Some smalls

I've been knitting a fair amount, off and on, since Christmas. Mostly, it's been small things that are easy to pick-up and put down and can be finished quickly. I've not been taxing my brain with anything complicated. I will say, I have been enjoying myself (and my right hand carpel tunnel pain has decreased considerably). It feels good to be taking things off the needles and adding to the stack of completed projects. Oh, I still have lots and lots of unfinished knitting languishing in baskets and bags, but for the moment I'm not stressing about them.

I keep a basket full of hats and mittens and a tub full of barn boots in all sizes for the grandchildren because whenever they are here they always want to go to the barn and/or the creek. Occasionally, one of the kids will take a liking to a particular hat and it will end up going home with them. I love it when that happens. It pleases me so much when they actually like something I've knitted enough to want to wear it. I hope having handknit hats, mittens, scarves and sweaters from their Nana will be a memory they keep long after I'm gone from this earth.

So, these are some of the newest additions to the basket. The chunky blue hat is a basic hat pattern knit from some of my own hand dyed, handspun thick and thin yarn. The other three are all the "Quarters Hat" that Kristin Nicholas designed. (You can buy the pattern at the linked page.) I cannot get enough of knitting this hat. I've knit a total of five Quarters hats so far and have more on the needles. This pattern is a great way to use up stash and I'm endlessly amused with picking out colors and types of yarn to combine. The pattern is designed with short rows and once you knit the first one, you can figure out how to adjust the number of cast-on stitches to adapt to most any weight of yarn. I used left over chunky handspun on one, the grey and white is some Patons 100% wool that I found at Michaels! (I know-I was really surprised at how nice it feels) and the multi-colored one is a combination of Kristin Nicholas' Julia yarn (really nice and it's soft enough to pass the kid non-itchy test!) and some Crystal Palace Taos from the stash. You should definitely add this to your to-do list. Just don't say I didn't warn you. They're like those old potato chip ads "betcha can't knit just one".

I'm off this afternoon (after a long, long list of errands to be completed) to my spinning group's annual retreat. We all look forward to this little get-away as a time of much spinning, much knitting, much laughing and way too much eating! So, I hope you have as great a weekend as I'm planning on.