Dreams of Blue Rooms

Woke up from one of my epic saga dreams, and the image that surfaced with me was of a room in a house probably in Morocco — tall ceiling, dark, cool, tiled floor,with plastered walls painted this wonderful shade of light azure and there were carved floral motif wooden grills made from Atlas cedar.

I tend to feel an affinity with Morocco.  I like their traditional style of housing with the glorious decorative tile work and the central courtyard with balconies and a fountain. Perhaps it is because the town where I live is at the same latitude as Casablanca (Here’s looking at you, kid.) and our semiarid climate is very similar to theirs.  Of course, Casablanca is on the sea coast and we’re about 600 miles inland; but we were close to the sea at one time. (So close, in fact, that we were under it!)

I wouldn’t mind having the screen in the picture.  I love carved wooden screens. I wouldn’t mind having a traditional Moroccan house, either — providing I had the income to maintain it (and me while I lived in it) — and pay a live-in cook/housekeeper, — and it had WiFi.  I mean, if you’re going to dream, dream real.

The word “azure,” and the color it names, comes from lapis lazuli. I love the color blue in all its myriad shades, and have done all my life.

In the knitting news, and you know there will be knitting news, I ripped out this hat because it needs to be on a bigger needle,

and this hat because I didn’t like the way it was going,

and this hat because it was too big and needed to be on a smaller needle.

I had a hard time with the purple one (ripped it out 4 times), because I couldn’t get the gauge right.  Now I think I have (72 stitches on a US size 4 (3.5 mm) for the band, then changing to a US size 7 (4.5 mm) for the hat body) and I’m writing a hat pattern for it as I go.

My main knitting challenge is that I knit loosely, and if a pattern gives a specific needle size, I’ll have to go down at least one, and maybe two sizes to get the correct gauge.  Another consideration is that I have a 22-inch head, and most ladies have smaller heads than I do (20-21 inches).

So far, this one is going to plan.  This will be the first time I’ve “turned a hem” when the knitting is ribbed, so when I get to the knit two stitches together bit, it will actually be k2tog, p2tog.  We’ll see how it goes. (The strings at lower right are for the provisional cast on.)

Another thing I’m trying is that half way through the ribbing, I’m changing from k1, p1, to p1, k1 (which is what the pink marker is about — this fuzzy yarn is really hard to “read”).  The reasoning behind this is that the reverse of a knit stitch is a purl stitch, and vice versa.  The hem has to be folded, and if I don’t switch halfway through, when I’m hemming, I would be trying to knit a knit stitch and a purl stitch together and it wouldn’t lay right.  Because I’ve “changed horses in midstream,” I’ll be knitting two knit stitches together, and purling two purl stitches together — or that’s the theory anyway.  Verrons nous.  On the next row after the hemming row, I’ll switch to stockinette and a US size 7 (4.5 mm) needle, and increase 20 stitches on the first row using kfb’s (knit front and back), with a simple ssk decrease at the top.

Here directly, I need quit noodling on the computer and call my BFF to see if she is still coming this afternoon, and if she is, I need to catch a shower and wash my hair before she comes.