Hats Hats Hats and More Hats (cont'd)

 

Believe it or not, my last mutsjes/little hats/egg-warmer's post was at the end of 2021!  So, yes, I have a lot of catching up to do here, for the record.  These are the 83 I've knitted between January and April (with a couple weeks off after I fell and tore the tendon on my left shoulder!).

When I use yarn from my own sock wool,

 I like showing the accompanying socks.

Most of the rest of these little hats are from communal yarn 

used by our knitting group here in our senior community.

Roy G Biv (in case you need reminding of the order of the rainbow colors).

If I had done this the way Astrid did hers, I would have started with red at the top,

but I wasn't that smart.  Think of this as the other rainbow in a double rainbow,

which IS backwards in color.

Next time I'll try to keep all my collage frames the same color.

(Yes, I'm picky.)

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

And now, just to let you know, we're geared up for a 10-night/11-day trip to Iceland, following (more or less) the Iceland Ring Road clockwise as seen here, starting and ending in Reykjavik, the capital: 

[credit:  theculturemap.com]

We're giving ourselves an extra day in Reykjavik at the end, just because.

Once home on the 16th, we have a week to catch up before our week in England

for our Shutterchance photoblog meetup.

Both of these trips were planned 2 years ago, postponed because of COVID.

NOW is the time to make them happen!

Hats Hats Hats and More Hats (cont'd)

One last post for the 2021 year, almost at the wire.  Might as well let it be for the mutsjes/little hats that round out the year!

Speaking of which, the 2021 mutsjes donated to Innocent smoothies for charity (helping seniors in need) were due by the end of November.  These next two batches were the last I donated for the 2021 year:

You can tell these little hats were from socks I made for me, myself and I,

now that I'm remembering to show the matching photo.

These were made from self-striping yarn in our communal stash.

I LOVE how they remind me of babies.

All in all, I ended up with 151 mutsjes donated to charity from 2021,

and because I didn't start until July, that's almost one mutsje per day.  YAY!

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Now begins the 2022 year in December, with my goal to make 300 mutsjes by the end of next November:

Self-striping yarn from the communal stash.

I tried light, medium and dark brims to mix it up a bit.

More self-striping yarn from the communal stash, which I love.

In this case, I found the green and gold solid-colored yarn, again from the communal stash.

You can't tell but they both have a gold, sparkly thread running through it.

Using the same green and gold yarn as in the previous collage,

I tried to make my own patterns, using white and red yarn to spruce it up.

It felt a bit more festive for this time of the year.

Now I'm back to my own Scheepjes yarn that does weird self-striping patterns.

It's my least favorite yarn but I want to use it up.

Last but not least, here's a loner from a scrap of communal yarn I found intriguing.

I'm glad it yielded only one because those colored flecks made knitting it hard.

Still, it makes for a perfect year-end splash, don't you think!

Speaking of which,

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

 

Hats Hats Hats and More Hats (cont'd)

 

Almost 3 months after the last mutsjes/little hats' post from July 23, here's the new batch from both of us!  

First, from Astrid:

A reminder that Astrid makes all her own designs "on the fly,"

using solid-colored yarn that she mixes and matches.

The bottom-left hat uses a sparkly red yarn that makes it very Christmassy,

so she's in the process of making several more-or-less the same.

My mutsjes since July 23, basically in the order in which I made them:

This yarn came from our knitting club's communal stash.

It's hard to believe that these hats are all from the same self-striping sock yarn

(from Dries and Ineke's socks)!

More self-striping yarn from our communal stash.  I like the colors together.

Again, from the communal stash, giving me fresh excitement.

Back to my own sock yarn.

More from the communal stash.  As you see, I'm going back-n-forth.

It energizes me to use new yarn designs I haven't seen before.

Here's another of MY sock yarns, all from the same skein.

Talk about wake-up socks before the mutsjes were even made!

Communal stash!

I should have thought of this before, to add the pair of socks to the matching mutsjes!

From the socks I made for my Big Sis in England.

Two mutsjes from a pair of socks for moi...but why only TWO?  Ah, yes...

Astrid used my yarn last year, with my permission, before I knew I'd be knitting my own mutsjes.

From socks for Astrid.

Communal stash.

From socks for BIL, Don.

From one of my favorite socks for moi!

Hmmm.  From the communal stash, I think.

They all start to run together for me!

These next 2 collages are from a communal skein no one else wanted.

That skein (top-right) yielded 17 mutsjes!  It was a hey-day for me.

I love the little flecks of snow.

From another favorite pair of socks for moi.

From socks for daughter Amy.

From another favorite pair of socks for moi.

Last but not least, a loner from communal scrap.

Nothing is going to waste, if I can help it.

I'm in the midst of knitting another batch from my own yarn, but that will be shown later, a couple months from now.

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

In the meantime, Astrid and I fly to Atlanta next Thursday for our first trip back since 2019.  GOD WILLING AND THE CREEK DON'T RISE!  I add that because the hoops we've gone through have been harrowing and stressful for us both...ending next Tuesday with an Internationally-Approved COVID test that needs to be negative before we're allowed to check in.  

Astrid says the minute our test comes back negative, allowing our travel agent to check us in on Wednesday evening, with boarding passes, she'll finally be able to relax and believe the trip will, indeed, happen.  I agree.  The best news is that we're taking non-stop flights both there and back!

Hats Hats Hats and More Hats (cont'd)

It was back on May 6th that I last posted Astrid's bottle-top mutsjes/little hats for charity.  And because not only she but I, too, am now knitting them, it's high-time to post again, to catch up!

First, Astrid:

To begin with, I noticed that I never posted this one after her sheep last post.

How can you resist such a sweet face!

As you can see, I'm bunching "birds of a feather" together.

These are all designs Astrid creates from her creative mind, using solid colors of yarn.

In this case she mixed some of my sock self-striping yarn with her solid yarn.

Again, more of the same.

The sky is the limit when you have endless choices!

See what I mean?

Astrid's creativity astounds me to no end.

Once I am finished with my sock self-striping yarn, I have much to learn from her!

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

My mutsjes since starting at the beginning of July: 

My very first mutsje is the one on the bottom-right!  HA.

Because my goal is to use up the leftovers of my sock yarn, I'm grouping the mutsjes together

from each leftover skein.  And in this case, because the socks were for Bruce, 

from my high school "Class of '63," these are in honor of him.

Since these sock yarns are self-striping, it means I don't have to do much,

except to sometimes piece solids from the skeins where I want them to be, if that makes sense.

Again, these are all leftovers from the same skein of self-striping sock yarn,

showing how many variations on a theme are possible.

I was quite surprised when this skein yielded only TWO mutsjes,

until I remembered who the socks were for!  Yup--bigger and longer feet.

Not that you would remember but I made the same Christmas socks for both Ruth (top-right)

and Lynne (bottom-left) from my high school "Class of '63."

Because I had leftovers from 2 skeins of the same yarn, I was lucky to get 7 mutsjes.

I made the executive decision to make a tasseled mutsje whenever I can make more than 3 hats,

in case you wondered.

Last but not least, for now, these are in honor of Diane, from my "Class of '63."

Because her feet are small, I milked the leftovers dry, with nothing to spare!

[The true colors look much more green than shows up here...for her Michigan State status!]

So, does it look like we're having fun yet???????