Simple Autumn Headband

(i need to take some better photos! but these will work for now.)

i recently bought some really lovely isaac mizrahi yarn (sutton, in the amsterdam colorway).  after thinking about it for a while, i decided i wanted to replicate a cute thick knit headband i bought last winter.  a headband is nice for me in the winter, because wearing a hat as a woman with bangs can mess up my hair.  i know, i'm vain.  using the headband i bought as a template, i knit this up last night!

Simple Autumn Headband

You will need: bulky yarn of your choice

Needles: I used a size 15, but depending on how tight you knit and how thick your yarn is, you may need to adjust this.

Two buttons to fit through buttonholes.  I used buttons that were an inch wide.  

Gauge: will vary.
Sutton on size 15 needles knit up for me as follows: 10 stitches x 10 rows = a square 4 inches across and 3.5 inches tall.

This is a super simple pattern that you can probably customize a billion ways!

CO 8
Row 1: knit all
Row 2: purl all

Make button holes:
Row 3: Knit 1, k2tog, YO, knit 2, YO, k2tog, knit 1.

Row 4: purl all
Row 5: knit row, adding two stitches by knitting front and back on stitch 2 and 7
Row 6: purl all

Begin double moss stitch pattern:
Double moss stitch pattern (uses multiples of 4 sts plus 2)
Row 1: *k2, p2, repeat from *
Row 2: *p2, k2, repeat from *
Row 3: same as row 2
Row 4: same as row 1

Repeat until piece measures about fifteen inches (it’s a stretchy knit! and i have a medium sized head, for reference). End on a row 4.

Decrease back to 8 stitches
Knit 1, k2tog, knit 5, k2tog, knit 1

next row, purl all
knit a row
purl a row
bind off in knit stitch.

Add buttons, weave in ends, and wear all over.

is it just me?

or do other people feel guilty when they come home, eat dinner, goof off on the computer/tv/netflix and then go to bed? i struggle with wanting to just relax when i get home, sometimes do nothing, but feel guilty if i'm not "working" on something.

i always put "working" in quotes when i talk about being at home and working on projects.  knitting, sewing, quilting, painting, drawing, whatever; it's "work." it's what i actually really like doing, not my job.  i call it work because it's important to me, even though it does not pay the bills.

at the same time, i spend huge amounts daily devoted to thinking and working at my job, and so why shouldn't i just chill out after work? or on the weekends? yesterday i did nothing but read and watch tv and it felt great, but i felt guilty at the same time.  where does this guilt come from? i was a terrible catholic, so i don't get it.  my therapist says that i need to try to be nicer to myself, and also more honest about my feelings.  it's a drag, but it is kind of helping. 

there just isn't enough time, and i think at the heart of it all is that i feel bad not trying to do all of the things i love, every day.  thinking and working at my job are one thing, but coming home and  "working," making something from nothing, creating, is what actually makes me feel good. i need my paycheck, but i'd probably go nuts just coming home and having nothing else to do.

today i started and actually finished a quilt top.  getting set up for the sewing and doing the cutting and pressing always takes the most time. it looks like i'm just poking around for hours, then suddenly! boom! quilt top! 

as usual, i did not use a pattern, just kind of made it up as i went along.  i might try pinning it all together tonight, or doing that later this week.  we'll see!  normally i try not to make baby quilts too pink or blue, but this flowered fabric has been staring at me for years, and a friend of mine just had a baby girl.  i think it will be perfect for her. 

how about happy knitting update

progress on my wooly shawl!  i added some bright blue wool yarn i've had forever (about 7 years?), and am almost done with it.  it's thick and pretty, and will be very warm when it's done.  it will also secure my grandma status.  whoo!

on restraint

i have been enforcing weird little time-outs on things lately.  not doing something for a week or longer, to kind of evaluate how it affects me.  this pay period i'm not buying anything on the internet.  i realized that i buy a lot of weird, random items while on-line, and i probably don't need all of them.  i thought, "i'll not do it for two weeks and see what happens."  thus far i have resisted buying some books, music, tshirts, and craft items.  this means i am reading books i have around the house (of which there are a billion), working on projects i've already started, and wearing clothes i already own.  surprise, surprise: my bank account is happier.  twenty dollars here or there seems like nothing, but taken all together, it ends up being a chunk of cash.

i also brought my lunch to work every day this week.  even if you only spend $5 a day on a sandwich, that is also money that adds up quickly.  being financially prudent isn't exactly fun, but my bank account is happy.  

