Team Spirit Hats

I've been having so much fun with colorwork these days! I've been inspired to create team spirit hats. You saw from my previous post the Pittsburgh Steelers team color inspired hat - my son was crazy about it, so I had a thought - what if I made more of these kinds of hats?  My son gives me the ideas and I try to create a hat from the color scheme of the team.

For instance I came up with my own colored chart to create a hat for the UW Huskies:

Go Huskies!!!

Reminiscent of the early football helmets of the 1900's
Earflaps are knitted double-stranded for warmth

Made with Lion Brand Wool-Ease in Oxford Grey,
Violet, and Gold 

Learning colorwork has been challenging yet fun and its opening up more design ideas. Also, now when I come across colored charts I'm not so intimidated. In the past I have steered away from patterns that require me to read a chart and especially any that had colorwork designs!  Now that I've designed a few of my own colorwork patterns, I say, "bring on the colored charts - I'm not afraid of you!!!"

I am currently working on of course UW's rival team - Washington State University Cougars, for which I have also designed a colorwork pattern for and of course I can't leave out the Seattle Seahawks - I designed a really cool pattern for the team color scheme for them. I will post pictures of the hats when I'm done, but in the meantime here is a sneak peek at the design I created for the Seahawks team spirit hat: 

Have you started your holiday knitting?  Have you decided on patterns and designs for the colder weather yet?  Would love to hear from you, come on and drop me a comment.  Happy knitting!!

Update: Finished September 28, 2011

As promised here is the women's WSU beanie with pom pom that I designed and below is the colorwork pattern for it:

Model: Vanessa, a friend at work

Update: Finished September 30, 2011

Seahawks, Sounders FC, or Thunderbirds Team Spirit Beanie

Close-up of colorwork design



Trying my hand at colorwork

I've been trying out different designs of colorwork. I mostly stay with two colors and I design my own colorwork patterns. I figure I should learn how to design them to understand them better if I'm going to try out other written pattern. My post New Hats on the Horizon have some simple designs I created on my own, but this one is a more elaborate design I created this weekend:

As you can see here the beginning design is stretched out - I knitted too
tightly and the design loses its look

From this angle you can see that the top design came out better, once I
loosened my hold on the secondary yarn

I realized when I started the next section of the design (the red strip) that I did the first section too tight and the hat is really snug and the design is being stretched out.  I learned to let up on the secondary yarn and weave it along loosely so the design doesn't get stretched when you put it on.  I'm thinking of frogging this and doing it again. Not sure yet. But I'm really happy with my first attempt at my own design and the results.  Will be trying it again and again, until it I can do it without thinking!

What are some of your colorwork designs?  Have you designed  your own? Would love to hear from you other knitters out there with some tips and tricks on how to make this easier for a knitter who knits too tight?

Happy knitting!

Update: Just finished September 19, 2011:

Pittsburgh Steelers inspired earflap hat

I did a little better with this tri-color earflap hat.  Colorwork is getting a bit easier the more I do it.  I'm no expert but I figure practice makes perfect!

Labor Day Weekend...what did I do? What else, knit of course!

As the summer comes to a close, I have been diligently working on projects for the upcoming holidays, as well as for my Etsy shop.

But before I can do that, I had to finish a charity knitting quota I volunteered to finish.  I read an article about Willow's Place, an organization that helps feed the homeless in my local city of Kent, Washington and contacted one of the sponsors to ask how, as a knitter, could I help. I was asked to see if my Wednesday night knit group would be willing to knit 100 hats and scarves by October 1st.  My group has gladly accepted the challenge and are all knitting away.

Here are my finished contributions:

Earflap Hat from Lion Brand, 2x2 Ribbed Hat from Fiber Trends,
and Skull Hat for Service Members from Knitting on the Net
My designs: Single crochet scarf and 2x2 ribbed scarf

Reverie Beret from Knitty and Garter stitch scarf

Design adapted from The Question Bag pattern:

Row 15: P2, S1, K2, PSSO, P2, S1, K2, PSSO, P2, (K1,P1) 7 times,

P2, S1,K2, PSSO, P2,S1, K2, PSSO, P2, SM, K to end.

Row 16: P2, K1, YO, K1, P2, K1, YO, K1, P2, (K1, P1) 7 times,
P2, K1, YO, K1, P2, K1, YO,K1,P2, SM, K to end.
Row 17: P2, K3, P2, K3, P2, (P1, K1) 7 times,
P2, K3, P2, K3, P2, SM, K to end.
Row 18: Repeat Row 17.

Two-color Earflap Hat with pom pom made for my son

The blue hat with the red and white band above and the red and black hat are my first attempts at knitting two or more colors at once. Now that I've tried it I found that it isn't as hard as I first thought it would be.

Knitting and enjoying the sunny weather was how I spent my holiday weekend. Love to hear from all of you how you spent this glorious weekend, drop in and leave me a comment, tell me what's on your needles!