Not only did I reach the double-pointed needles part of the project yesterday, I finished the hat. Go team me!

It is lumpy and somewhat misshapen and not quite long enough and the decreases happen in odd places, but I love it. I was so excited about it all working that I didn’t stop and rip out the place where the decreases started to go wrong.

If my excitement seems out of proportion I will tell you only this: I have hated knitting since a Brownie leader handed me a set of needles when I was tiny and told me that to obtain whatever badge it was I’d have to knit a 3 x 3 inch square. She eventually took pity on me and gave me the badge anyway. I’ve tried knitting once or twice since then and have given up. This time? I did it. It worked. And in the space of a day, too. And also? I didn’t work from a pattern. So yes, go team me!

Now that my trial hat is over (it is now officially a Trial Hat because I cannot give it to Mousme; she would heroically try to wear it and I would never do that to her) I know I can Do This. Actually, I started a different project first earlier in the fall. I bought some lovely yarn in shades of grey/silver/black with a touch of brown and started knitting myself armwarmers, but (a) Gryff tore the ball of yarn apart because it has real wool in it and rendered it knotty, and (b) it’s a loosely spun yarn, which means I keep splitting my damn stitches. Fighting with the yarn is not a good way to ease myself back into knitting. So when Mousme had her head shaved to raise money (over two thousand dollars, yay her!) for breast cancer research I asked her if I could knit her a hat to keep her newly bared scalp warm, and she said yes. (Because she is a Good Friend, she also said that didn’t I hate knitting, and was I sure I wanted to do this?)

I need more yarn now. I could rip out the hat but I knotted the end and besides it is my very first knitted thing and I love it with much love. Kind of like those trunk novels that will never ever see the light of day but I can’t bring myself to burn them.