Camera, light, action....

Went to town today on a big shopping spree, left on the 8 ferry, was back on the 12, so sweet. I got me flowers.

And a floor lamp to illuminate my knitting chair. My studio is the smallest part of the house and packed to the rafters, if they tried to make this up on a movie set, they couldn't...Anyway I got me a lamp, full spectrum bulbs and started knitting on the alpaca hat...I can see!!!
I Saw in Interweave Knits fall 2008 on page 84 a cover for a new book called Boutique knits. I loved the look of the hat, and the construction. A band around the head, and all the stitches picked up to make the crown. It inspired me.

This summer at a charity sale, I got Alice Starmore's Aran knits for $10!!! I could not believe my luck. When I got home, I have to say that I was a little baffled by all the hoopla around the book. It is a good book of Aran patterns and amazing pictures, but not in my view worth all the money it is fetching at auctions...Anyway, I put it aside. Then when I saw that new hat, I thought I would have fun with cables and went for it.

I started the hat with 34 stitches and got down to enough to make the band around the head (swacth 14A chart A) with bobles every other square to make them stand out more, kept the yarn attached and joined with a chain stitch and crochet, picked up the stitches for the crown, made a band of 5 cabled panels (swatch 14A chart B) only to row 25, and as luck would have it, 90 stitches with a decrease every 7 stitches gave me a beautiful spiral to the top.

When I walked into the living room to show off my latest project, my DD (the other one) asked if I wanted a professional model?

doesn't she look happy with it on?

Mommy can I keep it?

We''ll see.....