There’s lots of knitting going on here, but unfortunately not a lot of pictures to prove it. Blogs are better with pictures, so I’ll try to keep this short.

My good friend Hoang is moving from Los Angeles to Denver this week, so he had a going-away party on Saturday night. He’s been asking me to make him a beanie for what seems like years now, and I’ve been a total slacker about it. But when he told me he was moving to Denver, I knew I had to get him that beanie ASAP!

I used the extra Berkshire Bulky (ravelry) I had leftover from Starksy, and cast on three stitches and knit it from the crown down. I wasn’t sure what I was doing, so this thing was completely ad-libbed. I started knitting the 1×1 rib as I increased on the crown, and immediately wondered if I was making a big, boring mistake. I actually knit the hat with earflaps first, and even cast off, and then I realized it was both too small and looked kinda silly.

So, I ripped out the bottom and frogged back to just after I finished the increases. I then worked it in a 1×1 rib even for about an inch, then made a sort of chevron pattern by doing a twisted stitch to the right for six rows, then twisted back to the left for six. I then finished the rim by knitting straight in 1×1 rib for a few rows.

I then realized I had the dreaded nipple at the crown of the hat. So, taking a nod from Tech Knitting, I picked out the cast-on stitches and fixed the protrusion.

And it turned out pefectly. He loved it so much he wore the hat all night! (Even in 70 degree Los Angeles weather, so that’s saying a lot!)

I’ll miss Hoang, but I know I’ll see him (and the beanie) a lot in the future, so it’s not a sad goodbye.

In the meantime, I’ve said hello to this:

It doesn’t look like much right now, but it’s going to be a baby sweater. I’m using that beautiful Filatura Zara (ravelry) I picked up last week. I’m also planning on writing out the pattern and publishing it on this site and Ravelry, so keep an eye out!

I’m proud to introduce Knitters for Kiva, a new group that will hopefully inspire many of you to take part in the exciting and inspirational microfinance revolution.

Learn more about Kiva here.

Here’s the basics: Kiva is an organization that helps people in developing nations acquire short-term microloans. These microloans often go to women and people who otherwise cannot qualify for traditional lines of credit from banks. Many experts believe these loans to be more effective at bettering the lives of people in developing countries than traditional philanthropy, where money is often donated without any knowledge of specifically how it gets administered.

Check out Oprah’s take on microcredit.

I’ve been loaning through Kiva for about six months now. I try and target my donations to women in developing nations who have crafting businesses, but I’m not strict in my lending. I’ve already received over half my initial investment back to reinvest — I’ve already made 12 loans.

And now, through the bloggers with a heart challenge, I’ve created the Knitters for Kiva group. Please consider joining today — you can loan as little as $25, and the money gets paid back to you! You don’t have to be a knitter to join, either, just a person who wants to help. As we raise more loan for Kiva, I’ll post updates to my blog.

Join us today!

I always forget just how much yarn sleeves use. To me, they’re always an afterthought. They’re just little tubes after all, right? Wrong. They take up a lot of yarn. And you have to make two of them. I was reminded of this as I started knitting sleeve #1 for Starsky this week:

I started thinking, “Wow, that’s a lot of fabric!” And then I started thinking about how I added four extra inches to the length of the cardigan because I thought it’d look better. And then I thought about the year or so that Starsky sat hibernating, and how I used some of its alloted yarn for other random projects.

And the logical conclusion of this train of thought: “Oh crap. What if I dont’ have enough yarn to finish?”

I checked Webs for some Berkshire Bulky in my color, and while they had 50+ skeins in stock, I thought it unlikely they’d have the same dye lot from over two years ago. Five years ago I would have been screwed and would either have to frog the project or hope for a close enough hue from a different dye lot.

Luckily, we live in the digital era. More specifically, we live in the age of Ravelry. I immediately went to Ravelry and found all the people who had stashed Berkshire Bulky in my colorway. I then sent them all emails asking if they had skeins in my dye lot, and if they’d be willing to part with them for a fee.

After three “sorry, my dye lot is different!” messages and nearly losing hope, I received a message from bluepupae, a.k.a. my new hero! She had two skeins in my dye lot—more than enough to finish the project! And they arrived today!

Thanks to Dao, the internet, and Ravelry for keeping my project alive!