Guess who I met today??

Stephanie Pearl McPhee, otherwise known as the Yarn Harlot. She made us think today about how to finish the sentance "Knitters are......." I would have to say "a fun bunch". I had a blast today at the book signing.

I finished the I-Cord bindoff on the A-line baby dress, only to realize that in order to continue with it, I would have to have a very flexible Knitpicks circular needle, or some size 4 double points. The Boye kit that I have just wasn't doing the trick to get around those corners on the straps.Well, I had neither when I was outside of my house today, so I proceeded to crochet. Here is my progress on Deborah's hat.

Just a few more inches to go. But on the flip side, I have a little problem.

I knew it looked a little bit weird, because I have never seen a hat with those spaces, and it is BOTHERING me till no end. Chante was nice enough to point out that I have been crocheting wrong this whole time. And the pattern is not that hard...it is just a bunch of Double Crochet and Single Crochet stitches. So what's my beef??? The placement of 3 darn Chain stitches on each row. Chante explained that you are supposed to chain 3 for height, and then join it into the same stitch, continuing to work the round as usual. She tried to show me on another piece of a crochet project that she was working on, and I thought I got it.... but now I feel like a dummy because I still don't understand what to do. Deb, I am sorry that I am clueless to the operation of this confusing easy pattern. I even checked for an errata and found nothing.

Deborah expressed to me that she didn't want me to frog it, because she would just use it as a decorating element in the hat. But, it is still bothering me. So Deb, if you are truly not happy with it, I will take it out. Anyone else have an opinion that they would like to share?

More Cotton Candy!!!

I recently looked at the stash that is taking up space on my clothes closet, and it is overflowing. I can't even contain all of the yarn in the cubbyholes that I built. Yes, the yarn from my last yarn crawl does not have a real home.... sad to say. So, I decided to do some projects to de-stash. I started with this A-line dress for a baby girl. The yarn is Jaeger Baby Merino DK in the color "Yoyo". So, far it looks like 2 skeins will complete the 12-month size of the dress. The pattern is from "Knits, Knots, Buttons and Bows: Projects for Babies", by Lynda Schar. I got the book from www.wowio.com . The site is sponsored by different companies who pay for publishing rights, so you can download the books to PDF free of charge. However, please remember that unauthorized duplication of the PDF is illegal.

Anyways... back to the knitty gritty... Here is the dress with the front complete. I was supposed to do a scalloped edge on the bottom of the dress, but I didn't so of course it started to roll. I plan to do an I-cord edging to get it to lay flat. Although it is tedius, the results are gorgeous, as you can see in my vest from the previous post.
I also made some progress on a crochet project for Deborah. At this point, I have 1 more row of increases to do before working the length of the hat from the crown. It is coming along very nicely, and quickly. My only slight problem is the fact that the yarn is a bit more slippery that I am used to, since it is fingering weight alpaca. But, I have managed to figure out how to crochet without having the yarn split on me. Cherry Tree Hill Glitter Alpaca still gets brownie points in my book. It is super-duper soft.