Oh Baby

Baby hat

Yarn: Dark Horse Yarns-Fantasy (50% nylon, 50% acrylic)
Colors: 14 and 16 (shades of blue)
Needles: US 8s
Stitches: 54

After another long day yesterday, I set about finishing this hat. Knitting when tired isn't the brightest idea. I went to knit two together, but I think I just transferred the stitches to the other needle. I can't say for sure, though.

This would have been easily fixed except that in my weary state I thought I needed to undo stitches. To make a long story short, I ended up with one stitch less than I should have had. It didn't look like I lost any stitches, but something wasn't quite right. Since this was on the curly stockinette edge, I decided that I could hide any mistake in the seaming. I decreased the row and purled the next, but by this time I was convinced I had screwed up something.

I was very proud of the knitting I'd done until last evening's potential debacle--I said that it might be the best thing I've ever knitted--but I noticed a spot that looked kind of askew before my decreasing began. This and the possible new problems led me to stop what I was doing, which probably wasn't a bad idea anyway, and wait for confirmation or repudiation of my assessment.

I did frog the coffee cup cozy I began at the hockey game, though.

It turns out that everything was OK with the hat, so I knitted two more rows, one decreased and one purled. There were 22 stitches to be drawn together, which still seemed like a lot, and then it was time for seaming. Since the stockinette edges curl, it was more challenging to do the mattress stitch.

I'm not 100% thrilled with the seam, but all in all, I'm pleased with how the hat turned out. The colors go together well--I used leftover yarn from Kristin's scarf--and there are three stitch patterns (seed, stockinette, and garter) in one FO. This is going to sound like stating the obvious, but I was surprised how small the hat is.

I also want to make a baby blanket for these happy parents, so it was time to hit the yarn store. I didn't feel like going, but it seemed like a nice diversion for a day that had been a total bust in terms of accomplishing anything. Work is fine, save for a few issues, such as the fact that we are currently operating without a budget.

To explain briefly, we are mostly funded by the city. The college chips in some money, but the city pays for the bulk of our operation. They did not approve a budget back in November, gave us a frozen one for the first quarter, and have yet to designate funds beyond the end of March. Did I mention that the station is supposed to be moving this summer?

The financial issues are definitely causing a lot of concern about the move and the future, let alone what happens day-to-day. As much of a mess as this sounds like it is, I think everything will work out in the end. Not knowing is driving us crazier than getting an answer we don't want to hear. To make it more complicated, bad news could actually be good news--or not--and vice versa.

So between this and my upcoming move, I'm all kinds of stressed out. What better time to get some more yarn, right? I wasn't finding the baby blanket color I wanted in Lion Homespun, at least in what is available locally, so I embarked for the local yarn store. I brought the Homespun label to ease the computations in finding a proper substitute yarn. I was going to find other bulky weight yarn and buy enough yardage. Fortunately the store employee pointed out that I needed to consider the number of stitches per inch. She explained how I can figure it out if it isn't listed. Lesson learned.

I bought four skeins of yarn in light green for the blanket and two skeins of the Dark Horse Yarns-Fantasy, one in pink and one in rose, for another baby hat. I'd take pictures, but I'm ready to move away from the computer for knitting and TV viewing.

And apropos of nothing, my book review of Ricky Gervais Presents: The World of Karl Pilkington can be read at NightsAndWeekends.com. (It's not my site, which is why I'm linking to it.)