Hudson's Bay-by Surprise Jacket

As I was sitting there working on the HBC shawl a few weeks ago, one of my knitty girlfriends was working on a Baby Surprise Jacket.  I was thinking about all the leftover coloured yarn I would have from the shawl and then I had an epiphany: an HBC BSJ!

I was intending to wait until after the summer to start it, since I have a few time sensitive projects these days, but then I realized I have a bit of time before the August Camp Loopy project starts, and I couldn't bear to think of finishing the sweater I'm working on in this oppressive heat, and a BSJ only takes a few days...  So I cast it on and knit it up, squeeing all the way.

I thought about a few ways to incorporate the stripes, either right at the beginning (i.e. just after the sleeve cuffs) or through the main part of the body, but because the jacket itself is so wee, the stripes would have to be thin single ridges of colour to fit in most positions.  In the end, I decided to put them in the "work the middle 90 stitches for 10 ridges" part of the pattern so they would just be in the hem area around the bottom, but had to upsize that section to 14 ridges to accomodate all of the colours in a 2-ridge width.  The jacket ended up looking a bit long, but when I blocked it, I tugged it a bit wider and shorter and it turned out fine.

I was planning to get some little blonde wood buttons, but then I found these darker dyed wooden ones with little leaves on them, and they were so enchanting and perfect for a little outdoorsy baby that I bought them on the spot.

I still have tons of yarn left over, so I might just make this my new go-to baby gift.

HBC Shawl

Of course, the thing that prompted me to finally write a post about the June shawl yesterday was because I have another shawl to write about today!

Since I was a kid, I've always loved the iconic look of the Hudson's Bay Company point blankets: a simple off-white blanket with the four wide stripes of colour.  It's an instantly recognizable symbol of Canada (though admittedly not always a good one.)  As they cost hundreds of dollars, I've always relegated it to the "someday" pile.

Much to my happiness, the second project for Camp Loopy was to knit something up (using at least 600 yards of yarn) that is somehow reminiscent of a favourite place.  I instantly thought of the shawl Point, based on the concept of the classic HBC blanket.

The Loopy Ewe carries about a million colours of solid fingering weight yarn, in 200 yard skeins, which make it easy to stock up for striped projects.  I got one little skein each of the colours (and have just tons left over) and then three skeins of the Ivory.  The pattern only calls for two, but since that would give me essentially a one-skein sized shawl (like the one I posted yesterday) I elected to upsize it a bit.

The main body of the shawl is a little knit-purl pattern that adds just enough texture, particularly in a simple ivory colour, and then mindless garter stitch to make the stripes.  Because I'd upsized the shawl, I also decided to make each stripe three ridges of garter stitch instead of two (i.e. six rows of knitting instead of four.)  I really like it, since the stripes in the blankets are so fat and I didn't want these ones to be too thin.

Much to my dismay, the red yarn bled a bit into the ivory as it was washed.  I tried a second soak to minimize it, and while that did work to some extent, you can still see the little bit of red there, if you are looking for it.  I suppose I'd better wash the rest of the red before I make anything else with it, and keep that in mind in future.

Having pulled it up from drying on my bedroom floor, I couldn't wait even a moment to try it on for a selfie, without any makeup or even a sensible look on my face.

Perfect.