Lace Handwarmers and Felted Hat

Currently knitting these lace handwarmers made from some yarn I handdyed - in greens and blues. The handwarmers are pretty stretchy..although the pattern says "Fits most women".

Hand side:

Palm side:


As for my felted hat, the sob story is that I made one of these in 2005 and subsequently lost the favorite hat, so I'm making another as I know it'll be cold with that Victoria wind whipping by, and I don't want to go another year without. The hat is made with 3 skeins of Noro Kureyon - at least that is, with the parts of the 3 skeins that I wanted, namely the bright red and pink parts. The dark gray and black parts I just cut out. As one of my BB buddies mentioned, it probably makes the colorway more random. That's true, it's turned out wonderfully.
Here's the pre-felted version:


Although it's rough on the hands while knitting, Kureyon knits and felts up like a dream into a firm but soft fabric, albeit a little hairy. Definitely use a lingerie bag when felting one of these, it definitely sheds.

Just drying now, when it's dry, I'll post a pic of the finished hat.

Pet Peeve Adventure and Rant

Lately, in the last couple of weeks, I have been on a bit of an adventure. Unbeknownst to me, I have managed to pick up (twice now) objects that have lay idle for months secretly storing up gruesome smoky smells. Each time, I have thought nothing of grabbing said object and pushing it into a bag with my knitted objects or projects (Gak!) that are clean and non-smoky. Yuk, Disgusting. Yes, you can tell, i'm a non-smoker.

Last friday night, I was working avidly on my knitted felt hat, the hat to replace the beloved felted hat that I lost a year or two ago -that was my first ever knitting project from a class . This to-be felted hat lies ready and waiting, far away from other projects because when I arrived home on friday night, I realized I had put a smoky project (fall star stitch scarf) into a bag overnight with my other clean projects (to-be felted hat, and finished dream-in-color shrug). ugh. Another bout of febreze and the projects including the scarf smell new - a temporary measure until I can get to rinsing them with wool wash or eucalan. The hat to be felted anyway will have a bit of soap to keep it company in the wash so the smell will go.

Tonight yet again, I managed to put a smoky-smelling synthentic scarf (say that 5x fast!) in with my knitting stuff, after having worn said scarf into work, at lunch, and to knit night. Yuk! I didn't realize until I arrived home and pulled my knitting and knitted items out that they smelled smoky.

So, you might ask, "how are they getting smoky ?" Well, in my move last Dec, the professional movers I hired smoked furiously at breaks, came in, did a cursory wash of their hands, and went back to packing my stuff. Since I-5 was closed at christmas time, I ended up not being able to transport my clothes myself, so they were pushed into the professional move, and packed by yep, professional movers who smoke and have the dang smoky residue on their hands, and transferred it to my clothes. Great.

Now, as I've been unpacking some clothes from my storage unit I've discovered clothes that have held onto the smoke and ick now, able to store and transfer the yukky stuff again to my clothes. You bet I'm peeved.

I do have to say that I in my past life, I was way more tolerant of smoke. Having lived in Germany for 2 years where smoking, even with dinner, was the norm for many Germans, I knew that going to dinner at 8pm as was the norm for most germans meant grey blue smoke filled restaurants and pubs. My friends and I generally went out to dinner early at 6ish to avoid the smoke. When I returned from Germany to Portland, I was more tolerant than when I had been living in Germany even. That has definitely worn off now.

Now, with the rule about no smoking within 3m of an entry way, I see a habit that has changed its nature. Since smokers can no longer smoke inside the building, outside the building, or near the building, I see way more smokers smoking in their cars, dropping butts on the street, flicking ashes out windows, and smoking up a storm inside their cars before going in to work, or handling merchandise inside stores - including yarn stores.

Anyway, to anyone reading this - if you handled any items knitted by me in the last couple of weeks, and you're a non-smoker and were bothered by smelling my smoky items, I'm sorry if they were smoky, and smelled smoky. I hope I didn't transfer any of it to your knitting projects. I didn't know. I hope I'm training my nose to discern quicker the unwanted smells, and isolate the offending object sooner, and treat them with febreze, wool wash and/or a trip to the laundry.

Phew - let's hope this part of the adventure is over sooner rather than later.