i bought the pattern for this shawl over a month ago and haven't touched it because it looked hard.  for real.  i'm a baby.  the girlchild had a sleepover the other evening, and i started it then, because i was hiding out in my room to give them space and full reign over the tv.  (i can't stomach that new 90210, it's sooooo tawdry and terrible!) it takes a lot of concentration and patience, and i'm actually really enjoying it.  it's full of short rows and stripes, and it's using up all the bits of worsted yarn i have in my stash. 

august

it's cliche, i know, to say "the summer has gone by so quickly," but it really has.  suddenly it's almost the middle of august!  what have we done this summer?

i've been doing a lot of knitting with cotton, making dishcloths.  or washcloths.  depends on where you use them, i guess.  the ones above are a double strand garter stitch version; nothing fancy, but they look pretty and are extra thick.  working with cotton yarn so much usually makes my hands ache, but either i'm doing it right or my  hands are getting tougher; i've made a billion things and my hands feel fine (knock on wood). i say "hands," but what i mean is my left hand, with the cyst.  that is the one that gets achey and goes numb.  in any case, i can't possibly keep all the cotton dishcloths i'm making, so a fair amount will become presents.  i have friends having babies, and making smaller cloths for babies is too fun.  the lovely thing about cotton is how soft it gets after being washed, and you can make a bunch of little ones quickly; that way parents aren't stuck with a giant handful of washcloth when giving baby a bath, and because i can make a billion, you don't feel like you have to re-use it. you can clean up baby with a new one each time so you don't run into stinky washcloths!

they boys keep getting bigger and bigger!  we took them to the vet for the first time last week; they were both crazy well-behaved sweethearts and everyone who met them adored them.  tali is a bit bigger than vince at 2.9 lbs, vince is 2.6.  they got their first rounds of shots, tested negative for feline leukemia, and got some flea drops.  in two weeks they go back for boosters and we make the appointment for their fixing.  their distinct personalities are definitely also becoming more apparent.  vince is bit needier than tali; he wants more of your attention, more of the time.  tali is very playful and a bit more outgoing when he meets new people.  they still pal around together all the time, which is nice.  i like that they have each other. i don't like litter boxes, though, or making kids clean them.  i clean them too, don't get me wrong, but i don't think i should be the only one doing it.  why does every domestic chore immediately default to that?! even in my hippie family, when something is dirty or needs to be tidied, the onus falls to me to work on it.  if i were a quieter woman, i guess i'd go with it, but i feel okay saying, "no, it's not all my responsibility."  most of the time, anyway.   

the terror that is unpacking

i'm not sure why unpacking is always such a chore for me.  you would think i would be so excited to move into a new place, to make it my own, that i would just yank everything out of boxes and throw it all any and everywhere.  instead, i'm ridiculously slow at it.  i think too hard about where things should go, about what the ramifications of putting baking items in that cupboard as opposed to this cupboard will be, forgetting all the time that if i don't like the first place i put it, i can move it!  this time i'm also faced with my passive-aggressive mom-ness.  i'm hating that for whatever reason, no one feels like they need to do anything unless i ask.  for some reason, the task of unpacking and making house decisions is all mine, and that feels bogus to me.  i'm not a dictator in an apron, i promise.

instead of unpacking i'm looking at boxes and making plans, and doing some knitting. there is nothing more fun that starting a new project and watching it grow.  it's especially fun to work on something that's going to be a present.  i'm not terribly superstitious (i like to think) but i do subscribe to the idea that thinking good thoughts while working on something translates into the finished project.  that's why a lot of things i was working on when my dad was going through radiation got scrapped in the end.  doing the actual knitting and embroidering while waiting for him at the clinic was good for me in that it kept my hands busy and gave me something else to fuss over, but whenever i finished something i had to get rid of it because all i could think of what them poking and prodding him, his discomfort, the nasty radiation burn across his cheek and neck.  it felt like it would be bad juju to give those items to anyone else, too, so i threw most of them away.

i've been thinking about my dad a lot lately.  the other night while unpacking i ran across a xmas gift list he'd sent me, and it reduced me to tears.  i miss those little lists, how detailed they were, how he'd tell you not just what he'd like to get, but about how much it would cost and where you could find it.  D thought that was a bit fussy, but i explained that for my pop that just made sense.  he bought the things he wanted for himself, but knew we wanted to buy him things for xmas, so he made it easy on us.  he didn't want us to feel like we had no idea what we were doing, and he was open to getting things that weren't on the list.  he also wasn't a dictator in an apron.  it's funny the things that make me think of him, the things i miss.  the sound of his boots on linoleum, the smell of his aftershave, the way he would always announce "bump!" in the car when he saw a sign warning you of the same thing.  the pain of losing him isn't as overwhelming now as it was in the beginning, but it does kind of hide out and wait for me some afternoons.  grief is a strange monster.

