Kiss My Knits!

Yeah, that Jayne hat’s not looking so silly now, is it? Man, that cracks me up. I might have to knit me one o’ them.

Speaking of Jayne hats, here’s the first of several non-orange Jayne hats. The color is a bit richer than the picture indicates. The person who commissioned these was concerned about the Lamb’s Pride itchiness, so I’m subbing Berroco Ultra Alpaca doubled. It knits up at 4 stitches to the inch on size 9 needles. It’s a little dense, but any bigger of a needle and it’s too loose, so I’ll stick with this. I’m a little concerned – by my calculations, this is 22 inches around and it’s for a 24 inch head. Is that enough negative ease? I worry about little things, and I always get nervous when they feel loose anyway. Of course it’s supposed to be loose on me, I don’t have a 24 inch head, but I still get nervous. The next one’ll be for a head 23 inches in circumference, and maybe I’ll snug it up a bit more. In my experience, people tend to measure their heads a little big.

Emily picked out the yarn for her doll. The body will be the same color as the others, but she felt compelled to choose the hair from among the colors at the yarn shop… so hot pink it is! I have a few more red options here at home which I will present to her, but I know from experience that once she’s picked something, she’s set on it. And that’s fine. It’s her doll, and if she wants it to have hot pink hair, then it will have hot pink hair.

I’m off in a few minutes to hit the post office to mail some Turino silk, then another yarn shop looking for a good green in Ultra Alpaca – with a stop at a coffeeshop along the way for a pick-me-up. Thanksgiving left me beat!

Mailed out eight kits and two hats today, trying to get stuff done before the holidays close the post office. Then I gave someone a ride, which took up another hour, and now I’m back at the Jayne mines again. At the moment I’m working out gauge on some Berroco Ultra Alpaca doubled. I’m knitting a Jayne in it on size 9’s, but I think it’s a little dense. How is it possible that I have no size 10 Addi Turbos, 16 inch length? I’ll try it on 10 1/2s and we’ll see how it goes. I’m a fairly loose knitter, though.

I’m using Ultra Alpaca because this client was concerned that Lamb’s Pride might be itchy on her giftees’ sensitive scalps. She’s also getting several different colors, so I’m delighted to work with something besides orange. The denim blue I’ve got is absolutely gorgeous. It would work up great in a sweater for pretty much anyone.

I’m enjoying the Fall leaves. I always do. Obviously my Yankee mother’s influence. Thanks, Mom.

…or kit, your choice.

To the first Aussie/Kiwi/Brit/other foreigner to offer to send me some cash in an envelope in time for my kid’s Dec 1st school unit on foreign money. It doesn’t have to be much, just a bill or a few coins. If you’re an Aussie/Kiwi/Brit, that’s a $40 value (or $20 for the kit) for the price of whatever you toss in an envelope and send to me. It takes about a week to ten days for stuff to get here from overseas, so you’re gonna want to jump on this.

Drop me a line at heather at jaynehat dot com.

Sweet Baby Jayne!

Yarns: Karabella Aurora Bulky in orange (28), yellow (27), and red (19)
Needles: 10 1/2
Gauge: 13 sts=4″

Eeee! The cuteness! Hard to get scale from the pic, but it’s modeled on a grapefruit wrapped in tissue paper. The orange is a little melony, but it was that or eye-searing traffic cone orange.

This is a 40 stitch cast on, earflaps are 10 stitches wide. Ties are braided to be less tangly.

Karabella Aurora is a great choice for baby stuff, price aside, because it’s super soft and machine washable. This is the first of several baby Jaynes in the Jayne hat queue and I’m glad, as I really enjoy working with this yarn.

I really hope the parents send pics of the little nipper in this hat. A baby scoots down the hall in that hat, people know he’s not afraid of anything!

I think a family of tribbles has moved into my head. I feel fuzzy and stuffy, with a lot of pressure behind my eyes. I slept until after noon today, and I feel like I could go back to sleep anytime and not wake up until tomorrow. Thankfully Emily is wanting to play by herself a lot today, and Steve is, as always, a super dad so he’s being sure she gets some quality time with him.

