I am so happy with how this pattern came out!

More info to come when the pattern gets posted on Ravelry…

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I’m baaaack!  Zinnia Dahlia is now a free pdf on Ravelry, and you can get it by clicking here. 

How did this design come about, you ask?  Well, my husband’s brother’s girlfriend asked me if I could knit a hat like…and emailed me a picture taken from quite a distance away.  I could tell that it was waffley, and had a bit of a brim, and I knew she wanted to wear it with the brim in back, so I started thinking about a way to make the barest glimmer of a brim.  Short rows to the rescue!  That bit of the pattern looks intimidating, with 20 steps, but so long as they’re followed, creating the rolled brim should be a piece of cake.

The body of the hat is based on the Mock Honeycomb stitch pattern at Knitting on the Net.  I converted it to knit in the round, and in so doing also decreased the row count for the pattern by 6 rows. 

Sizes, you ask?  The pattern is worked over 8 stitches, so I checked my gauge and multiplied.  Instructions cover 16-24″ heads.  If you want smaller, decrease by 8 stitches.  If you want bigger, increase by 8 stitches.

Happy Knitting!

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Erm, did I forget to actually say why I got the design out of my head and onto paper?  Well, that has to do with the Malabrigo Junkies group on Ravelry.  Several months ago, before I began working full-time, there was a post about the Malabrigo Junkies Holiday Stockpile, where there will be as many gifts knit for the holidays as possible during October.  One of the “events” is the one-skein design.  I’ve been an accidental budding designer for a while, and I am a Malabrigo Junkie, and I already had this hat design request, and it was going to be knit with Malabrigo, so it seemed like a no-brainer to get do it for the contest.  What’s the prize?  Zinnia Dahlia could be featured on Malabrigo’s website.  How cool would that be?

Wish me luck, and more Happy Knitting! 

Last night as I was patterning a little sumtin sumtin for the Malabrigo Junkies Holiday Stockpile One-Skein Design contest (on Ravelry), I could not find the short row instructions I printed off a couple of years back (small wonder). 

If any of you have done the “short row with wrap” thing, you may have encountered a hole on the purl side.  I know I did.  And it made me NUTS.  So I went asking on the Hyenacart Forums for a better way.  And I was guided to the Wooly Wonder Forums. (Wooly Wonder, btw, is home of the famous Perfection Pants, a pattern I have not used but have heard great things about.)  In any case, at the forums, Ruth provided an absolutely amazing and fantastic Short Row Tutorial With Pictures, no wrapping involved, and (wonder of wonders!) no hole!

But as I said, I could not find the printout I made ages and ages ago.  So I went searching for them on Google, and I had a hard time finding them.  Once I did, I decided to blog about them, link to them, and paraphrase the instructions right here, because I’m going to lose the printout again and maybe, just maybe, I’ll someday feel confident enough to attempt the short rows without the instructions.  But I won’t have to!  These instructions assume you’re working in stockingette, but they can be used for different stitch patterns.

1. Place markers around the section to which a short row will be added
2. Knit to one stitch before the first marker (on the right side)
3. Turn and slip the first stitch purlwise (this leaves a visible gap in front of the marker)
4. Purl back to one stitch before the second marker
5. Turn and slip the first stitch purlwise (another gap created)
6. Knit back to two stitches before the first marker
7. Slip the next stitch to the right needle purlwise
8. Pick up the stitch under the slipped stitch with the left needle, and pass the stitch you just slipped to the left needle
9. Knit the first stitch as normal
10. Knit the next two stitches (the picked up one and the one on the other side of the gap) together
11. Knit around to the next marker (the gap is on the other side)
12. Slip the first stitch after the marker knitwise onto the right needle (reversing it’s mount)
13. Pick up the stitch below the next stitch on the left needle with the right, and place it onto the left needle
14. Pass the slipped stitch back to the left needle
15. Knit this stitch and the picked up stitch together through the back loops
16. Knit the next stitch as normal.

And that’s it!  Lots of instructions, but actually quite a simple method.  Last night I tried it in seed stitch, which worked great (although i didn’t like the effect for the pattern I was working on, so I won’t blog it here, maybe on my next pattern).  I’m sure it would work with ribbing as well, or anywhere else that shaping is required. 

Many kudos and props to Ruth, who I will quite happily link to if I can find an active blog or website for her!

I’m almost done with LJ’s Pimlico.  Another 3″ of 3×3 ribbing over 510st, BO in pattern, and finis!  Ribbing is thankfully monotonous, and I was able to get almost 2″ of it done while watching Juno on dvd last night.  Great movie, except that it made me really, really, really miss my husband, who has been out of town for the past 6 days, 5 nights.  I will hopefully get the rest of it done over the course of the week (15-20 rows?), and can then ship it off to my sister (who deserves it, and so much more).  After that I can get started on finished with some projects that have been on the needles, or otherwise in progress, for so long it’s embarassing.  Among them, tulip intarsia and the nb soaker, which needs to be finished soon, so I really should get on that.

Ah yes, DH has the camera with him, so I haven’t been able to take pictures of squat.  But soon, I will, and when I do I’ll upload and post pronto, promise!