Sunday, November 22, 2009

Shoulder Cat


Shoulder Cat
Originally uploaded by PhoebeJ
Tortellini likes to get up on my shoulder for brief periods. I think it helps her in her role as lookout. She is a very cute and loving cat. I'm lucky to have her.

She's not the only adorable cat around here. Abby and Nora are pretty wonderful too. Torts and Nora sometimes fight--not in a friendly cat wrestling kind of way, but like real antagonists. So it's nice to see them sitting sweetly together even if it's only because it's cold.

Does It Get Any Cuter?

And Abby? She loves to sit on the (formerly) neatly folded packing paper. I finally had to get rid of this paper since tomorrow is recycling day, but if I ever empty another box there'll be a new pile for her.

Abby Rests

No knitting posts today, just kitties. They do seem to go together.

Friday, November 06, 2009

I Can Haz Bukkit?

I have many, many works in progress so of course I had to start something new. I needed a hat since I have gone about three years without a usable hat. (I had some commercial knitted berets with elastic that was completely shot. Tossed them when I moved. Good idea.) So I looked in some books at the Village Sheep and found directions for a felted bucket hat from Chic Knits. I pulled some purple Cascade 220 out of the stash. Figured if it came out okay that Zoe might like it since purple is her color.

It was easy to knit, but the adult size requires 220 yards of yarn, the exact yardage of the Cascade. What did you think the 220 in the name meant? I found my gauge was okay on the stitches per inch, but short on rows. So when I tried to knit it to the exact directions, there wasn't enough yarn. I spoke to an employee at Modern Yarns in Montclair who told me that if you follow the instructions and knit to 5.5 inches in the body of the hat, it will be too deep when you felt it and come down past your ears. So I pulled out some rows and squeezed out the whole hat out of a single skein.

The next area of anxiety was the question as to whether my new front loader would felt the finished hat. The front loader has a pause button that allows you to open the door and check your project (or add newly discovered laundry.) Well, the energy efficient, super gentle washer did an excellent job of felting! I was very pleased. The hat is drying on a Farberware sauce pan. I think it's going to be great. The hat is not too deep. I've already started one in red. And maybe I need one in black. And how 'bout one in Noro? I see holiday presents! It takes about one evening or a little more to knit.

Finishing the Hat