The next hat in the queue is for a baby. I know that my germs wouldn’t travel with the hat, but I’m a mom, so I’m paranoid. That hat can wait for a day or so. The baby isn’t here yet, so there’s time.

When I’m doing baby hats, I like to use a different yarn than Lamb’s Pride. Baby heads can be delicate. I had thought Karabella Aurora 8, but the only orange I could find in person or on the Karabella color card was traffic-cone orange, and I don’t want the parents’ retinas to burn out while they’re looking at their child. So here’s Karabella Aurora Bulky. The orange is a little more melon than my usual orange, but still within the realm of acceptable. And like all the Aurora yarns, this 100% wool is incredibly soft and machine washable. Both very desirable features in baby clothing!

I’m looking forward to getting started on it. In the meantime, since Emily took over my spot on the couch, I’m back in bed with a Chloraseptic “relief strip” on the back of my tongue. Those things work great. I may knit some on my socks, but usually when I work on them tired, I tend to screw up somewhere. So we’ll see.

I did manage to get a few things photographed yesterday to go up on eBay (unless someone’s interested) so maybe I’ll try to get some of that listed too.

Actually, the longer I lie here, the more I think I may just go to sleep.

I will give a free hat to the first Browncoat from this town to ask, just for get the pleasure of sending something there. So totally worth it.

In today’s girl scout meeting, we’ll be finishing up business from last meeting’s try-it patch. We ran out of time to do s’mores. S’mores presents a challenge in a classroom. One of our girls is bringing a lantern, and we’re going to try to melt chocolate over it. I like her ingenuity. Fortunately, I like all three ingredients in s’mores, so it’ll be tasty no matter the outcome.

We’ll also be working on the “Puppets, Dolls, and Play” badge. I picked up some craft foam from Michael’s craft store, and we’ll be making cunning little puppets with holes cut out for our fingers to be legs. Note picture to the right of the sample I made to be sure it worked. I didn’t want to make it too fancy, because I don’t want the girls to make themselves nuts. I just wanted to try it out and show them one method. It’ll be interesting to see what they come up with.

Wearwithstyle is again open for business. My hand is tender when touched, but I can knit just fine. So, hopefully knit night tonight, unless I get too tired. I missed last week, so I hope to make it out tonight!

Three kits out the door today, four more orders in.

Too! Many! BROWNCOATS!

The Joss’d podcast is up. If you want to skip ahead (not that I’m encouraging that!) to hear what I actually sound like, interviews me at about 43 minutes in.

For the record, I said that I knew nothing about Woolloomooloo, Australia, and it could be a hole for all I knew but I loved its name. I loved it, do you hear? I’ve looked it up since. It’s clearly not a hole. I did not mean to impugn the town of Woolloomooloo or the Australian nation. I even gave a shout-out to Aussie and his awesome artwork. Australians, please do not pelt me with boomerangs or kangaroo droppings.

Crap, I did it again.

Aside from me possibly causing an international incident, neither nor I sounded like morons, so I’ll count the interview a success. Thanks for the opportunity, !

Glee! The yarn store called to say that my massive cones of earflap red are in. This means that I am finally fully stocked – and just before Christmas!

The Jayne hat mines are back in full production, baby! Woo!

Of course, the next six hats in line are all from other materials or in other colors. My yarn bounty will be for kits and I’ll get to knit with something besides orange. It’s a win win win!

Greetings from beyond the grave! Yes, I moved to week two of the Couch to 5K podcast and I’m fairly sure that it actually killed me.

The first leg: “This isn’t so bad!”

The second leg: “This is more challenging than last week.”

The third leg: “It may have been too soon to move to week two.”

The fourth leg: “Maybe if I run toward the light…”

Everything else is just a blur. I arrived home with sweat pouring off of me like it was the very first day again. Now that I’ve drunk some water and squeegeed myself off, I’m red faced but much more comfortable. I haven’t decided yet whether I’ll do week two again next time or go back to week one. Maybe it’s like childbirth: you have to forget what it was like before you want to do it again.

Yesterday I sent out a mass e-mail telling folks that Jayne hat kits were available again, and a buncha people signed up overnight, so I’m cleaning up, then stuffing envelopes while I watch To Have and Have Not which I snagged from the library yesterday. No worries, there will be no actual Tvini sweat on the yarn.