fo: selbu modern

Yay, Fair Isle hat! I'd been afraid of Fair Isle for so long - I tried doing it once, when we were living in Tokyo, and it just kept unraveling in my hands, and the whole thing just put me off the technique for ages. I'd been wanting to learn it properly for some time, though, since there are so many gorgeous patterns using Fair Isle out there. This time, it came much easier, possibly because I bothered to read the online tutorial carefully for once (something I am extremely bad about), even if it took awhile to get the hang of holding yarn in both my right and left hands (usually I just hold my yarn in my right hand). It's not perfect, but I'm still pretty happy with it - the excitement I felt while knitting this was almost akin to the excitement I felt the first time I knit anything: I couldn't believe I was actually doing it. 

The pattern is the deservedly popular Selbu Modern, which is free and easy to follow. I'd definitely recommend it as a first Fair Isle pattern - having just two colors to negotiate made my life easier, and it was easy to fall into the rhythm of the pattern and not have to look at the chart too much once I got into it. I used the recommend yarns, the Fibre Company's Fingering Canopy, which I also liked a lot - the finished hat feels just fuzzy enough. I blocked over a dinner plate, and am very happy with the resulting fit.

 Raveled here. 

new pattern: phaedra

I think I must have had the fastest test knit on the planet, because Phaedra has now been test knit by four awesome (and crazy fast) test knitters, and is now done! I barely had time to finish knitting my own second version of the hat before they'd all finished.

This slouchy beret is available in two sizes - a M/L size (above) which I knit in madelinetosh merino DK in mulled wine, and a S/M size (below) which I knit in Anzula Cricket MCN in a colorway whose name I either forgot or never learned. This was my first FO with Anzula Cricket, and I love how soft it is - definitely check it out, if you haven't already! 

Phaedra is usually $5.00, but will be 25% off through the end of August!

FO: a prototype

Though I haven't been posting much (either to here, or to Ravelry), I *have* been knitting a lot this summer, I swear! In between my two part-time summer jobs, I finally had the chance to finish this hat prototype, and - more importantly - decipher my scrawled notes and turn it into a pattern, which I just put up for test knitting this morning.

I both love and dread test knitting; it's a huge rush to see people make your pattern (or, as I triumphantly pointed out to Iain the first time I saw it happen: "Look at that scarf! I TOLD HER TO DO THAT!") But, the moment I send the PDF off to the testers, I can't stop worrying that it makes no sense, that it won't fit, that I accidentally did that weird thing I can apparently do in Word where you drag bits of text around without realizing it, which totally happened in the final draft of my English honors thesis on the Faerie Queene back in college, and is now preserved for posterity in the basement of the library archives. Anyway. Still, ever-present murmur of anxiety aside, I always get super excited when it comes time to get something test knit. It never ceases to amaze me that there are people willing to donate their time and yarn, and I've always found it to be a really positive experience. 

As for the hat - I drafted the leaf pattern at the start of the summer, but it took ages to get here! It was originally supposed to be a hand-warmer using a totally different pattern, but then I found this slightly crooked leaf in a Japanese stitch library, and tweaked it to come up with this instead, which, as it turns out, looks not so great in a hand-warmer but much nicer (I think, anyway) in a hat. Still undecided as to the name, but - in the Thisbe vein of Ancient Greek lady names - I am tentatively calling it Phaedra.