Tag: knitting

52 hats:: 7 – Ribbed Rib Hat (free pattern)

~ Maggie ~ 7 Comments

(this post contains affiliate links)

It’s rather simple, but I like it. It’s the kind of hat my husband likes to wear. I even think I’ll pack it into our carry-on luggage for him if the weather in Holland keeps doing what it’s doing now (so cold! so happy to be away from it!).

Want to make one too? You can downlaod the free pattern here

Please tell me if there is anything unclear or wrong with it. I’d also like to hear from you if you actually make a hat with this pattern 😉

Making, right now:

I actually finished hat #8, but I still have to take pictures of it (It’s not easy to take pictures of hats on your own head. I need to find myself a mannequin head model or something like that (the one I linked doesn’t ship to Curaçao, but maybe I will be able to find one in Holland)

Working on hat #9 now. It’s not going smoothly, this one, but maybe I want it to be too perfect. So right now I’m practicing the art of letting go of perfection… 😉

This Wednesday I’ll be hosting my monthly Mad Hatters’ Link Party. Feel free to visit and post any hats you made last month.

Linking up with Jeannie Gray Knits’ Makers’ Monday and Frontier Dreams’ Crafting On

52 hats :: 5 + 6 – Two of a kind

~ Maggie ~ 8 Comments

My fifth and sixth hat were two variations on the same pattern, a slouchy one and a normal fit.

The first one had me knitting on the edge. This was all the yarn I had left to finish it… (and that was after cheating on decreases on the top: I skipped a few rows I should have knit to make it flatter).

Anyway, It actually turned out nice, I think. I added two rows of YO and two rows purls to give it a bit more movement and texture and that worked out great.

I liked that texture so much I decided to use it on the next hat too. Same yarn, different color. Shorter brim and no increasing after the brim, but the rest is the same. I thought I’d like this one better, but it seems slouchy hats are growing on me cause I prefer the slouchy one.

Which one do you like best? And what are you up to these days? Any hats?

(linking up with Frontier Dreams’ Crafting On)

Right now

~ Maggie ~ 4 Comments

Right now I am…

:: looking back at a wonderful weekend

We started it on Friday evening like we do most weekends: by visiting Seaquarium Beach, have a bite to eat and a few drinks, while watching the sun set into the sea. We never get tired of that!

On Saturday we worked all day and it felt good. It’s silly how chosing to work can make such a difference in how it feels… T. dove into getting to know a different programming language then he normally uses and I worked on my Dutch blog and my book. Yes, that’s right. I’m afraid to jinx myself if I write it down, but it seems my writer’s block is finally over!

On Sunday we drove to the west part of the island and visited Shete Boka (Seven Coves), a national park on the North Coast we love very much.

:: knitting

Hats, of course. Working on #8. Note to myself: Bring more yarn next time. I still love knitting hats, but I’d also like to pick up something else every once in a while.

:: reading

I’m really enjoying the columns a famous Dutch writer (mostly known for her children’s books) wrote in the fifties. I love the way she plays with language and I also love that she dares to write what she thinks, even if it was something less acceptable in those days (she was a feminist). It’s kind of inspiring.

I also read a book by Andreas Eschbach, but it seems that there isn’t an English version (I read it in Dutch). To bad. I think he’s one of the best writers of our time. Trying to find English versions I also found out that a lot of his books aren’t translated in Dutch either (he’s German). I can read German if I really want to, but it’s not a fun language to read… Still, his stories are great, so maybe I will, sometime.

At the moment I’m reading and writing both in Dutch and English and I’m trying to learn Papiamento (the local language on Curaçao). I think that’s enough languages in one mind for a while.

Since I keep hearing that the Matchmakers’ series I enjoyed so much is comparable to Janet Evanovitch’s books, I’ve started reading “One for the money” on Saturday. I like it sofar, but I can’t download the rest of the series within my e-book subscription, so I can’t read the whole series.

When I finish it I plan to start reading an historic novel about Curaçao. I feel like I should learn more about the place we want to settle, so this is a good start (I know novels aren’t the best source, but this is written by an historian, so I assume he does have his facts straight).

:: writing

Lots of articles in Dutch. I hope to be back to more active blogging in English soon, but for now I’m stuck with Dutch, it seems. I’m also looking forward to keep going with my book.

:: making lists

And lists of lists to make. Hmn. Relax, Maggie, relax (oh, I was so right to pick that as my word for 2018)! But there’s so much to think about. We return to Holland in about a month, but only to sell our house and to take care of lots of small things. And then (we hope in July, but it may take us longer) we’ll return to Curaçao to permanently live here. O my!

