Tour de Baby Hat 2015

Last Saturday was a big day: the first day of this year's Tour de France, 3,360 KM of cycling during 21 days, with just two days of rest, and the 100th anniversary of my father. I have a tradition of making some crafty project during the long hours spent in front of the TV. It has been baby hats in 2012, and some baby blankets too, it has been Scandinavian Christmas quilt stitching in 2012 and 2013, last year probably sock knitting, and this year it will be baby hats again, like  during the Giro d'Italia earlier this Summer.

My last Giro hat, the red one in this group photo, ended up too large

so I un-knitted it and knitted the yarn again, with less stitches and using this cable pattern:

I also prepared for more busy days and knitted some hats during other spare moments, so here is a hat for day one

and day two

and day three, which was yesterday.

With the cable hat of the Giro group, they kind of spell my name:

Today's hat with the last bit of this red and the last bit of the Giro pink is on the needles and will be shown in my next post. Yesterday's big crash needed my attention more than the knitting. I hope today will be a better day for the cyclists and for my project.

Meanwhile I have been busy making more coasters for the Villa Cooper:

My Shadow Plaid quilt is coming together nicely, but I keep cutting more and more squares to make bias squares. Unlike Stephanie, who has her Supreme pattern testers (including yours truly), this author has obviously not had her pattern tested. The pattern tells me to cut 216 dark squares, 144 light ones and 72 medium ones to yield 432 bias squares, which sounds like an awful lot. But after I have made 12 blocks consisting of 4 nine-patches each, I have used 12 x 4 x 9  = 432 bias squares. The next step is to take the leftover bias squares (which I naturally did not have) and make two strips of 24 squares for the sides, and later I would need 96 bias squares more for a border, and 4 for the corners. 148 bias squares are missing from her list! I think that too is a lot. I don't know if her yardage estimates are accurate, because I have naturally used odd pieces of old shirts, and luckily I have lots and lots more of them. The book is called Mad about Plaid! and it is by Debbie Bacon.

The peonies are in bloom again, and so heavy with rain.

First baby hat goal reached

Do you remember the baby hat challenge I set for myself in May during the Giro d'Italia? I wanted to knit one baby hat for the hospital for each of the 21 stages of the cycling tour I watched with Mr K.

Here are 19 hats, including the top left one I knitted before the race, but not counting one white hat that already went for a tiny baby due soon, and the hat and booties set that I sent to our nephew's son. The next knitting session will be the great Tour de France beginning on 4th of July, also 21 stages and about 3,000 kilometers.

Mr K. has been busy again with his Summer projects. This week he added the wall triangle to this end of our terrace and painted it red. The other end is more difficult so he will rent a lift thingie.

Last night we had a 0 temperature but the garden flowers are used to it, they seem to last longer in this not so warm weather. Today is the day when it is traditionally safe to plant the potatoes and summer flowers. No more night frosts to be expected.

Baby things and finished repair job

This week we had baby news from a nephew, and I knitted this set of hat and booties for his brand new son. The yarn is 50% cotton, 50% acrylic, and the colour is more teal than in the picture.

This set counts for one stage of the Giro knitting. Two more stages to watch and knit!

Earlier I made this nursing cushion for my daughter-in-law.

The idea came from Dolores, and the pattern from one of the links on her blog.

I made two covers, the baby fabric one has the zipper in the inner curve and this other one in the outer curve, which seems to be both easier to sew and easier to use. For some reason this cover is not as tight as the other.

Last week I finished the repair of my daughter's quilt and gave the quilt a final touch by soaking it and giving it a gentle wash in the machine. 

Here it is drying on the line in the sun. you really can't tell the new blocks from the old ones any more. 

The garden has recovered from the winter very well and we have more pearl hyacinths both is blue and in white than we had before.

Change of view, new hexagons and tiny hats

This used to be the view from our kitchen door until mid May.

 And this is the same view some days later.

The young trees were growing so close to another that it was not easy to walk among them.

The trunks were left lying there, so a walk will be even more difficult, but we have much more light in our yard now.

For my daughter's quilt I made six new flowerbeds to replace the frayed ones. I saved some of the middle hexagons. These blocks are in place now, but when sewing them I found two blue hexagons that needed replacing too. Luckily I found a hexagon in the exact same fabric among the leftovers of this quilt, and one fabric that will do. I'm doing the hand quilting over the new blocks now.

The Giro d'Italia cycling tour has reached stage 14 today. I have been knitting these hats for newborns to be donated to the maternity ward of our local hospital, and it seems I have finished one hat per stage. We don't watch the whole race, but even a couple of hours in front of the TV doesn't feel so wasted when I can show the bag filling with hats. The Giro has 21 stages, and so does the Tour de France in July, and the Vuelta d'Espagna in August. 63 little hats sounds like a nice goal!

On Thursday night we had the first little thunder of the season, and after it a perfect rainbow.