now it's house time!

we got the keys to our new house yesterday, and i was so tired that i didn't even go over there.  can you believe that?  i can, because i honestly felt like someone had beat me with a sock full of oranges.  tonight i'm actually starting to feel human again, so i headed over this evening with D and the kids to drop off a bunch of wedding presents.  we figured they were still all nicely packed, they should go over first!  walking in was awesome.  it's completely empty, a blank slate for us to play and goof off in.  we were fortunate enough to receive some lovely gifts, and while opening them the other night one of the things they girlchild said was, "man, our new house is going to look so cool."  she's right, it is.  going from the wedding to the house is a lot of work, i won't lie, but i think it's more than worth it.  we get to start our new life together in a new place, and that is pretty damn cool.  i see all sorts of fun projects in our future!  my first was to knit my new house key a cozy little sweater, because i am a dork.  i saw a few patterns for key cozies online, then watched some law & order while i winged it.  it wasn't terribly hard to make, and now i kind of want to build a bunch of cozies for everything.  keys, ipods, kindles, lamps, vacuums....okay, maybe not the vacuum.  maybe a nice mug cozy, though.

also, since we had a good friend officiate our wedding (and didn't want to make him have to get ordained as something), we needed to make our marriage legal so we hit the courthouse today and once again said "i do."  it was a super low-key affair, and we have decided that from now on we'll just have a three day wedding anniversary.  going to the courthouse didn't make me feel any more married (i truly feel that i married D on saturday!), but it does make our union kosher, and now i can start with all the name-changing shenanigans.  that sounds decidedly less fun that knitting key cozies, but it will be fun to have a new name.  now i just need to get used to signing it...

this means i'm going to have to finish wedding decorations

my giant, procrastination aiding project, the missoni style afghan, is done!  well, the ends still need to be woven in, and i think it might benefit from blocking, but the knitting is DONE.  this took five months to complete, two or three of those months spent just looking at it and dreading the miles of stockinette stitch that were to come.  taking a break from it was the right thing to do; i think i made some more courageous color choices near the end because i'd had some time to think.  i really didn't want it to follow a pattern or the colors to be too "matchy."  in the end, this was totally worth the time, effort and cost.  (although i used knit picks wool of the andes that i bought during a sale; making all the yarn for this cost about $50!)  the blog post that started this whole thing can be found here, and my photos over on flickr can be found here.  

hello, darlings

look at this awesome purse my sainted mother gave me for xmas.  it's giant, it's sturdy, it's covered in sugar skulls and it's got a rad flat bottom so it stands upright (making it perfect for knitting).  it's funny how i rate purses now not just based on awesome looks, but whether or not it can carry my yarn and needles, and how easy it is for me to knit right out of the bag. 

there's an oddities mini-marathon on over at discovery, so i've been working on my missoni blanket and watching.  i think it would be totally worth the price of plane tickets to take the kids to NY to see the place in person.  we could go to some museums too, so it would be all kinds of educational... 

really, i don't have a problem

it's just that these are SO fun and easy to make, turn out super cute, and when you hang them on your tree you can almost see the little gnomes creep out of the woodwork.  i love them. 

ha ha...gross

i knit so much this weekend that at one point my mean pea started to throb.  it was actually under there, pulsing away, grossing everyone out. 

i am a hardcore eXtreme knitter, though, so i just took two more advils and got back to work.  there are a million more tiny mushroom that need to be made, and my afghan looks more and more awesome with every passing stitch. 

jingle bells

this is the last weekend before the Big Holiday, and i plan on spending all of it at home, baking some cookies and doing some knitting.  there are a few things i would like to pick up, but i had a kerfuffle with my bank account, and so those last minute presents will be VERY last minute; like xmas eve.  ugh.  i hate putting it off so long, but the legal firm i'm using for my bankruptcy made an accounting mistake and took too much out of my account this month.  the good news is that since they've got it, they'll use it for some other fees that i won't have to worry about later.  D got fussy about it, and i would have too, but the fact remains that i'm using kind of a cheap law firm.  that's what i could afford, and you know, you get what you pay for.  i'm sure they'll handle all the filing and typing and all that jazz just fine, a little accounting mistake hasn't shaken my faith to the core or anything like that.  it throws a kink into my holiday planning, but nothing serious.  i had most everything bought anyhow!