We did decided to give ourselves two years here in rentals and then we’ll evaluate if we want to stay or return (or move on to some other place).

:: thinking

About this blog and where to go with it. But also thinking that maybe for now it’s enough to enjoy what it is now. It’s fun to write about knitting and life. And I love the connections and comments. But then again, there’s so much more I’d to write about and…

Relax, Maggie, relax… 😉

Bon Siman! Wishing you all a great week.

(linking up with Jeannie Gray Knits’ Makers’ Monday)

Making, right now

~ Maggie ~ 8 Comments

Right now I’m making…

:: hats

Of course.
I sort of lost count and I don’t have much time this morning (this is just a quick update), but I think I’m still on track or even ahead with my 52 hats challenge. I have been knitting almost everyday, despite all the other things I’ve been working on this week

:: home

Last week, we moved. We’re no longer staying at our friends’. It was all quite sudden, but we rented a small (tiny) apartment in a neighborhood we’ve loved ever since we first visited the island. It’s a long term rent, for at least a year. And yes, that does mean that living here permanently is becoming more and more a real thing. I’ll talk some more about that later.

:: rhythm

I find myself going back and forth between vacation mode and stressing out. Last week I was supposed to work on the bookkeeping and taxes, but we spent three days packing, moving, shopping and cleaning (I can’t feel at home somewhere if I haven’t cleaned it myself – I know, it sounds like OCD and maybe it is).
Still, I managed to finish the things I really needed to do, so now I can move on to finding a rhythm that includes writing (both blogs and fiction) in my weekly routines, while still leaving room for impromptu beach visits and other fun stuff.

It’s funny to find that my routines here aren’t all that different from the ones I had back in Holland. I still do most of my cleaning on Mondays (got to get that over with asap) and the weekly bookkeeping on Tuesdays (need to make sure I get to that every week). Wednesdays are for grocery shopping, leaving me two days for the rest.

Oh! Writing this makes me see where my thinking is off. It seems my weeks are very full, but in fact they’re not. Cleaning, book keeping and grocery shopping doesn’t take all day. I have most of the afternoons free for other things to do. I think I need to start viewing my days in AM and PM to get a better idea of my planning. Will be working on that…

For now I’m wishing you all a great week.

Bon Siman! (as they say here on Monday – it means  “good week” and I love how positive that is compared to the “I hate Mondays” attitude so many people seem to adopt nowadays)

linking up with Jeannie Gray Knits’ Makers’ Monday

Mad Hatters' Link Party + free pattern

~ Maggie ~ 6 Comments

Well, the first month of 2018 is almost over. It wasn’t the easiest month for me to keep knitting, but I did, despite travelling, tropical temperatures, a very limited stash and other obstacles.

I am on track with my challenge to make a hat each week, so that’s going great.

These are the four hats I made in Januari:

1 :: True Blue

2 :: Gray Slouch

3 :: a Field of Tulips

4 :: Bobble Top

My personal favorite is the Bobble Top, and now you can knit that one too. I tried to write down my notes as clear as I possibly could. Download PDF here (204.4K).

If you find any mistakes, or have any questions, contact me in the comments or via e-mail (adres is on the pdf)

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52 hats :: 4 – Bobble Top (free pattern)

~ Maggie ~ 8 Comments

Well, this one was a bit of a struggle (my notes were all wrong and I was short on knitting time), but I think I do like what I ended up with. It’s actually the same as this one (I gave it away before I could take any good pictures):

Want to make one too? You can download the free pattern here.

If you find any mistakes, or have any questions, contact me in the comments or via e-mail (adres is on the pdf)

I’ll be hosting my first monthly “Mad Hatters’ Link Party” tomorrow (feel free to link up any hats you made the past month, wether or not you’re doing a 52 hats challenge).

What have you been up to these days? Hats? Or bigger projects?
I’m feeling a bit of an urge to start something bigger or at least other than a hat coming up, but I’ve to find a place to buy yarn first…

Linking up with Frontier Dreams’ Crafting on and Ginx Craft’s Woolly Linx Party
 

Making, right now

~ Maggie ~ 4 Comments

Right now I’m making…

:: progress on the more boring tasks in my life. End of year bookkeeping, taxes and annual accounts for six (small) bussinesses. I always have to kick myself to start and then I remember how easy it is. Actually, I even like doing this. I should remember that next year.

:; plans and decisions about the rest of my work. I feel like I bit off more than I can chew, trying to maintain (and grow) three blogs and hoping to write another book. I need to prioritize.

