Cardi-Shrug

...I finally have the time to post about the Card-Shrug I made in August to wear at a wedding a week ago.

Some of you may remember when I posted pictures of the dress --



(click for full-size)


For the Cardi- Shrug, I used a wonderful pattern by Jennifer Jones from The Knit Monster. It was a fantastic, easy to follow, and easy to knit pattern that only probably took me a week of random - knitting time. (And the style was perfect for the dress!)

So, without further ado, here is the finished shrug.


(click for full size)

Boye Electric Yarn Ball Winder

Recently, I bought myself a present - this " Boye Electric Yarn Ball Winder" and I am in love!

It runs on the market for about $89.99, but I had a coupon for Micheals to get 50% off any one regularly priced item, so the grand total for this gem came to be about $48.00! Can't beat that! As in love as I am, though, I wouldn't have paid $90 for it,  that's overly priced in my opinion.

It is great, though! It's so much faster than winding yarn by hand (with a crank/dial) or the umbrella swifts. I love that with the electric motor, it's almost hands free! All I have to do is thread the machine and feed the yarn through every so often if it gets caught before it gets back on track again. It's perfect for rewinding partially used skeins that take up a lot of space in my yarn stash (perhaps, this will be my new excuse to by more yarn...now that might not be too good!) The new balls are compact and easy to store!

(click on all pictures for full - size)
It turns this messy skein....


Into this....


It even makes this messy, dyeing experiment gone wrong...


Look semi- decent....


I rewound all of this...


In less than an hour! That's SO much faster than hand winding!

So, if you are in the market for a new yarn winder, I would highly suggest you check this out!

Free Pattern: The Dad Hat

This is the year of knitted gifts. I am determined to knit something special for the important people in my life for Christmas. It is easy to knit for my mom and grandma and the children I baby sit, but it is always hard to knit (or buy) something for my dad. After giving it some thought, I decided to make him a hat for those cold Ohio winter months when he is either shoveling the driveway or walking the dog.

So, without further ado, I present "The Dad Hat" modeled by my brother:

The Dad Hat

Level: Very easy

Materials:
About one skein of Plymouth Encore Yarn 75% acrylic, 25% wool (I used Navy)
One pair of size 9 (US) needles (I used circulars, but this isn't knitted in the round so long straight needles would work fine, too)
A tapestry needle

The Pattern:

CO 84 sts.
(To change the size of the circumference, increase or decrease the number of CO sts by multiples of 8)

*K4,P4* across row (ending on a P st)

Continue the K4, P4 rib until the hat measures 10 inches from the beginning.

Now, start the decrease rows:

Row 1: *K2tog, K2tog, P2tog, P2tog* across the row
Row 2: *K2, P2* across the row
Row 3: *K2tog, P2tog* across the row
Row 4: *K1, P1* across row

Cut the yarn leaving a long enough tail (better safe than sorry!  I usually cute a 24 inch tail.)
Thread the tail through the tapestry needle and carefully slide the stitches of the hat off of your needle.
Thread the needle through every stitch and pull tightly, then seam the side of the hat and back stitch 4 or 5 stitches to secure the seam.

Fold up the brim and you are done!

(C) Amanda_Knits
If you do use this pattern, I would love for your feedback. This is the first time I've written a pattern and it was test knitted by me, so please let me know if it worked out okay or not. Thank you!)




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