Just over half a skein of Araucania Nature Wool later, I have a second super hero helmet hat. This hat is all about instant gratification, and the squoosh factor is incredible. I made the 68 st Medium this time, and it fits nicely without being too snug. (Again, good for all of this hair!)

There’s nothing quite like garter stitch at the end of a long day. I had to cast on for another.

In order to face the week, I needed blackberry pancakes. (Mondays can be tough!) I ate them for breakfast and lunch, and they helped, like they always do. Moving on…

I knit this over the weekend for my friend H. (of wedding shawl fame) because tomorrow is her birthday! I just couldn’t wait any longer, so I gifted this yesterday, which means there is absolutely no danger of spoiling the surprise. I used more of my Hello Yarn Five Plum Pie handspun, and I still have about ten yards leftover — truly, a never-ending skein.

Calorimetry was one of the first patterns I attempted to knit — and while I finished it rather quickly, my skein of filatura di crosa 127 print (or whatever the pattern calls for, because I had not yet learned to substitute) won the day, and I finally understood why gauge matters. My first calorimetry was enormous! This time around, I read up on the pattern and followed some common modifications:

I cast on 88 stitches using size 6 needles, and worked only as many (decreasing stitch count) short rows as seemed like half of the width I was hoping for, and then completed the same number of (increasing stitch count) short rows to get to the other side, being careful not to run out of yarn.

Yay! I tried this on to take some pictures, and now that my hair is longer, I really like this. I may need to make one for myself.

I did manage to ply the polwarth. Here’s what it looks like before washing/thwacking:

This may be the softest, squishiest yarn I have ever spun. It is hanging to dry in the kitchen, and I can’t help but pet it each time I walk by.

In keeping with “hat-tober,” I cast on for yet another handspun hat — Cosy’s Super Hero Helmet Hat. I won the pattern on her blog a few weeks ago, and I am knitting it out of some of my earlier wheelspun: AVFKW Woolly Wonders corriedale in The Candle’s Nimble Flame. I’m using size 10.5 needles, and I love the squoosh of the garter stitch.

Apparently Boh also had a very busy day. (While I read, wrote, cleaned, knit, plied, grocery-shopped, cooked, etc., Boh moved bones back and forth from his box, growled at the electrician through the window, took notes on squirrel movement, and perhaps dreamed of rabbits, chipmunks, and deer.)

This hat just flew off the needles, and I love it. These big hats intended for boys also seem to work with my incredibly big hair, which means I may need to cast on for another. This grey/green version out of AVFKW falklands in The Silent Undergrowth colorway has more drape — again, maybe because it is a 2-ply, but also because the yarn seemed a bit thinner as I was working with it. (I used the same needles: US 6 for the ribbing, 7 for the st portion and decreases. WPI tool, are you hiding under piles of fiber?) Also, for those counting ounces, I started with 3 oz. of fiber, and I have .45 oz. of yarn remaining.

Here it is, with the brim unfolded. Perfect for big hair, no? (The colors are too wonderfully gift-able for me to keep this, particular when compared to the bright. cheery pile of handspun taking up space on the bookshelf. I can still try it on a bunch before the holidays, right?)

Alright. Onward to a few photos of the fun parts of Saturday:

Snoring dog, hot cocoa made with milk on the stove, the New Yorker…

Snail hat, handspun cowl, thanksgiving day mitts: necessary for a nice walk along the reservoir.

Boh continues to stretch and snore. I imagine he’ll be doing lots more of this later today, as his greyhound friend (and his people) will be here (with breakfast!) in about twenty minutes. Boh has no idea.

This pattern was made for handspun. And for boys. This is a simple hat with a serious fold-over brim. What do you think about this particular hat for a (grown-up) boy? Are the reds too rosy and not enough burgundy? It was rainy and overcast yesterday, so these pictures were taken in less than ideal circumstances. Here’s a true-to-color picture (which also illuminates the challenges of taking a picture of the hat on your own head):

I made the large size, and it is roomy without being ridiculously too big on me. This might be terrific for not totally crushing my hair when I am running late, my hair is still damp, and I’m heading to campus for something that requires me to look nice. I guess what I’m saying is, this is a traditionally sized men’s hat, which is good to know.

Details: Seaman’s Cap, by Brenda Zuk

Size: large

Needles: US 6 for ribbing, 7 for body of hat

Yarn: Spunky Eclectic Spunky Club dark bfl in Myrtle, 3-ply, light worsted.

Now that I have the kitchen scale, I should really be more precise about this, but my houseguest is still sleeping, and I need to turn the lights on to read the screen on my digital kitchen scale. I have a small ball of yarn leftover, maybe 30 yards or so? That would mean that the large size of this hat used up about 150 yards, give or take, which is perfect for single skeins of handspun.

It is possible that I will cast on another seaman’s cap very soon. Time to wake up my visitor and head to the farmer’s market!

Yep, that’s a word. In fact, it is the perfect word to describe this dog.

Let’s look at that face from the other side, shall we?

Boh is actually using his paws to support all those wrinkles on his face. Being jowly is tough. It’s a wonder he’s able to get through the day.

