Day 9 Already!

Wow, I can't believe we're slightly more than halfway through the Olympics! I finished the Baby Tart hat last evening – hurray! I started doing the bobbles a different (and much easier) way, and was able to complete it with much less frustration than I had been experiencing. To decrease the five stitches of each bobble back down to one stitch, in the decrease row, the pattern said to slip 2, k 3 tog, then pass the 2 slipped stitches over one at a time. Trying to k 3 tog with cotton is much more easily said than done, as it doesn’t have the “give” of wool, but I struggled through 7 sets of bobble pattern rows before giving up. Then I started instead to slip 4, k 1, then pass the 4 slipped stitches over the 1 knit stitch. Much easier, much faster, and there is no noticeable difference! Now I’ll have to block it a little bit, so the pastry “edge” stands up a little better.

I haven’t quite reached my Olympic goal yet, however, because I haven’t yet made a hat for my new grand-nephew, born just last Wednesday. I decided that I wanted to do more than just a larger version of the spiral rib preemie hat that I made earlier, so checked through my various pattern books this morning until I found one that I like. It’s pattern 6003B from Dale’s Baby Collection No. 60, designed by Kari Haugen, which doesn’t sound very romantic or cute, but it is! The cap has a Norwegian design with the typical 8-petal rose (what many people often mistake for a snowflake) around the brim, and the main part of the cap is alternating stripes going from bottom to top of the hat (not around). I’ll knit it in Dale Baby Ull, with light blue for the main color, and white for the contrasting color. I may do the matching booties and mittens, as well, but the hat comes first, my last official “race” of the Knitting Olympics. Anything after that is a bonus, er, warmdown.

Like Kathy, I hope that everyone will post a short note about your progress at this halfway point (actually a little more now) in the Knitting and Winter Olympics. It will be great to see how everybody’s doing.