the kids are now on xmas break; one of them is out riding his bike, one is reveling in watching tv (since she's been banned from it for weeks now).  i'm going to warm up my cup of coffee, work on more tiny knit mushrooms, an afghan, and maybe a batch of eggnog bread.  i might not leave the house or even change out of my pjs today.  so don't come over!

making a list!

it's feeling like a holiday kind of day.  the girlchild is dressing the tree (she loves it, and i let her do most of it; partly because i'm lazy, partly because it's just a lot of fun to drink coffee on the couch and tell her how awesome it looks), i'm packing stuff up, working on cleaning my sewing/knitting/computer room, and doing some last-minute gift knitting.  i told the girlchild i'm working on some mittens for my sister, but joke's on her!  the mitts are actually for her, i just don't have time to try to hide the knitting from her.  my mom used to do the same thing to me; every year i'd see her working on something for someone else, and it would end up in a box for me.  i was a dupe as a kid (soooo gullible) i never once caught on.  it happened almost every year, and i know mom thought i was in on her little joke, but i must have been in my 20's by the time i figured it out. 

all that talk of my genius is sometimes overstated, is the point of that anecdote! 

i have been trying to downsize my crafty supplies.  some are from projects i used to work on years ago, and might not get back into.  a lot are taking up valuable space.  i don't know what's come over me the past year, but i'm way more open to getting rid of stuff.  my packrat days are fading.  yeah, i might use that ball of yarn i've been carting from one apartment to another for YEARS to make a hat, but honestly?  if i haven't used it by now, i probably won't.  that's okay.  someone else might get more use out of it, or at the very least it can become part of their stash.  i've got a cup of coffee, my new favorite podcast on, and boxes filling with stuff that's got to get out of my house.  wish me luck! 

we're still knitting a lot of mushrooms

by "we" i mean the boychik is in on it now, as is one of his little friends.  so far the count is 7 'shrooms total, including one stuffed with catnip for lulu.

oy

i really wanted to talk about my awesome book tonight, but it was a strange night and all i ended up doing was drinking a few beers and knitting some mushrooms. 

i don't talk about work a whole ton because a) it's not always real cheerful and b) HIPAA, dudes.  today was a reasonable day at work, followed by a shitty email from a teacher (guess who skipped an IN-CLASS homework assignment?! is she trying to give me an aneurysm?), after which i came home, found some awesome mail, and then went stocking stuffer shopping.  a little retail therapy helps at times.  after that, literally moments after walking in the door, i got a call from my co-worker who said there was an ER case that came in that looked bad.  the hospital called nicely (since we don't work on call; it's one of the weird things about being a contractor) and asked us to come back in (which is super rare), so the patient could get their MRI before being moved to a different,  bigger hospital.  going back into work wasn't a big deal, i live all of five minutes away.  the case was shitty though.  the patient is super sick.  not a little "oh, we can work on this" sick but probably "good luck" sick.  the whole family was there, and it was more than a little heartbreaking.  it made annoying homework issues and home stuff seem downright prosaic and lovely.  after that, i just wanted to come home and hang out with my people and just be here, now.  it's corny, i know it, and i think saying it out loud makes is 500 x cheesier, but i have these moments at work when i realized i need to go home and appreciate everyone here for a few minutes, because right now just doesn't last as long as you want it to.  i wouldn't trade my shittiest days with this family, my family, for anything.  i hope the family i helped tonight are okay.  i hope that things get better for them.

in the meantime i'm going to knit some ridiculous mushrooms and stay up too late.   

fruiting body

i'm currently reading city of saints and madmen, which talks a lot about both squids and mushrooms.  needless to say, i am smitten.  i'll tell you more about how much i love this book tomorrow, i just wanted to show you my tiny mushroom before i went to bed.  i woke D up to show up, but oddly enough, he wasn't as pleased as i am.  jeez, you wake your boyfriend to show him how crafty you are, you would think he would be a little more enthusiastic.  or something.

working!

this year thanksgiving is at our house.  i did this for a few reasons, one of which being that even though my mom lives only an hour or so away, i'm a bit sick of driving out to the island.  there's also something kind of exciting about being grown-up enough to host a holiday.  to get ready, today we did a whole lot of work around the house.  things were vacuumed, bleach spray was used liberally in the bathroom, the carport was cleaned out, and i bought a slipcover for the couch.  whew.  then i took a long ass nap.  i'm really not so domestic, it took a lot out of me.

