It's Easy If You Know What You're Doing

I bought this yarn when visiting my Mom back in December. It's S.R. Kertzer (brand) Truffle (name of yarn), made with 80% merino wool and 20% cashmere. It feels like it has more cashmere than that and it's bouncy, light and the stitches came out nice and even (a problem I usually have when knitting with alpaca.) I was originally going to make the stripes of equal width, but my Mom inspired me to be more spontaneous. I do tend to be a bit rigid when knitting. Wanting to use the yarn called for by a pattern and rarely making alterations. I'm afraid to deviate because I don't want something that's useless, because what's the point then of spending all that time knitting? Maybe if I were a faster knitter, I'd be more adventurous. But it usually takes me a very long time to make anything, so I want it to be right the first time. Anyhoo, this hat was a relatively small project so I thought I'd be crazy and make the stripe widths varied. I like how it turned out. I also made the top long, so it'd be just a little floppy. I started off not using a pattern, but finished it off using a Rowan hat pattern for the decreases.



Here's something I've been struggling with for quite some time. In the past, I haven't had much luck with tailors hemming my pants. They measure my pants and then when I get them back they're almost always too short or too long. So I finally figured out that I need a 31" inseam, which allows me to wear 2"-3" heels. So, I took some newly purchased pants (off the clearance rack of course) to the tailor and told her to take exactly 1 inch off (I'd made sure to measure the inseam at home, it was 32"). I was so excited to get them back. When I finally got them, I held them up and the joy faded. They looked a little funny. I whipped out my measuring tape and measured 29.4"!!! What the heck??? Anyway, long story short, the lady wouldn't give me my money back but "fixed" them to an acceptable 30.5" (I have to wear them with flats now) and offered to clean them once for free. I haven't gone back since and now I feel I must hem my pants myself from now on. The problem is that I don't really know how to. I'm just guessing here. Let me know if there's a better way. First I ripped out the seam, then measure 1" up and ironed. Then I did the combo straight stitch and funky swirly stitch as you see below and then trimmed it. This seems kinda messy, but I don't have a serger and didn't see a stitch on my machine that would stitch around the edge. Next, I will hand stitch to finish. I know there is some sort of way to do it with the machine, but you have to fold it in someway I can't even imagine and I'm just plain scared. I don't know why. Maybe cause it all seems so foreign to me. Oh, how I wish I knew what I was doing.