My new hat and jacket

My son gave me a pretty red polarfleece jacket that I quickly embroidered a fuzzy dog on. I started wearing it this week when it turned cold and I had to walk the dog twice a day. I decided I had to have a hat to match it because it REALLY turned cold.

Since the Spiral Hat pattern Marg Coe put in the Knittingmachine group files, is my most favorite of all time hats, I decided that was the hat I wanted to make but I didn't want to buy any more yarn. I dug out some Red Heart self patterning yarn from my stash and it has red in it so I started the hat on my LK 150 machine. YUK, about halfway through I wondered if I was going to like it but you can't tell with this hat until its sewed together. Variegated yarn definitely is the way to go with that pattern, I already knew that but who in the world would have thought it would turn out as great as it did? I didn't really know until it was sewn what in the world I was going to end up with but I absolutely love it. Check it out when I fold up the cuff. The cuff has little spikes where the increases were which I dearly love about this hat.

BTW, Marg calls it a Garter Bar Project but I couldn't find my GB for the mid gauge machine so I just *took it off on 3 rows of waste, rehung the pattern stitches and quickly zipped the waste off, repeated from * It took me 1 day to knit, no swatch necessary. Because the yarn is thicker than the other hats I've made with this pattern, I only knitted until there were 9 plain sections instead of 12 as suggested in the pattern. Then I hoped it would fit. It did!

Teddy is modeling the jacket with the hat, you really can't see the difference between red and pink in this yarnunless you click on the picture to enlarge it, there's a pretty red in there as well as a denim heather.

Biscuit's Sweater is finished just in time

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back of sweater, chain buttonhole loops are on the belly wraps on the inside

Man alive, just in time, its cold and windy today. I bought a sweater kit for biscuit from Lion Brand Yarns (pattern # 80100M-L, SoHo Cables It comes with the pattern and yarn Wool Ease, all for $6.96. Its an easy pattern but its definitely for small dogs. Biscuit weighs 13 lbs and although I knitted the size Medium, I had to make it as long as the Large and widen the belly band even bigger than the large. But then, maybe its my dog? He's so fuzzy its hard to fit him because you never know if you're measuring fluff or body. I've written notes all over the pattern, next time I'll make him a large. And I'm going to make it on the LK 150, definitely it can be made on it. It could be made on any machine but I like Wool Ease for this, its warm and breathes better since it has wool in it. The belt band calls for 18 stitches each side of the center piece for size medium, large calls for 22 stitches. I used 24 stitches. I knitted and knitted and knitted thinking I was finished, I would take it off the needles and try it on him and it was still too short. Finally I finished it, tried it on him and unraveled the bottom yet again. I added 3 more inches to the bottom ribbing and really it could still stand some more length. The belly band could have been wider, I did widen it some but didn't want it too wide for a boy. With all that said, I love the sweater. .

BTW, I laid the sweater near him so he could smell it and I just now went to get it and put it on him and doggone, he's chewed one of the beautiful wooden buttons I bought for it. (Hobby Lobby buttons). Guess I'll go find some plastic ones in my button box.

picture of inside, piece goes over head, down chest and around belly" Awesome design, I never would have thought of designing one that fits like this.

Its not going to keep him super warm in a really cold environment but I'm one of those who thought God gave dogs enough fur to keep them warm. Unfortunately, I don't know if that's true for a Maltese, especially if their hair is kept short.

He has a bare little pink belly. So I have also bought him a Sherpa coat for visiting colder climates.