So we've talked about this before, but it's helpful enough it bears repeating.  If you're doing a hat with fast decreases (and a lot of mine use those), my favorite way to know if it's tall enough is to get all the stitches on two needles and try it on. Fast decreases distort the fabric (and that distortion uses up some of the fabric you've made), and arranging it like this does a good job of mimicking that distortion.  If it's tall enough on two needles, it will be tall enough when you've done the decreases. Here I needed a [...]

So there's this nifty thing where, if you keep working on something, it will usually grow.  That does seem to be happening here.  The hat is getting markedly taller. It still needs another inch or two (I have a few things in mind for the decreases here, but any of them will need the hat to be pretty tall first), but the end is in sight (this is the inside, because some folks have asked...though honestly that feels a tiiiiiiny bit like asking to peek in my medicine cabinet...). Then?  Then I think maybe it will need a pom pom...

I'm loving how this is shaping up.  Once you're done with the colored bit on the brim, you don't actually ever make another knit stitch with the contrast yarn.  You just weave it in and out of the stitches knit with the gray yarn. For some reason this both entertains me and makes me feel clever (and yes, I realize that I probably am not actually terribly clever if that entertains me, but I'll take what I can get. And once more, for anyone wanting to track down their own, the yarns are Tosh Vintage in Smokestack and Tosh Merino [...]

So you saw the swatches the other day, and here's how it's shaping up. There's no way to make a few rows of stockinette all that interesting...so I'll distract you with the purple hat (Entrapment, that one's out now) and the pink hat (out soonish...probably) instead. Then you join in the gray bits...though it's still not all that interesting. Then you get to do the fun bits! That's much better...   [pextestim pex_attr_set="looking-for-this-pattern" pex_attr_autoplay="false"][/pextestim]

So every now and then, some lovely person says 'oh, all your knitting is so pretty.'  And that's very very kind, but it's also totally not true.  A fair bit of my knitting actually looks like absolute trash.  It's just that I usually go through that stage while I'm swatching, not on the full project stage of things.  See? Absolute crap.  There is nothing appealing about this save the yarn. But the secret is, that's just a swatch.  It's all of three inches across.  That means I can keep going and keep experimenting and it's just not a big deal.  [...]

I'm pretty sure this is cuter and more fun than should be allowed... Of course it's also unblocked and has its ends waving shamelessly in the wind.  But we won't talk about that. How about we distract ourselves with the cute way the top of the hat folds over on itself instead, yeah? Or, failing that, we start daydreaming about how the third in the series should work...swatches soon (just as soon as I get the book off to the printer and sleep for 48 hours straight).   [pextestim pex_attr_set="looking-for-this-pattern" pex_attr_autoplay="false"][/pextestim]

This is just about ready for the decreases. Which means it's time to start figuring out what to do for the third one (the blue one here). Expect swatches soon...

So when I say I'm thinking of doing a set, I'm speaking fairly loosely.  We're not talking a hat and mitts and a cowl, we're talking a few pieces that all explore a similar idea. In this case, that idea is 'what if I start with a lovely, neutral background and a simple shape...and then pull another yarn in to do something a bit crazy with a funky stitch for some fancy texture?' So here you can see the first iteration of that (it's Entrapment, and it's already out on ravelry if you simply must have it). And here's the [...]