Learning Intarsia with Cotton yarn & 10 colors = Bad Idea

The colorful baby-blanket is no more. After working a few more intarsia rows last night, I held it up & looked at it. And it looked like crap. Lots of little holes from uneven gauge as a result of changing yarn every 5 stitches. Note to self: when learning intarsia, use wool & a maximum of, say, 4 colors. So, like any rational grown-up, I pulled the blanket off the needles, threw it on the floor, and announced my intention of throwing the whole damn thing out. My husband, irrational creature that he is, objected to throwing away several 90% intact skeins of yarn that cost us $50. So I am making lots of chemo caps with lots of pretty stripes. Chemo caps seem like the best way to get rid of cotton yarn I don't know what to do with.

Yarn that will be used to make chemo caps:

• 12 skeins of 1824 cotton in various colors
• 3 skeins of ivory baby acrylic
• and maybe 3 skeins of Cotton Classic used in the Pea Pod Baby Set

But I might make another Pea Pod Baby Set because I just found out my cousin is having a baby! Surprise! I am very irritated with even the thought of baby blankets right now (same goes for intarsia), so it looks like all the expectant mothers I know will be getting itty-bitty one-color sweaters.

But it looks like I'm going to have to make 4 billion (ok, closer to 12) chemo caps before I can do any more stash-enhancement without a husband-lecture. I am so deprived.

Pea Pod Baby Set

The third time was the charm for the pea pod baby hat. This was the first thing I've ripped out twice before it was the way I liked it. And I am very, very pleased with how it turned out. The set was knit up in Tahki Cotton Classic. I think I shall probably make more of these - they're faster than baby blankets and so precious. How precious? I will let you decide.


The pattern for the Pea Pod Baby Set by Kate Gilbert can be found at Interweave Press.

On The Needles or On My Mind

Projects that are actually on the needles:

• Baby Blanket from Vogue "On The Go" Baby Blankets 1. Baby is due in August - I have got to get moving. Intarsia hell soon to follow.
• Multicolored Cotton Sweater for which I have lost the half-completed sleeve & associated circular needle & ball of yarn. I have searched high and low. I suspect, as per usual when knitting-related articles go missing, that my husband is involved with the disappearance. And, as usual, he proclaims his innocence.
• Navy blue cardigan made of beautiful blue wool my parents bought in New Zealand. I will resume work on this when we move back north. Maybe.

Projects that are on my mind:

• The Pea Pod baby hat from Interweave Press's web knits that I finished last night. It is perfect except for the fact that it is pointy. As in, it looks like an elf-hat. I am seriously considering frogging this tonight & trying again. So it might be back on the needles soon.
• The Knitting Guild master's program, level 1. The yarn is in the mail for this, and I am itching to get started.
• The Atlanta Knitting Guild's knit along project: a felted water bottle cozy. I will add a long strap to it & make it more like a water-bottle sling. This project is on my mind the most because of the decorating options it provides. I could do blue waves in different shades of blue with water drops on the strap. Or I could do a design inspired by pottery I saw on my recent trip to Greece. Or, I could do a plain boring one and embroider a martini on it, with olives on the strap.
• The three chemo caps I have to knit from the cotton classic I bought for afore-mentioned Pea Pod baby set. The yarn estimates were, for the first time in my life, accurate, and so now I have three balls of Tahki cotton classic. I can understand why yarn stores don't accept returns, but I don't have to like it.
• What to do with the growing pile of one & two & one-half balls of yarn (mostly wool or wool-blend) left over from other projects. If it weren't wool blend, they could be chemo-caps (my favorite odd-ball project). And if they were black, they could be soldier's helmet liners. As if they were the same gauge & blend, I could use them together to make some interesting color-work thing. But as it is, I am stumped.
• Buying flannel liner for a blanket I finished in February & hemming it & attaching it to the knitted blanket. Finding flannel in July in Atlanta can be, ahem, somewhat challenging.

The first list is actually a lie. Those are the only projects I'll admit to. There may, or may not be, a dreadfully ugly, acrylic, lacey baby cardigan hidden under my stash. But I'm not telling.

I plan to post pictures of my latest finished work soon: Interweave Press's webknits Pea Pod Baby Set.