Something Girly

I finished seaming my flowery sweater yesterday, and none too soon, since the third Camp Loopy project was due to begin.

The challenge for the final project is to make something that uses at least 800 yards of yarn.  For many petite knitters, a sweater would be an obvious choice for that sort of yardage.  As a more Rubenesque knitter, 800 yards isn't a whole heck of a lot for a full-sized sweater.  Of course, I could have chosen to knit something else, like a large laceweight shawl or a baby blankie or something, but I had a hankering to make a sweater.

Once again, I made a search of my Ravelry favourites list and came up with a few contenders.  The one I ultimately chose to use for my final Camp Loopy project is a cropped lace cardigan from Chic Knits in DK weight cotton.  I've been admiring this one for a while, and think it's pretty cute but also practical for the summer months.  It has an unusual construction (been going for that a lot, lately) where you knit a narrow lace back panel and then pick up stitches from there for the rest of the back and sleeves.  It's finished off with some nice ribbing and that's it - no buttons or anything complicated.  Just what I need for some (relatively) mindless summer knitting.

Nordic Pot Holders

The Norwegian yarn company Drops is always putting out great free knitting & crochet designs.  Over the years I have knit many of them (and have many more in my mental queue.)  Every winter they organize a little set of holiday themed designs, and this is one that I've been wanting to make since they first published it a few years ago.

The original design is in cotton yarn, but I think that's a bit crazy.  Cotton yarn is a fantastic conductor of heat when wet, which translates into burned hands from gripping hot pans (I've learned that lesson the hard way.)  Wool, on the other hand, is insulating when wet or dry, so you won't burn yourself even if these get damp.  I had intended to add a layer of quilt batting in the middle, to add some extra insulation, but it turns out that two layers of stranded DK weight wool are pretty thick already.  I washed and blocked them to tidy up the stitches a bit, and just like that, my holiday decorating has begun.