Winter Pompom hat

With the winter coming soon who doesn't need a warm hat, especially if you live up in the Great White North like I do!

My friend Jenn has the same problem I have when I comes to buying hats - we both have small heads. Sometimes this means shopping in the kids section sometimes. How embarrassing would it be to bump into a kid wearing the same hat as you? Haha :) Jenn has been hunting for a cable knit hat with a pompom for a while now. She actually asked me to make one for her last year, but with my pregnancy and prepping for S' arrival I just didn't have time. This year she asked me again, and I finally delivered :)

I went my favourite pattern site Ravelry to find a cable knit hat that would allow me to knit different sizes. But even if I couldn't find one I would have just bought a lower gauge yarn and used smaller needles and followed the pattern as is. I found a nice pattern called the Gingerbread Hat, which I liked because it had some additional design elements in addition to the cables.

I knit extra rows of the ribbing brim so that Jenn could fold it up - I thought the hat would look better this way, and I think I does :) I knit an additional 12 rows than what the pattern called for.  I found the pattern to be pretty easy to knit - the first couple of rows I had to keep my eye on the pattern, but once I figured it out it was smooth sailing :)

I topped the hat off with a pompom made out of the remaining yarn. I found this video on YouTube that showed me how to make it. I crapped up the first one, and had my sister help me with my second attempt :D Note to self - always try a new technique with scrap yarn that you're not going to be using for your project - I almost ran out of yarn making the second one!

And voila.. Jenn's new hat :)

Arm/Wrist Warmer Fun

I've gotten back to my roots - knitting wrist/arm warmers :)  I went through this phase early in my pattern knitting career making up patterns for wrist warmers.  But of course I made up the pattern as I went, and I didn't write it down (well there are notes, but it's all short-handed jibberish with dots, squiggly lines and numbers - a language I think I could only understand).

My sis and her husband ventured downtown one afternoon and happened to stroll into this yarn store.  Now, my sister does not knit (she sews... we make a pretty good crafting mega team!), but she strolled in because she wanted to get me a business card just in case I wanted to go some time.  While she was there she saw these arm warmers that looked pretty cool - it was a long cable knit arm warmer with a cable pattern.  What was so interesting about these arm warmers was the cable wrapped around the thumb hole.  She asked me if I could knit something similar for her.  I consulted my cable knitting bible (LoL) and this is what I came up with:

 
I think they turned out pretty well :)  I used Martha Stewart 100% merino wool to make her wrist warmers.  I love knitting with merino - the structure of wool but super soft.  My sis loved the arm warmers - yay! :D

Pattern is available to purchase by clicking the "buy now" button below (sold through Ravelry and is a direct file download)