I decided to knit a hat with one of the skeins from the goody bag I bought from Jimmy Bean Wool, Madelinetosh DK Twist Desert Bloom. All of my recent projects at are still on needles, mostly going backward. Lots of ripping out or total start overs, have made those project very boring. I need a break. I needed something to make me feel acomplished.

The pattern I choose was Amida from by Maiko Hikosaka. I wanted something easy-ish but cute (of course) and I like the graphic quality of the lines.

I realized from my recent projects there were many false starts. Cast-on, knit, find a mistake, read the pattern wrong, rip out mistake or total start over. This process may repeat a couple of times and this project is no exception.

To change this habit, I need to read the pattern really well, account for stitches in the instruction to make sure I understand what I’ve been asked to do. Every pattern designer has their own way of writing a pattern, and I need to read the pattern and annotate what it means in my own words. This is what a good educational content designer would do. I’m just lazy. haha.

Once I got this pattern in my head, it was very easy and the yarn was a dream to knit with. I took the project with me on my trip to Japan and finished on my first full day of the tour while on the train to the first trail.

By the end of my hiking tour, I decided to give the hat to our tour leader. We had a conversation on the trail about Hokkaido in the fall and the winter. I thought she could make good use of it on a winter hike.

Here’s a preview on the my next project.
Pattern: Alicorn by Julie Crawford
Yarn: Lecce from Puppyarn.com, color: 412
Bought the yarn from Masuzakiya
Fiber: 90% wool 10% mohair
Cast-on: day 7 of the tour in the court yard of our inn.
Continued to work on in Kyoto. Probably use two skein (40g each) to get this done.