Finished for fall!

Just an update of some projects that were finished over the past month. A birthday hat for my brother::

This was just a simple hat of my own design. I cast on 90 stitches, ribbed the bottom, added the stripe, and finished it off with the star on top! I used some malabrigo (for the stripe and star) and berroco peruvia for the body of the hat; it was a great way to use up some left-over bits and I'm excited to know that it'll keep my brother warm this winter! {now I just have to get a picture of him wearing it!}

I also finished the February Baby Sweater that was a gift for a family friend::
I'm glad I restarted this, making it slightly larger and using the brown yarn made for a perfect little gift. I LOVE this baby knit. It was so fast and easy, and I definitely want to knit more of these. I'm evening thinking of doing the adult size version for myself. I really like this version.

And I finally sewed on the buttons for my Drops Cardigan. So here are some shots of the final product::
Again, I LOVE this sweater! I think it's going to get a lot of wear this fall. I used Malabrigo, making a soft and cozy sweater. I am worried that it's going to pill a lot, but I'll just take the pilling as a sign of how much I love it.
Some notes for this sweater:
I followed Canary Studio's lead and knit this all in one piece. I cast on the same number of stitches as she suggests here. After the cast-on, I knit down the body, with no waist shaping, and stopping when I was happy with the length. I then went back to the cast-on edge and picked up the stitches for the neck. When it came to the sleeves, I knit them in the round with no shaping at all, it made for a nice wide cuff (where again I used seed stitch to finish them off).
Notes on the neck section::
While knitting the whole neck section with the double seed stitch, I continued with the should seams (decreasing because I'm working 'up' the neck). To do this, I would just incorporate the decreases on the right side rows while still following the double seed stitch pattern. For decreases, I would either k2tog, ssk if I'm at a point in the pattern where I should be knitting, or if I should be purling, then I would p2tog. After doing a decrease row, it would mean that for some rows, I would have one, three or four knit/purl stitches in a row, rather than the two stitches for the pattern. While this seems like it would cause a problem, it doesn't. If you look at my shoulder seam area, you can see where the seams are, but it doesn't look like the stitch or pattern is messed up. Although, I didn't finish the shoulder seams until I was back at a point where the stitch pattern lined up correctly (two knit, two purl, two knit, etc). I hope this helps, and I'd be happy to answer any questions!

Yarn Malabrigo - 5 skeins (give or take, I bought 6 and have a lot left over)
Needles - size 8 US

And finally, a spooky picture of me and some fall foliage::