Blue Bunny Hat

As mentioned in the Baby Bear Hat post last month, I had discovered that I was having difficulties working with the Cascade Cloud 9. Turns out breathing is awesome, and antihistamines are super useful. Which is very sad, because this hat is really lovely and soft.

Yarn: Cascade Cloud 9

Yarn Supplier: Webs

Needles: US 8.0 / 5.5mm

This was knit without a formal pattern as a 80 stitch 2X2 ribbed hat. I knit to maximize the yardage, because I didn't want any leftover allergens in my house. Fortunately a friend was super happy to take this cuddly hat off my hands though, and now I do not have any of this yarn left in my stash now.

Hufflepuff Socks

Continuing to work my way through my mending basket, in May 2011 I had knit Salvbard a pair of Hufflepuff-colored socks. They were knit toe-up with an after-thought heel. This yarn had been a purchase while I was living in Madison, WI for a summer in grad school, and I had some sentimental feelings about buying it to make socks for him while I missed him.

I had just had a single ball of the yellow and black striped yarn, so the coordinating toes, heels, and cuffs helped me stretch the yarn a little further. I did wind off a small amount to get the stripes to start in the same place, and then I knit them from either end of the same ball to maximize yardage.

Yarns: Lang Yarns Jawoll Superwash Solids in color 83.0004

& Regia 4-fädig Nation Color (discontinued) in color 5391

Yarn Suppliers: Knitting Treasures (closed) and Lakeside Fibers (closed)

Needles: US 1.5 / 2.5 mm

Pattern: toe up w/ afterthought-heel

They never even made it to the blog though, because the bind-offs were a little too tight. Instead they got tossed into the mending basket to be fixed later. *Dun dun dun!* So nearly 5 years later, they are finally into rotation!

The new bind-off was done as a sewn bind-off, which has become my preferred bind-off for toe-up socks. Previously I had done that thing where you just try to be conscious to bind-off loosely, which just does not work for Salvbard's shapely calves.

Blogging this pair feels sort of bittersweet in looking at the number of closed or discontinued sources it used. Things change in this industry faster than I generally think much about. I am grateful for all of the memories knit into them though, and Salvbard seems glad for another pair of socks in his sock drawer.