Actually, I have finished a few things.  Since I seem to be “the accessory knitter” fortunately most of my projects are small.  The Marsan watchcap was a quick knit and likely one that I will be doing again.  It’s got a twisted rib used throughout, and is a great TV-watching project.

I had promised a friend some hand-warmers last year, and since I had this yarn out, I went ahead and improvised some fingerless mitts using the Subway Mittens from Interweave Knits Winter 2007 for my guide (and to get the thumb gusset somewhere close to correct). This will be another pattern I’m going to knit again.  I love these for myself, but there are a couple more elderly sisters for whom I want to make some.

The yarn I used this time, was given to me by a friend whose mother died and this was part of her mother’s yarn stash.  Most of the stash is acrylic baby yarn, since she crochet’d beautiful doll clothes from sport weight acrylic, but there was also a bit of navy blue worsted wool in there.  (Amazing how fast mittens knit up using worsted weight yarn.)  I tapered the tops using randomly placed cables, and then ended with a K2P2 rib.   I guess they would look a little better “modeled” since they just look all kind of rumply here, but I don’t have them anymore.  They’re warming a friend’s hands.

Meanwhile, I’m swimming upstream with a flood of ideas and me trying to cast them all on at once.  It must be the season.  It’s a good time for making warm things, and this summer was so hot it really wasn’t all that conducive to getting enthusiastic about hats and mittens and shawls and socks and sweaters and more hats, and more mittens … stuff like that.

And here’s what I have to show for my attempt at the pattern thus far.  It would make a great dishcloth or doily without the brim, I’m thinking.

It’s too big here, so I tossed it in the washing machine to felt down for a while, and I think I’ve decreased the size by about 1/3rd.  We shall see when it’s finished drying again.

I also didn’t do the ribbing on the brim as shown on the original pattern.  My brim looks more like an eye of the partridge heel on a sock - or maybe a seed stitch - and I really like it.  It was, of course, one of those “happy accidents”.  What happened was, I didn’t have the picture of the beret in front of me, and the instructions for knitting the ribbing don’t just say “do a K1P1 rib” - which would have made total sense to me - and I think I tried to make more out of their hand-holding than originally intended, so I ended up with a completely different “rib” - which is actually no ribbing at all!

My gauge for the lace pattern was apparently OFF by quite a bit too.  So, if I knit this one again I will either go down a few sizes on the larger needle (the one used to knit the lace pattern) or maybe not do quite as many repeats of the lace pattern as called for….likely the needle size will be my safest bet.  However, I’ve got so many of these hat patterns that I have found and want to make, this will likely be the only attempt at this one for a while.  Once the felted version is dry, I’ll add it’s picture.