Finished: Ellinor Hat

Look!  I finally finished something!

This is the Ellinor hat, from the pattern Ellinor by Maria Naslund.  It is a feast of twisted stitches and lace.  I love it.  The pattern itself is adequate in transferring information, but it does assume that the knitter can fill in details.  Instructions for steps like joining to work in the round are omitted, for example.  There are several rows where one must shift the start of the row to work a decrease at that seam.  The pattern also includes six different kinds of decrease, with minimal instructions on how to work them.  I spent a couple of busrides staring at the hat and the pattern instructions until I figured out a decrease that would get rid of the appropriate number of stitches, lean the way I wanted it to lean, and twist the stiches I wanted to twist.  More thorough details can be found on my project page.


In that way, it was a refreshing exercise in not being slaved to the pattern.  I liked what I knitted even if it is different than what the designer might have intended.

The yarn is Cheval Blanc's Bamboulène, a wool-bamboo blend, in colorway amiral.  It was a gift to me in last June's Geek and Nerd Swap: theme fantasy.  This yarn is fuzzy and feels like wool, though a bit softer than something Cascade 220.  It made a warm hat, but I'm not sure it was the best for this pattern.  Ellinor has twisted stitches and lace, so I think a smoother, tightly twisted yarn would have shown off those details more.

I successfully used up two skeins, without particularly trying.

That's all that's left.

It felt really good to cast this off, since this project had ended up taking longer than planned.  Clearly I am no good at estimating the time needed for projects.  I started it because hats are quick projects, right?  Glenna C. uses them as knitted swatches in the round that one can apparently knit in a Saturday, if one is not me.  This hat took just shy of seven weeks of transit knitting time, and I have been doing a lot of transiting lately.

My record might be improving.  On another bout of transiting, this happened.

That wad would be the Elizabeth shawl, sitting next to the needle and stitch markers used for its construction.  Blocking is imminent.