most of the top portion, including the "I'm running out of yarn!" olive green strip near the top was added at about 4:30a.m on the morning before my last trip to Chicago. Mizan had been really fussy and kept us both up, which wasn't doing much for my rest for a 9AM flight. After I finally got her to sleep, I kept thinking "tomorrow morning, she'll wake up and see that I'm gone..." So I stayed up until 5:45a.m, and finished the hat for her so she'd have it while mommy was away for a week. I just keep finding new reasons to love this hobby...

Not too long from now, I'm going to make one of these for Adachi as well to show how the hand dyed yarn stripes so differently from skein to skein.

My current WIPs are two items that are...dare I say it... for me! One is a shrug, and the other is a light tunic-style sweater. My goal with each new project is to either try a new technique (double pointed needles, and extra large needles on these 2) or to add something to a pattern that is my own design. More pictures of those as they come along.