Spun Yarn

I finally have my own spinning wheel, and I love it!! I entered some yarn in the county fair and got a blue ribbon, but I have a better picture of the yarn that I spun up to make another Monmouth Cap. I love handspun. What can I say more?

Monmouth Caps for Pirates

When I used to think of pirate hats, the first hat I pictured wasn't a simple wool cap.  Little did I know that the hat (or cap) most commonly worn from the mid 15th century through the 18th century by sailors and the upper class, was just that.  The hats became known as Monmouth Caps because Monmouth, England was home to thriving industry manufacturing caps.

The caps were knit, but were then "fulled" to make them very dense, warm,  and almost water proof.  Fulling is like deciding to felt you wool item, then changing your mind when you get halfway there.  Many worn by soldiers were described as having a button top.  They at least sometimes had a loop for hanging, and the brim could be worn up or down.

I had to learn to make one.  I designed my pattern to copy as best I could the bad picture I could find of the hat in the Monmouth museum in England, which dates from the 16th century.   I've interpreted the button on top like others as a yarn "button" not a hard horn one.   I've usually used natural fiber colors, or madder red or navy.  And I've found there is a lot of interest in monmouth caps.

I sent my first batch with a friend to the Pirates in Paradise Pirate Festival in Florida.  They didn't sell well the first warm day in Florida, but I was lucky that a cold front moved in and they were all gone by the time the festival was over.

Since then I've been knitting for several re-enactors.  I have to admit it's a rush to sell your own work and have someone appreciate it.  

Mad Pete in my Monmouth Cap

But for some, even 3 oz of wool is not enough.  If you need a really, REALLY, warm and waterproof hat for your tall sailing ship, then you have to have a thrum cap.  These were traditionally made with "thrums" from the end and pieces of yarn that would have otherwise gone to waste.  And if a hat that shaggy isn't funny enough, all the pictures from the time show them rather conical too: A shag conehead, in other words.  It took a bit of experimenting to settle on my favorite method of making the thrums, but the hats are really fun to make.

Here is "Cross" in a thrummed cap I madly finished for him on a deadline.  Mine's the one on the right.

I'm loving making these hats as authentically as possible in wool, color, and construction. Now I'm selling them on Etsy.  What fun!

Dyeing to Knit

I have all of these fun pictures of my knitting. I've just looked back at my last posts from over two years ago, and there are so many unfinished projects that I've now finished, and new ones that came and went. I don't have much that's interesting to say, so I'll just post a few pictures. This is yarn I dyed at the recent knitting retreat at my local yarn shop. It was so much fun! I always wanted to dye, but I had no idea how much. I have so many things in my head now that I want to try!

These are "subliminal socks". First, we were to write messages on the sock blanks that had meaning to us or to the person for whom we would knit the socks.

Then we unravelled the yarn into hanks.

Finally, we knit the yarn up into beautiful (or crazy!) socks!

I'm back!

It's been three months since my last post. How does so much time go by so quickly? But in the interim of no knitting and no blogging, I turned a big belly into a beautiful baby boy! Yeah!


So I don't know what to call all of my children on this blog. Everyone seems to have great nicknames to protect their children's identities. Valerie's Post explored her take on the phenomenon, and I've been deciding what to call my kids besides, "the three-year-old" or "my oldest". How do you approach this if it doesn't come naturally?


My knitting has suffered from never having two hands free, as has my typing! However, I have completed my first felting project! I got to turn this...



...into this!


It's so cool to actually experience the before and after.




I used my three-year-old (what will I call her?) as a model for scale.
The pattern is the Squatty Sidekick from Knitting Daily. Now my 9-year-old wants one too.

What Have I been up to?

A sigh for the untouched "Avast" sweater.

Well, the baby is due in less than three weeks. Could this possibly be true? I've just discovered the secret to making the end of the ninth month go quickly. If you put of ALL baby preparation, you will suddenly be hit by a sense of absolute panic, and you'll hope that time passes more slowly. Wow do I have a lot to do! Of course it doesn't help that a big event makes me think that I could accomplish what I can't otherwise: having everything in my home and life organized and clean all at the same time. Yeah, right. I've decided my biggest goals are making room for the bassinette in my bedroom and ordering a nursing bra. Of course today is my 2, no 3 year old's birthday, and Tuesday is my boy's birthday, and I'm helping my mom finish with finish work on her cabin this weekend, and, and, and.


This all leads to the fact that I haven't touched my knitting needles in a week. I have touched the crochet hook (a blanket for the baby), and I've carried my kintting bag around, but otherwise, nothing. *SIGH* I started these socks too, and I would so love to work on them.

Happy PI Day!

If y'all didn't know, today was PI day....you know, 3.14, March 14? This holiday must be celebrated by eating pie, of course! This was my second pi day, as I just learned about it last year. I just had a fantastic day of pie, intermingled with high stress of a science fair and minor crisis for my Mom.

On a low-fat diet and everything, I managed to love pie day! (OK, I cheated a little). For lunch, we had beef and chicken pot pies, chocolate pie, pecan pie, rhubarb pie, huckleberry pie, chess pie (wow!), and lowfat Blueberry Crumble pie. This all enjoyed with some fun and intelligent women that I don't get to see enough of. (OK, OK, of whom I don't see enough?)

If that wasn't enough, for dinner (late, after the science fair), I had an AMAZING low-fat beef pie with a crust that was made from potatoes+ that was made especially for me by another caring friend, then had a little blackberry and banana cream pie for dessert. What a day.

I've completely neglected the many knitting projects I have going, but the picture at the top is most of the stuff I have on the needles right now.

The Value of Friends

Valerie, what can I say but thanks? If anyone reads this who isn't Valerie, there's nothing like a friend you buys you yarn+ on a teary, tragic type of day. I had one of those days this Thursday, and while my husband and mother were sympathetic, they also tried to paint the bigger picture for me and suggest lessons to be learned. Sometimes you just need to grieve and overreact for a while before you get reasonable. Valerie gave me permission to do so.


And she also gave me some nice meditative knitting. I neglected many other duties and knit the beginnning of a sock. The picture was taken at night and isn't great. What you can't tell is that the sock is about the right size for a lumberjack. I could tell this 1/4 in into the ribbing, but I couldn't bring myself to stop. I just had to get to the lace pattern. What you also can't see is that something went horribly wrong with the lace pattern, and I still don't know exactly what I did wrong. To tell you the truth, I just didn't care when I was staying up to late knitting. I just wanted to watch the subtle change of color, and play with my needles. I'm going to figure out what to do before I rip it out.

I have so many more pictures to post...but they'll wait for another mood, I guess.