i'm also working on a lap-afghan that no one loves but me.  see it up there!  it's loud and ridiculous and soft and cozy.  i maybe knit a bit too much this weekend, my mean pea is acting up and my left wrist is unhappy with me.  tomorrow i get to go to the dentist and maybe the girlchild's parent-teacher conference.  i say maybe because D might have to go without me, depending on how long the dentist takes.  honestly, i could do without both, but what are you going to do?  i need to have a filling replaced, and we need to get a handle on why getting homework done is such an issue for the girl.  good times!  we'll also get to do a little more shipping for thanksgiving day supplies, and i might bust out the new tablecloth.  ooh, la la. 

hey look!

not only do i knit hats for awesome boys (dave and cary, to be exact), but i make the same face in each photo of the finished product.  i guess i think i have a good side, and i'm sticking to it.

this one is D's

this one is for D and is made out of some seriously luxurious yarn.  alpaca with a twist recently came out with highlander, which is merino, baby alpaca and just a smidge of microfiber.  it's a bit spendy, so i couldn't make him something big like a sweater out of it, but for a hat it wasn't too much at all.  besides, i still think he shouldn't get a sweater until he marries me, which is ridiculously old-fashioned for a girl who is shacked up with her boyfriend.  what can i say? i'm only traditional about stupid things.  i found the pattern over on ravelry, from a yarn store up in canada.  i liked the honeycomb cable pattern; it gives it an interesting texture without being too fussy. 

after i finished this one tonight, i decided it should be sent to cary.  he's living with my favorite portland family right now, and this hat should keep his noggin warm through his first oregon fall and winter.  he's originally from arizona, so he's still getting acclimated to our odd, damp, dark weather.  it's from an awesome pattern i also found over on ravelry, and is made with my favorite acrylic, vanna's choice.  it's warm, but can be thrown in the washer and drier when it needs it, without him having to worry about it.  it reminds me of tiger stripes.  i liked working the pattern, too, so i think i'll be making a few more before the holiday season is through.

nothing makes me feel craftier than starting and finishing a project in a weekend, and hats are perfect for that!  i want to make myself a new one, but it's like the scarf dilemma; so many hats, only one head to wear them on.  such is the trouble all knitters have... 

i succumbed to the cowl fad

i suppose things could be worse, i could be into sexting or frotage, or whatever the kids are doing these days.  although to be honest, i probably don't need the five hundred or so scarves i've made, bought or inherited over the years.  i bet three would suffice.  if you get some sort of neck-warming-device any time soon from me, i'd like to apologize in advance.  some of them might have to go... 

i had to work at a "women's fair" today, manning a booth that let ladies know our hospital provides MRIs and PET/CT imaging.  it was thrilling.  by thrilling, i mean i started and finished another cowl, read a magazine, and heard way too many women talk about their various diets for hours on end.  lunch was good, though.  they had goat cheese sandwiches and lentil soup.  no one liked the soup but me, and i loved it.  i don't know why lentils get such a bad rap, they are delicious.

i think after that yoni-fest (which D and i decided was the flip side of a sausage-fest) i need a nap, and then i will frost some delicious vanilla cupcakes i made and start cooking dinner.  tonight we are having roasted chicken and squash with mashed potatoes. i love that the cooler weather lends itself to roasting stuff in the oven.     

not serious enough

because i've been knitting a lot of socks lately (see above!), i've been on ravelry looking at socks and sock patterns quite a bit. i've noticed that quite a few knitters do things a bit differently than i do. for one things, many of them match the stripes on their socks up. others who use self-striping or variegated yarn do it in a way to avoid "pooling," which is when a color collects at certain spots, making a little "pool" of color in an otherwise mixed up palette. i don't do either of these things. i kind of dig when the stripes don't match, and i think of pooling as just one of those things that hand painted or variegated yarns do. trying to fight against it is time consuming and sometimes futile. i like to think that i'm expressing more of a go-with-the-flow attitude that outright laziness, but i'm sure some serious knitters out there will furrow their brow at me.

i have to admit though, that whenever i see a blog or ravelry post about pooling or striping and knitters who make themselves frog row upon row of their work because things don't "match" i always want to leave a comment along the lines of "but dude! both are the same color! just go with it, man!" if you are a serious knitter, one who matches everything on their socks up, may i suggest trying to knit a pair where you let the yarn do what it will? you might be surprised at how cute your socks end up.

evidently i am more of a hippie than i want to be, and my socks never match up unless they are knit in solid colors. which has happened one time so far, because you know how i love stripes.