I started another handspun hat last night. This is the seaman’s cap, and I am using my first 3-ply handspun: dark bfl from the Spunky Club in the myrtle colorway.

I’m starting to think that it might be more accurate to name this month “hat-tober” over here at Chez Rooster…

I have a busy day ahead of me, but Boh will likely be doing more of this.

“…where the rivers change direction across the great divide.” Other Voices, Other Rooms (Nanci Griffith) was on the stereo throughout a fun Saturday night at the home of friends, which prompted me to digitally dig out some Nanci to accompany me through my Sunday.

Though it warmed up to the low 70s yesterday, the morning heralded the coming fall, and I certainly needed my socks and mitts for our first lap around the neighborhood. Today’s weather is supposed to be similar — in the 70s by mid-afternoon, but cool and autumny right now.

In preparation for fall — and for a great evening of knitting, wine, and pie — I cast on the Botanic Hat with my leftover Five Plum Pie handspun and some Cascade 220 leftovers.

I am loving this hat already: involved enough that I’m interested and paying attention, but simple enough that it qualifies as social knitting. I started on 6s as directed in the pattern, and then decided to stick with 6s after the ribbing instead of changing to 7s in order to compensate for the occasional variability (read: thinner sections) of my handspun.  Here’s a shot of the inside:

I love that this hat is reversible! I’m thinking that it may become a go-to pattern for this year’s holiday knitting, which I guess I should start thinking about…

Despite my success with pizza dough earlier this week, it seems that I still have a thing or two to learn about calzones, and in particular, the behavior of white-whole wheat flour. I made exactly the same dough recipe, but with white-whole wheat, and it just did not rise this time, which yielded a rather dense calzone dough. These were good, but an airier, dare I say, doughier crust would have made them fantastic. Well, that and not eating an entire loaf of farmers’ market bread BEFORE putting the calzones in the oven.

I’m pretty sure I’m ready to jump back into the land of productivity, and my new sheepy slouch will certainly make it a slightly warmer leap!

Details: Le Slouch, by Wendy Bernard.US 7 needles, sheepy Romney/Corriedale blend worsted from the Merck Forest and Farmland Center. CO 74 st, knit 6.25 in before decreasing. I’m not letting Boh get this one.

The spring semester starts Monday, and there are certainly productive things I could be doing (like brushing up on my skills in a certain language so that I can pass a translation test whenever my department decides they’ve found someone to administer it), but instead, I’m knitting a hat. Boh ate my favorite squishy malabrigo cabley slouchy hat (see previous post), but instead of replacing it with a malabrigo look-alike, I’m craving something a bit sheepier, if you will. Enter my second le slouch. This one will be slouchier than the first, and a bit tweedy in appearance. I’m knitting it out of a Romney-Corriedale blend purchased as part of last winter’s snowshoe adventure at a farmland trust in Southern Vermont. I modified the cast on # slightly in order to accomodate my desire to knit the hat on 7s — in part because my 8s are in use, and in part because I want a denser fabric. Hoping to have this warming my ears soon!

I finished these thank you-dishcloths yesterday, which means I’ll have no excuse if they aren’t in Tuesday’s mail. You heard it here first! Also, we were invited for dinner at a friend’s house a few nights ago, and bread was requested, but it was too late in the day to start my go-to no-knead bread. I opened Mark Bittman’s big yellow book, and found a recipe for a lighter whole wheat bread using baking soda, yogurt and honey, and ta-da:

A hearty, wheaty quick bread that has been great with morning omelettes. I’ll be making this again.

Rather than take advantage of the free time to get ahead on reading, thinking, language study, etc. this weekend, I’m planning to knit and spindle away the afternoon before a planned evening of hunkering. There will be calzone-making, movie-watching and wine-drinking here at Chez Rooster — the dough is steadily rising!

And here’s what I was working on while skein number 1 was hanging to dry. This is the first half of 4 oz of Finn in colorway Equilibrium, the November installment of the AVFKW Woolly Wonders Fiber Club. Here’s the beginning of the second half:

This is more of a complex chestnut brown than it looks. Silly me for photographing it on a brown chair. I clearly took this picture before my morning coffee. I’m planning to attempt plying on my spindle when I finish spinning this up. I think these colors look lovely together, and “Equilibrium” suits them perfectly.

I’ve also been working on turning another square:

I had to have one for myself — I’m hoping that the decrease seams will become more slouchy with a good blocking. (Apologies for the blurriness on this shot — all I can say is that my arm is a bit tired from all of the spindling!) Details: Grey Cascade 220 and Araucania Nature Wool Chunky leftovers, size 6 and 7 needles, as directed. Also, even though I’m using the notes to get the stripes to line up, it doesn’t look quite right. I ran the tails of both colors up the seam to fill in a few gaps that formed during color switches. Maybe I need to pull the yarn tighter as I’m carrying the strands along inside.

Totally unrelated, but I found myself wearing my malabrigo cowl on my head. And I like it.

Still thinking about my knitting plans for 2009…