O! My! Bob! I like having Fridays Off!

 

 Hello:

It is still Spider Season in the Pacific Northwest.  This one is the size of a quarter, I am not kidding.  It's in the front yard, though, and not near where I walk.

I did not have school today.  We had a faculty work day, and since I am classified personnel, not certified, I did not have to go.  Instead, I KNIT!  what a great day.

I got up early because I wanted to finish another animal hat.  The Doc is down in Tucson, AZ visiting Himes this weekend, and I sent down 4 animal hats for the little cousins who live there.  I started the last of these 4 hats on Wednesday, and although I stayed up late last night trying to finish it, I just got too tired.  So, I finished it early this morning.  Here are the 4 hats:

A gray cat, a gray bunny, a panda and a dog.  These amazingly cute hats are from the book, Animal Hats, 15 Patterns to Knit and Show Off by Vanessa Mooncie. I showed you the cat and bunny last month when I first made them.

I made another cat hat, a Ginger Cat, for Addie's First Birthday (the party was last Saturday).

She has a real ginger cat at her house, and I thought she might want to play cats some days.

Then, on Sunday, I got a great idea to knit 2 more hats for the little cousins in Tucson.  Because I was using worsted weight yarn and size 9 (5.5m) needles, I was able to finish the 2 extra hats in time for the Doc to bring all 4 with him on the plane today.

First I made the panda.

One of the things I don't like about the book is that all the hats are knit flat.  This makes sense for the cat hat as the white face is intarsia, but the rest of the hats are just hats with animal parts attached.  So I knit the panda hat in the round, made the black parts and attached them.  The eyes are supposed to be safety eyes, but I made them by crocheting circles with a magic loop beginning.  Way cheaper since I have so much yarn, and even more safe than the "safety eyes" for young children.

Then, on Wednesday, I started the Dog hat.  I finished the hat part on Thursday afternoon, and started knitting the Dog parts that evening:  2 ears and an eye patch.  The ears took a bit of time.  I knit them double knit rather than making 2 pieces and sewing them together.  Honestly, It would probably be faster to just knit the 4 pieces of inner and outer ear, then sew them. but I really like making ears with double knitting instead.  I also knit the eye patch, but made it bigger than the pattern called for, because I thought that patch was too small.  I crocheted these eyes, too, then went to bed.

In the morning I sewed everything on, then knit the nose.  I knit 4 noses before I liked the way it looked.  I ended up knitting a double knit nose as well, just to make it more 3-dimensional.

Ok, the eyes look a bit off, actually the ears are a bit off, too, but it's finished.

Then, I got to go to Crossroads for Fiber Friday!  I was joined at the round table under the skylight in the center by CathieC and JulieMustKnit.

CathieC brought her Exit 0 Shawl, by Laura Aylor.

Julie brought a new cowl, the Carmella Cowl by Elizabeth Smith.

Julie tried to blame me for this project... she spun some tale about driving to Tolt in Carnation for more navy yarn for The Detroit Achievement Academy mittens, and seeing some Misti Alpaca Yarn, and knowing that she needed to get in a project for the HPKCHC by the 10th to win a pixel badge, she had to buy the yarn and pattern.... and this was all my fault.  Well, I can't tell you how soft that yarn is.  I thought CathieC was going to run off with the cowl, that is, if I didn't.

So, blame away.

I drove the Doc to the airport, then spent the late afternoon and evening with my cats, knitting and listening to podcasts.  Other than missing the Doc (he will have a GREAT time with Himes at the U of A vs USC football game tomorrow), all is right with the world.  And I still have the weekend ahead of me.

Peace,
f1bercat
shaping the world with animal hats