Scarves for a Good Cause

The DFW Fiber Fest, a local yarn/knitter/crocheter convention that was this weekend which I also attended last year, chose Knit Your Bit as their charity program this year to provide scarves to our local veterans groups. It was developed in 2006 by the National World War II Museum in New Orleans, and provides Veterans across the country with scarves. The Museum has sample patterns on its website if you need some ideas, or you can choose any appropriate pattern you like to knit or crochet. Pretty sure they accept them all year round if you feel like making and sending some over.

As the Museum asks you to include your Name, City, State, and care instructions with each scarf so I made up some little tags. I printed mine off on cardstock I had lying around and punched holes and tied them on to the finished scarves. Fiber fest also as some for download if you don't want to make your own tags.

V For Victory
I picked out two free patterns to try. First up: V for Victory which I worked up in I Love This Yarn in Dark Olive. First off, of course, I started with a foundation double crochet row of 23 stitches rather than the chain and work into method. Once you have the foundation rows done, you start working the V. The pattern however just assumes you know where and how to skip, as well as where to place the dcs in the center of the V shape in order to end up with the right look across the rows. I can see how a novice would find this very confusing. For example, row 12 should really read: ch 2 (counts as first dc), dc in next, 4dc in chain space, 11dc across, 4dc in chain space, 2dc, which equals 23 dc across.

Then you just work a ton of rows for length, then do the V rows again, but backwards, followed by the end rows and done! I used up about half of the skein for the first, so I made a second with the V only on one end. That second one ended up being a bit short, even for a scarf, so I turned it into a cowl by seaming up the end. Each scarf was totally easy, aside from the assumptions, and took about 3 hours each.

After finishing the Proud to be one, I whipped up one more V for Victory scarf in the rest of the blue skein, as I wasn't sure if they really wanted cowls and I wanted to make sure I donating three scarves. Ya know, after looking at the one in blue I can't help but think that I could make a bunch for our school... for the Vikings!

Proud to Be
As I also had red, white and blue on hand the second pattern I tried was the Proud to Be scarf. I did not have a full skein of white to use, but I figured I had enough to make one of the white blocks with an S on it (from USA). My plan then was to make one set of the letter blocks and then make the rest of the scarf in solid red, since that's what I have the most of.

Since this scarf is worked in sc it takes a lot longer to work up. I got into the 10th row and had maybe 2 inches of scarf done, but the front post double crochet worked into the second row down is a cool way to get dense raised areas. It's like making cables, but without the open area behind that normally occurs; very cool, but super time consuming.

Once I got the three blocks of USA completed, I decided to be done with the letters. I switched over to double crochet and worked a row of white, then blue then finished out the rest of the scarf in red, making it as long as the skein lasted. Time to complete: 8 hours

While doing these projects, I am starting to realize that it is not so much the materials that I am donating, but the time, which is far more valuable and meaningful.

Hats for a Good Cause

Saw a post on Facebook from Lion Brand Yarn who are partnering with AllFreeCrochet.com to help out the Little Hats, Big Hearts Charity Drive. The post stuck with me. Not only is it just a nice thing to do, and I have a TON of red yarn that was given to me by a friend, but if you send something before September 30th you also are entered to win one skein of every Modern Baby yarn by Lion Brand. Pretty cool in all respects.

You can send The Chicago American Heart Association hats directly right up until January 15, 2015 though, so even if you cannot mail something this month, don't let that stop you.

Hats must be:
- RED
- cotton or acrylic
- medium to heavy weight
- machine washable and dryable

I had some super soft red acrylic that fit the bill so I set to work and made a three from a few different patterns. All these hats take about 45 min to an hour to make, so you really have no excuse not to make a few.

Newborn Crochet Hat

Newborn Crochet Hat
This hat pattern was one suggested from AllFreeCrochet.com. It takes about an hour to make. After Row 12 it doesnt really say how to make the rest of the fold up brim. I am assuming you could just do as many rows of sc around as you like till you are satisfied with how it looks when folded up. So after Row 12 I did one row of hdc around and one more of a shell edging to make it look a little nicer.
Shell row is: chain 1, sc 1, *skip 1 sc, 5dc in next stitch, skip 1 stitch, sc in next*, repeating around.

