Knits for calming nerves

Knitting does many things for me, and while we were in hospital it calmed my nerves. There were two projects on my needles: Soulemama's hat of choice, which for once was something just for me. I'm a strange one, in winter, I hardly wear hats, scarves or gloves, for various reasons. As to hats, I hardly find one that I like on me, so knitting this hat for me, even with my favourite yarn (Noro) was definitely a statement.

The pattern is easy, it knits quickly because of the thickness of the yarn, and when it was done, it was, well, far too small. So I unravelled and changed things here and there, I'd cast on an additional 7 stitches anyway because the swatch was already on the small side. I added two extra rows of pattern and 3 extra rows when decreasing.

It may have something to do with getting needle sizes wrong between US and UK sizes, because when I wrote my alterations up on Ravelry, I realised that the pattern there asked for 5.5mm size needles, while I thought it was 4.5mm. That may explain a thing or two. Nevermind, it all came out in the end and I left the hospital wearing a hat I love, which suits my strange head and keeps me warm in this rather unusually cold winter.

Photos taken by Cubling with my favourite toy, which, you know, makes it rather attractive to small hands.

The other project was a remote control holder. Much needed. We have like 4 remote controls and it's doing my head in, they are forever hiding in the toy box. So I picked a thick Shetland grown and spun lambswool yarn and a contrast colour from Alpaca wool and got going. Rather far. It's now sitting in front of me and all I can say is that I don't like it one bit.
The yarn is lovely, but the two yarns don't go together, one knits much thicker than the other.
And the woollen yarn just doesn't speak remote control holder to me. It says more like warm hat for Mr Cartside, or slipper socks. It looks plain wrong in this project.
I haven't yet brought myself to unravelling the whole thing, because I spent many hours knitting it in the hospital, but it's not going anywhere. It's a rubbish remote control holder. It did a rather good job as nerve calmer and tear catcher though. Sometimes something becomes much more important than getting a project finished. So, here's the remote control holder that was my best friend in the lonely hours and has done a good, if unexpected job and is now no longer needed.

So unravelling it will be, if another day when I feel more like letting go.