Update first: I caved and bought the fabric. Then I fell in love with more fabric.

I’m still resisting.  Barely. I seriously need to start making stuff with the fabric I already have. Where have we heard that before? I’m guessing quilters have the same problems with stash that knitters do.

I finished a hat. I made the hat for David’s Uncle Wendell. I had seen David’s uncle before, in passing, at the family Christmas parties but hadn’t ever really gotten to visit with him. I got that chance while visiting David’s grandparents. David’s grandfather (Doyle Thurston) was on hospice care and wasn’t expected to be around much longer. Everyone that could was dropping by to say goodbye. I tried to go into the room but the grief and the stress that everyone was going through hit me really hard. I quickly backed out of the room and sat in the front parlor and tried to knit because I didn’t want to burst into tears in front of David’s grandmother. I figured they were all going through enough without me being a big wuss. I’ve not ever been around someone who was in the process of passing away. I’ve always been the relative that was on the other side of the country, got the phone call, and showed up at the funeral. This was so very different. It was kind and loving and in a way beautiful but still nothing I had ever been exposed to before. Wendell and then his wife Roxanne came in and sat and chatted with me for a bit.  He is such a kind man. I remembered that he was the family member that did all the wood carving and mentioned to him that we really loved the wood spatula that he had made. We were afraid to use it. He carved these simple spatulas out of Grandpa Thurston’s favorite apricot (?) tree that had died and every family had received one. To me they were these precious objects to be preserved. He admonished me to use it, it had been made to be used and instructed me on how to care for it. So like a knitter! That’s when I had the idea of asking him for a yarn bowl. We exchanged phone numbers and I sent him some pictures of what yarn bowls looked like. A few days later he presented me with not just one, but TWO gorgeous yarn bowls. I’m so spoiled. I showed the yarn I picked out to Wendell and he thought it was great.

I asked Wendell what colors he liked and he said he liked browns. Hmmm.  Brown.  Okay. I couldn’t bear to just pick any plain shade of brown so I picked this gorgeous stuff up from JoAnns and like any responsible knitter made a swatch.

Just so you know, swatches are lying little bastards. Or I’m bad at math. Whatever.  The resulting hat band looked like it needed 18 less stitches. That’s a lot of stitches in a chunky yarn! I cast on again with 18 less stitches and the darn thing was too small. I cast on again. This time it was just right and I got the size I was looking for. Being chunky yarn, the hat went quickly and before I knew it, it was time to start the decreases. I did 6 decreases every other round, something I would swear I’ve done for beanies in the past.

Um, no.  No, no, no, I couldn’t present David’s uncle with what this was turning into.  I think the Yarn Harlot called this penile. I’m not going to call it that. Whatever it was, it was embarrassing. I tried again and decreased 8 stitches every round. MUCH better. Apparently chunky yarn doesn’t need a plain knit row in between decrease rows. Maybe I just have a bad memory about how I’ve decreased for other hats. I was a good kid and made faithful notes on my Ravelry project page. Deborah Norville Serenity Chunky in Chocolate. The colorway is gorgeous and the yarn was nice to knit with. I’m getting more of this stuff. I think David needs a hat made out of it and then maybe I’ll make some matching hats for my friend Joe and his lady Rosie that live in Maine.

The fabulously fantastic yarn bowls by Wendell Cloward.

Now, on to making the gloves.