A Busy June

As you may have noticed, this blog has been rather quiet lately. June is one of the busiest months for me. All four of the people in this household have birthdays within the 30-day period from June 3 - July 3, plus there have been multitudinous other events to prepare for such as:

• Father's Day,



• a ballet recital,

Can you tell that Daughter#1 has had a growth spurt recently?



• a piano & voice recital,

Daughter#2 playing something from the Magic Flute

Daughter#2 singing The Rainbow Connection

Daughter#1 playing . . . ummmm (bad Mommy can't remember)

Daughter#1 singing The Candy Man (note the candy-themed outfit, with candy necklaces adorning her various body parts -- her idea)



• two graduation parties,

Half-brother#1 (I only have 1 of these, but I figured he should get a number just like everyone else) swinging at a giant smiley face piñata at Niece#1's party.



• many, many softball games,

Daughter#1 pitching

Daughter#1 at bat

Daughter#2 hitting the ball

Daughter#2 ready to run home



• a mini-vacation (more on that in another post),



• plus all the usual crapola (trying to finish up homeschool lessons, trying to find time for work, etc).

Anyway, I've been busy. But I have gotten some knitting done. I've got a pile of completed projects to blog about. (OK, it's a small pile, but I feel good about it.) Here is the first on the list -- the Graduation Socks.

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Pattern:

No pattern, just basic stockinette socks

Yarn:

Zitron Trekking XXL [75% wool, 25% nylon],
color: 109 (variegated purple)

Needles:

ankles done on 2.5mm, heel & foot done on 2.0mm, top of foot done on 2.25mm & 2.0mm. (Yeah, I like to make good use of my needle collection.)

Gauge:

8.5 - 9.5 sts/inch

Comments:

I made these socks as a graduation present for Niece #1, aka Oh, Jane. She has tiny little muchkin feet so I had to rip back a little to make them smaller at her graduation party, which just happened to be on Knit in Public Day. I guess that sort of counts as knitting in public. There were certainly several people there who were amazed by the whole sock-knitting process.

Oooh, the pretty purpleness -- as modeled by Sister#1, who, like her offspring, also has petite munchkin feet with dainty little ankles.
(Who, me? Jealous?)

Free Arrowhead Lace Headband Pattern

As I mentioned in my last post, making the Saving Grace headband has inspired me to look through my pattern books for other potential lace patterns that would work well with a worsted weight yarn for a quick headband. This turned out to be a bit more difficult than I anticipated. The use of worsted weight yarn meant that I needed to keep the pattern under 14 stitches so the headband did not become uncomfortably wide. I swatched a few options, but the headband below is the most successful one so far.

This headband is based on the Arrowhead Lace pattern stitch in Barbara Walker's A Treasury of Knitting Patterns. It has a tendency to poof up in the middle (I didn't bother to block it), but it seems to flatten out when worn. Here's the pattern.

Arrowhead Lace Headband

YARN

Cascade 220 [100% wool],
color: 9455 (turquoise heather)

NEEDLES

US 7

GAUGE

approximately 5sts/inch

DIRECTIONS

Cast on 11 sts.

Follow the arrowhead lace pattern (using chart or directions below) until the headband is approximately 16 inches long (or long enough to fit around your head when slightly stretched). Bind off and seam ends together.

Arrowhead Lace Chart

Arrowhead Lace Directions

Row 1 (WS):k1, p9, k1.

Row 2 (RS):k1, yo, ssk, yo, ssk, k1, k2tog, yo, k2tog, yo, k1.

Row 3:same as row 1.

Row 4:k2, yo, ssk, yo, slip 2 together as to knit--k1--pass the 2 slipped sts over, yo, k2tog, yo, k2.

Pattern & images © 2006 Tamara Stone-Snyder.
May be distributed freely for personal use only. Cannot be reprinted on the web or otherwise without permission.

A quickie

Looking for a quick knitting project to use up some leftover yarn? How about a simple lacy headband?

Pattern:

Saving Grace headband, a free online pattern by Dawn at Wild Yarn

Yarn:

Cascade 220 [100% wool],
color: 7811 (purple heather)

Needles:

US 7

Comments:

This was a great project -- super fast and easy, and yet quite lovely when done. The only thing I might do differently next time is to use a provisional cast on so I can kitchener the ends together and have no seam.

I made this headband for Daughter#1, and now Daughter#2 wants one as well. I'm happy to make more of these, since I have a whole rainbow of Cascade 220 that's just waiting for projects like this.

This pattern has inspired me to look through my stitch pattern books and find some simple lace patterns that might translate well to headbands. In fact, I found one that Daughter#2 likes, which I am currently working on. Pics of that soon.