Finishing Flurry

I was going to title this post, "Finishing Frenzy", but it hasn't been very frenzied, and I still have a lot of projects on the needles. I did have a little flurry over the last couple weeks, however, and I want to share the projects that came off the needles.

I had my biggest "ta-da" moment when I finally, after almost three months, bound off on Yvonne, my It's the Berries Vest.

I began knitting this in early June, and the two-hour long bind-off happened on August 31. Despite the very repetitive pattern, which might seem boring, I really enjoyed this project. It was almost always my car project on days that Mr. D and I went hiking, and that helped me to finish it a lot sooner than I might have otherwise. It's a lot of knitting—at the end I had 544 stitches on the needles—but it is well worth the effort. I can't wait to wear it!

After finishing a big project like this one, I usually want a change-of-pace small project. Over the next few days, I finished two small projects. The first was French Kiss, designed by Nikol Lohr.

The designer bills this as a "two-hour beret," but I'm a slower knitter than she is, so mine is called the Four-Hour Beret. It's knit with bulky yarn held double on size 13 needles, and it does knit up very quickly. It's a mystery to me why so few people have knit this little gem. It's also a great stash buster; look how much yarn was left when I finished:

My other FO was my standard change-of-pace project—a dishcloth. This time, it was a new riff on "Grandmother's Favorite", my Old Favorite with a Twist. The pattern is eLoomanator's Diagonal Knit Dishcloth, and I love how it turned out. I'll be knitting more of these in the future!

Today I'm off on the last hike of the summer. I'll be back with a report on last week's hike in the next day or two, as well as my thoughts on "almost UFOs". Stay tuned!