knit1frog2

no dice

Sooooo close...but a call today while I was at the market confirmed my worst fears...the sweater that I was almost done with, was going to be too small for my niece.

tiny puffy

While that might look like a lot of yarn left, it's a lot more sparse than it appears and I knew that I would need another ball to get both sleeves and the buttonbands done. ugh...murphy's law.  I thought about initally ordering 3, but didn't and sure enough I will need that third.  For some reason it didn't occur to me that WW would have probably brought in more than just the 2 balls that I ordered.  Sure enough, a phone call confirmed this and I was on my way across 520 to pick it up. 

What a gorgeous day today!  I didn't even mind having to stop for 20 minutes mid-span today on 520 as they raised the bridge for some boats to sail through.  I almost don't even mind having to frog back to the armholes either.

mini me

Check out what's on my needles!  But um, could mine look BIGGER?!!  sheesh.  I've never felt huger than just this minute...

for my niece

Okay, she isn't a baby or anything remotely close, but man does her sweater look tiny...or um, does mine look enormous.  yikes.

soon, very soon

Yesterday I wove in the final 3 ends (why did I wait so long??) and set the puffy into the bath to begin the blocking session.  (and yes, I thought I would wait to sew on the buttons after it blocked...when do other people sew on buttons??)  The suds kind of took me by surprise!

cold, sudsy bath

I wonder how long it's going to take for it to dry...hmm.

wet wool.  ugh.

There are probably people out there who actually don't mind the smell of wet wool.  I, however, am not one of them. 

k5b

So...the k5b stitch.  I meant to blog about it before, but after the berry hat was done, it was kind of hard to go back and re-create it all.  When I decided to knit another hat, I figured this was the perfect opportunity.  Here.  we.  go.

You have knit the setup knit rows and come to the start of the k5b pattern.  What you will need to do is, drop the next stitch until you have 4 rows of ladder rungs.

the right most stitch will be dropped

Use a crochet hook to grab the dropped stitch, you'll thank me later.

dig out that crochet hook!

Then reach behind the 4 rungs of ladder rungs and grab the yarn as if to crochet (or knit).

see?  It's really not that complicated!

Pull the yarn through the stitch...

almost done!

Place the new stitch on the RH needle, snug up the yarn and continue knitting to the next k5b!

finished.

That's all there is to it! Go forth and knit on...let me know how it works for you! ^__^