:: a swatch. So exciting, right? Well, actually I can’t really remember ever having done that before. I must have, because my reason for not doing it is that even after swatching and calculating and making things hard, I tend to end up with something wider or narrower than I intended. Oh, that’s right. I swatched before knitting my husband a sweater that somehow ended up big enough to house two men his size (realized that about half way in). Anyway, since I want to share a real pattern for my last hat, I thought I’d try to state the gauge I’m knitting in.

Linking up with Jeannie Gray Knits’ Makers’ Monday.

Knitting and reading

~ Maggie ~ 10 Comments

(this post contains affiliate links)

Knitting:

Well, that fourth hat takes a long time. I couldn’t take it with me on our little trip to Bonaire (didn’t want to risk having to throw one of the two sets of needles I brought with me to Curacao in the bin at the airport), so it’s been on hold for two days. I’m looking forward to picking up my knitting this afternoon, after I do some more important things first.

Reading:

The good news is that I could take my e-reader with me, so I’ve been reading a lot. I also found ou that with my e-reader t I can knit and read at the same time.I used to be against multi-tasking (I don’t think it’s productive at all), but doing two things I love at the same time can’t be wrong, so I’m rolling with it.

If the cats don’t bother me, that is. They’re very interested in both my knitting and my reading.

I’m working my way through the Matchmaker Mysteries series by Elise Sax. when I took this picture I was halfway book 4, but we spent a lot of time on the airport yesterday and now I’m halfway book 5. I’m loving every one of them.

Linking up with As Kat Knits’ Unraveled Wednesday

52 hats :: 3 – a Field of Tulips

~ Maggie ~ Leave a comment

Last week I was in for something that required a bit more thinking than a simple slouchy hat. I was looking through a magazine with all sorts of stitch patterns (didn’t bring my grandmother’s book – was afraid it would fall apart) and found one that looked interesting. Then I thought: “those blocks look like tulips” and it sort of started growing wild from there.

The finished hat has no resemblance to the pattern that started the idea, but I kind of like what I did. It does need some tweaking (if i’ts too big to really show the pattern on my giant head it will be too big on most heads) before I’d call it a pattern (as far as patterns go when I’m trying to write them), but I am definitely going to make more of these.

Linking up with Frontier Dreams’ Crafting on

Making, right now

~ Maggie ~ 4 Comments

Yesterday I found out I lost track of the date. That may not sound alarming to you, but it’s really not like me.
I tend to be an obsessive planner. I even wrote a blog about planners for a while, until my husband kindly (well, as kindly as he could muster up to his very stressed out and worked up planner wife) asked me to quit being so fanatic about it.

Anyway, we found out yesterday that we’re not flying to Bonaire (a neighboring island) on Tuesday, like I thought, but today. Ahem. I remembered the date correctly, but lost track of what date we were actually on. I guess that’s a good sign. I’m finally relaxing a bit.

I will be sharing the third hat tomorrow (hurray for being able to schedule posts), but I don’t know yet if I’ll be able to get online until Wednesday. Well, so be it. (See? Relaxed!)

The fourth hat is not coming along as fast as the others.I kept wondering why it didn’t look like the first version I made at all. I thought it had to do with using a different type of yarn and figured maybe it was trying to teach me a lesson about gauge and pattern writing.
Hey, I don’t cook from recipes (and have a hard time telling people how exactly I made something), hardly ever use a pattern for knitting or sewing and write books by typing whatever comes to mind without any plotting. So why was I thinking I could write very precise patterns that other people would like to use and maybe even pay for?

But then it dawned to me that maybe my notes were wrong. The stitch pattern comes from my grandmother’s knitting book and was designed to be knit flat. What if I simply copied the original pattern but forgot I had to purl instead of knit and knit where it said purl? I dug up the original photo of the first version of this hat (the third photo in this post) and enlarged it until it was clear that indeed I had been mixing up knits and purls. So I frogged back to the brim and started over. This time it does look like the green hat. So I will be sharing my notes or maybe even a real (free) pattern after I finish it.

That could take a little while though, since I do have a bit of a problem with the cats here. I love having them around but I never really expected them to paly with my yarn. The last cat we owned was old. Ancient for a cat. We don’t know exactly since we got him from a shelter, but he was at least 21 when he died. He was constantly on my lap when I was knitting (I guess because that usually meant I wasn’t going to jump up to do something else for a while) and just slept through it.
These cats though… well. I will get there eventually, but I have to put my knitting away when they’re around.

Linking up with Jeanny Gray Knits’ Makers’ Monday.