Sunday Knitting

Here is my finished Huntress Shawl, with its little fox face.

But I'll probably wear it as a scarf, more like this.

This was an easy project that went quickly. You begin with the center panel, and use yarnovers to make the fox head. Then, stitches are picked up on each side and knit toward each end, decreasing until it tapers to just a few stitches before binding off. The Huntress Shawl pattern is from the Fall 2012 issue of Knitscene. The yarn, Cascade 200 Superwash, is just from my stash. I always like working with Cascade of any sort.

I don't recall why I bought this particular yarn, but I rarely buy any without specific plans in mind. Nevertheless, my stash has gotten a little out of hand, mostly just from project leftovers. So yesterday I went through and pulled out enough to fill two large bags and offered it up on Freecycle. What I have left is mostly sock yarn and it's far more manageable. I also found a few things I didn't realize I had, which was especially surprising since I keep a spreadsheet of all my yarn.

I'm still working on Pianissimo, but now I've also started a couple of socks as well. I'll share photos of those soon!

Sunday Knitting

Lovely, if I do say so myself. And just in time to wash it and put it away for the summer. By the time fall rolls around I will have forgotten all about it and will be in store for a wonderful cozy surprise. At least that's my plan.

This is the Noro Striped Scarf from this pattern, using 4 skeins of Noro Silk Garden on size 7 needles. Easy and satisfying, I could easily make another one right now. Noro uses some gorgeous colors, and the surprising way they appear from the skein keeps your project from becoming dull.

Sunday Knitting

This may come as a shock to anyone who remembers how much I dislike knitting scarves, but since my rather gluttenous trip to Windsor Button not long ago, I've been compulsively knitting this scarf.

Compulsively. On the bus, while watching Dr. Who, while sitting and thinking about the other things I should be doing.

It's a simple 1x1 rib, striping every two rows. I'm using 3 colorways as the pattern recommends - I'm not sure why it recommends 3 colorways, but I couldn't find two balls of one neutral-ish colorway as I wanted to so it worked out that way anyhow. It's one colorway throughout the entire scarf, and then the more neutral one switches off halfway through to the other neutral colorway. I thought it would be less noticeable, but the neutrals are more different from each other than I thought. Well, I still like it.

It got a little dodgy around this part.

The yellow and tan combined in a most unflattering way, but luckily it all turned pink and grey again before things went too badly.

The beautiful and ever-changing colors are what make the knitting a pleasure, but probably the most important thing is how wonderful this yarn feels. Yes, I'm talking about Noro here, notorious for being scratchy, not to mention full of bits of twigs and whatnot. I kind of like finding those. (Not so much the knots, but I've only found one knot mid-skein so far, knock on wood.)

Noro Silk Garden, I should have bought you long ago, rather than just staring wistfully at you for so many years!

Scrunchable Scarf

This was a super simple pattern, found free here. I used Malabrigo Worsted in Bobby Blue and size 8 needles.

The scarf isn’t super long, but it’s thick enough that I wouldn’t have to wrap it multiple times anyway. Originally I planned to use a bulky yarn but the day I went shopping there wasn’t a color I liked in the bulky Malabrigo. I think it turned out quite lovely anyhow and seems to be warm enough. (Of course it’s almost June so it’s difficult to judge that accurately.)

I will need a matching hat because this color doesn’t go with any of my hats. I don’t want it too matchy-matchy, which is why I only bought enough yarn for a scarf, so I will look for a complimentary color. Maybe gray? If I have a little of the blue leftover perhaps I can use it for an edging on the hat.

Tomorrow I’m going to Windsor Button to find buttons for my Puff-Sleeved Cardigan, so I’ll look at potential hat yarns while I’m there. And of course this means I should have finished photos of my cardigan soon! Be patient though, because I have to block it and make sure it’s perfect before I reveal it to the world.

I'm knitting a scarf

I may have mentioned before how much I dislike knitting scarves. But the fact cannot be escaped - I really need a nice snuggly warm scarf. A few months ago I bought a couple of skeins of Malabrigo worsted, suspecting that it would never actually become a scarf, but I surprised myself a few days ago by casting on for the Scrunchable Scarf. The pic on the site makes it look unappealing but there are some nice shots on Ravelry.

Originally I wanted bulkier yarn for nice big squishy scarf, but I also was leaning towards Malabrigo and none of the bulky colors jumped out at me. This pattern knits up nice and snuggly and squishy, so I think it will be great. And the color is amazing. This picture doesn't quite capture the subtle shades, but maybe I'll get some better pics later.

The pattern is super easy and it makes for great tv/movie knitting. I haven't had a project like that for a while.

Progress shots of scarves are very boring, so I won't show this to you again until it's done!