Where to Start?

It’s Sunday. Yesterday was Saturday, my usual blogging day. I, however, was busy with other things. I was asked to be the substitute teacher for two knitting classes yesterday and I did it gladly, and enjoyed myself.

Ok, this is where the post takes a slight detour. We will get back to Saturday. On Friday, we received some mail for the person who lived here before; it was a T4 slip (needed to file income tax returns here in Canada, it’s a statement of earnings), originating from a hotel not far from where we live. John decided we should drop it off there, letting them know that the intended recipient no longer lived at the address on the envelope. I delivered it, then told John I’d walk the rest of the way home. The weather was gloriously sunny.

It was, however, a little on the cold side, even with my jacket, alpaca scarf and gloves. When I got home, half an hour later, I decided I wanted a hat that would come down over my ears and stay there. Most of my hats creep up a bit or don’t quite cover my ears. I went hunting. It just so happened that in my “friends activity” that afternoon, someone had posted a picture of “Minty”, a free hat pattern, available through Knitty. I went shopping in my stash and found a dk weight yarn that I liked (Fleece Artist Silk Stream…50% wool, 30% silk, 20% nylon… discontinued), made some alterations (Minty calls for worsted weight, a heavier yarn, so I had to change the stitch count and slightly modify the pattern) and cast on.

Now we’re back to Saturday. Minty was my knitting project. Even though I was supposed to be teaching, in reality, I was there as more of a hand-holder, advice-giver and help-I-screwed-up fixer-upper.

Once I got home, I kept working on the hat, a very simple project, by the way, and finished it that evening. I like it! It’s kind of funky; John described it as “hippy-ish”. And it covers my ears nicely. I’ll give it a test later today.

As I was searching through Ravelry, I also came across another hat I thought would be eminently suitable for my walks. This one has earflaps, but not like some of the earflap hats that seem to be ubiquitous these days. They’re just large enough to cup the ears, something I think would be just right. While at the yarn shop, I looked around for the perfect yarn and ended up with Berroco’s Vintage DK, 50% acrylic, 40% wool, and 10% nylon. This is a really nice yarn, soft without being sloppy. I can see myself using it more often.

The pattern, if you’re interested, is Grantham and is available as a free Ravelry download. You can find it by clicking on the name. This hat is my project for today. I love making hats; they knit up so quickly!

I’ve also been working on the cardigans for Trinity & Oceanna. After last weekend’s fiasco, I’m back on track and alternating between the two cardis.

At this stage, they’re perfect listening-to-audiobooks knitting, nothing but stocking stitch until I get to the neck shaping.

Speaking of audiobooks… which I listen to on my iPod… which brings me to iPod apps. I know, I know. However, I found a couple of apps this week that I really like. All are paid-for apps (all .99). The first is Water Your Body. It helps you track how much water you’re drinking during the day. You input your weight and it tells you how much water you should be drinking per day; then, each time you have a glass of water, you tap the screen and it puts another glass on the table. John thinks it’s kind of silly, but I like having the visual reminder to drink more water, something most of us need.

I found my second app as a result of being very disappointed with All-in’s Pedometer app. Every time I went for a walk, it would count about 6 steps and stop. Very frustrating. I went hunting and found Run Pedometer. It’s a simple pedometer that shows your number of steps, calories burned, distance travelled and elapsed time. And it works well.

The third app I purchased is Best Timer, a really pretty kitchen timer, stop watch, countdown/up and sand timer. I just thought it was a really nicely done app and couldn’t resist.

There! Enough for this week. I have every intention of getting out there today and enjoying the sunshine, even though it’s pretty chilly out today (-9C/15F) – the perfect day to test the new hat!