Barb's hat did not work out...

Barb's Seamless Hat
This pattern was linked from the AHA website directly.
First thing I noticed is that the pattern calls for baby weight yarn... that is fine and all, but the charity asked specifically for medium or heavy weight.. and since that is already what I was working in I had to make a few gauge swatches to fix that issue before I could start.

To make the hat the right size, without changing yarns, I had to find the right hook for the job. I started with a 5.00mm hook and the 9 sc gauge swatch was larger than the 2inches that it was supposed to be. Working down from there in hook sizes I found that a G/4.25mm hook produced the correct 2 inch gauge.

I also did a simplified round 1 by doing a magic circle and 10 sc into it and continuing from there. I got all the way to round 7 when I realized two things: 1) even thought I can still follow the pattern with my yarn and hook, the yarn is so much thicker than baby yarn that that it started doing this odd wave thing because it was so tight in increases and 2) I could not keep going and expect it to fit a human baby like it ought. Bummer, but we all learned something today: don't use normal weight yarn on a baby yarn pattern, even if you can get the gauge right.

So new pattern.

Button Flap Beanie KINDA...
Now I know I cannot use a button as the charity also requested that we refrain from embellishments or buttons or things that might be a choking hazard... BUT I know that I can simply stop this brim before the flap part and just have it be a nice ribbed brim, kind of like when I did my stripe slouch hat.

Once again I got to round 7 and did not like where the pattern went after that. Round 7 makes the flap, goes back around the hat and then turns and goes back the other way. Since I didn't want the flap part I stopped there and made up the rest myself based on that striped slouch hat pattern.

I did two more rows of dc around after 5-6, for 7-8.
The next few are for the brim which is worked perpendicular to the hat.
Row 1: Ch 7. Working in BLO, sc in the 2nd ch from hook and each ch. (6 sc) Sc2tog in the next 2 set-up row sts. Note: Do not sc the one you were just in but the next two open sts! This is the “securing st” that attaches the vertical brim rows to the horizontal last row. Do NOT ch, turn.
Row 2: Skipping the securing st, sc in the BLO evenly. (6 sc) Turn.
Row 3: Ch 1, sc in BLO evenly. (6 sc) Make securing stitch. Turn.
Row 4 – 40(or the beginning): Repeat Rows 2 – 3
To close the brim at the last row, bind off leaving a long tail and whipstitch the first and last rows together, working in the back loops of the first row to maintain the ribbed appearance.
Weave in ends.

OK now that I have two hats done... and still more than half this skein left, it is time for one more pattern. This time I am going to make it up based off a cross double crochet stitch that I just ripped out of a blanket swatch. Well call it the:

The small holes are from the X stitch.

All My X's Baby Hat
R1. MC chain 3, 11 dc into mc. (12)
R2. Ch3, 1dc in first stitch, 2dc in every stitch around (24)
R3. Ch3, 2dc in first stitch, *1dc in next stitch, 2 dc in next stitch* (36)
R4. Ch1, 1 sc around (36)
R5. Ch 3, skip one sc and dc into next dc, go back and dc into one you just skipped, then go forward 2 for the next dc, then go back one into the one you skipped. Do this around. Should make kind of an X stitch out of the two dcs (36)
R6. Ch 1, sc around (36)
R7-12: Repeat 5-6 thrice more
R13. Ch1 and 1sc in first st. * 1sc in each of the next 8sts. 2sc in the next st. repeat from * around. Slip stitch into the top of the first sc to join. <40>

R14. Ch 3, 1dc around all. Bind off.

The three finished hats.

So go forth and make a few if you have a bit of spare time and spare red yarn. You've got the rest of this month to submit to AllFreeCrochet to enter to win, and the rest of the year to send directly.

Knitters: there are patterns linked for you as well all the websites, so please join in!