A week late, the Denbigh Cowl is released into the wild

It didn't take very long for my resolution about releasing a pattern every month to fall by the wayside, did it? Without further delay, please meet (again) the Denbigh Cowl.

This pattern was originally published in Issue 23 of Knit Now as one of the Designer Challenge projects. The challenge being: you have one ball of Blacker Swan Island DK and one ball of Blacker Breeds Pure Teeswater DK - what do you do?

In this instance, I knit them up into a fun cowl with a dramatic geometric pattern created with slipped stitches and two dramatically contrasting colors. The cowl begins with an i-cord cast on (kind of a pain in the bum, but well worth the effort), and is worked to a depth of about 8.5 in/22 cm before finishing off with a matching i-cord bind off.

The version of the pattern now available also includes a long version, that is approximately 57.5 in/146 cm in circumference, so easily long enough to wear hanging down or wrapped a couple of times for extra warmth.

A note about these two yarns: although both are designated DK weight, they are very very different. If you're going to substitute different yarns, beware! The Swan Island DK is a plush, round, fantastically squishy yarn that is perfect for cuddling up next to your skin. The Pure Teeswater is a much thinner yarn with dramatically less elasticity, owing to the properties of the breed. As a spinner, I was fascinated by how different these yarns worked up together, and I tried to emphasize the characteristics of each. If you are going to substitute, I would recommend maybe using a heavy fingering weight yarn for the CC in place of the Teeswater to get a similar effect. A standard DK should be fine to substitute for the Swan Island DK.

SKILLS NEEDED 
Knitting, purling, knitting in the round, i-cord cast on and bind off, slipped stitch pattern.

SIZES 
Small (large), approximately 20.5 (57.5) in/52 (146) cm in circumference, and 8.5 in/22 cm high.

YARNS 
MC: Blacker Swan Island DK, 120 yds/110 m per 50 gram ball, 1 (2) balls. 
CC: Blacker Breeds Pure Teeswater DK, 120 yds/110 m per 50 gr ball, 1 (2) balls.

This is a great project if you've never worked with two colors before but you want to try - only one color is every used in any one row, and there are only 4 rounds in the entire 12 round repeat that are anything other then straight knitting. 

Denbigh Cowl, $5.00 - click the button below to buy now from Ravelry. The pattern will be delivered to you as a pdf, and you do not have to be a Ravelry member to purchase. Thanks, and enjoy!

Finished Objects

A number of things were finished over the last week or so. The biggest and best of those was Yarn in the City: The Great London Yarn Crawl (V1.0). It was a fantastic day, with ample stash enhancement of all sorts and loads of yarny goodness displayed at the pub afterwards. Our amazing volunteers shepherded their teams around London, despite the vagaries of London transport (I'm looking at you Central Line...), and kept everyone together and happy throughout what was a very long day. And Alli and I are pretty sure that we will be doing this craziness again next year, so if you didn't manage to come this time around, keep an eye out for V2.0 next autumn!

In the final run-up to the Crawl, I spent what precious little free time I had frantically finishing up my Christmassy-cowl, out of Romney Ridge Farm yarn I purchased on my Downeast Yarn Crawl over the summer.

I tend to find entrelac too fiddley for my taste/patience level, but it was just the right thing for me to knit last week - mindless but requiring a bit of focus. I kept going until I was almost out of yarn, and then did a 3-needle bind off using the last scraps and then a bit of leftover yarn from a different project when I ran out.

After the crawl, I spent most of Sunday morning spinning, but then turned to my wee baby cardigan - I finished the knitting on this more then a week ago, but (as always happens) I stalled out putting on the buttons. Not because I didn't have buttons, but just because I couldn't be arsed to pull them out and sit down and sew them on.

Now the buttons are all sewn on, and it's ready to go. Sadly, there won't be FO photos on the blog for quite a while because it's a Christmas present*. Here are the pertinent details:

Pattern: Right as Rainbow Baby Cardigan by Stephanie Lotven
Yarn: Spud & Chloe Sweater, very small amounts for the stripes and edging (Firecracker, Grass, Aqua, Lake and Grape Jelly), Brown Sheep Cotton Top (discontinued) in Natural for body and Brown for last stripe.
Needles: US 6/4.0 mm
Start/finish: 4 September - 14 September for the knitting, 22 September for actual sewing on of buttons.
Comments: This was a lovely, straightforward pattern, with the only complicated bit coming in the decreases in the yoke to make the nine points. Otherwise the perfect TV-watching, stressed-out event organizer knitting. I may or may not have piles of worsted/aran weight yarns decorating my office, waiting for me to cast on the next one.

Some things are just made for each other

Like this lovely Romney Ridge Farm yarn in "Cranberry Bog" and entrelac. I've got deadline knitting to do (laceweight, cables, a big boo boo to go back and fix - ugh), but I can't put this down. My other entrelac projects have been terribly fiddley, but worsted weight yarn is so much faster and more satisfying! The plan is to keep going until I run out of yarn, and then do a three-needle bind off to turn this long strip into a cowl. And these colors are going to be the perfect Christmas present for someone.

In other news: I am completely swamped by GLYC organisational stuff/another impending trip/the start of school/general life. So things are going to be a bit sparse on the virtual ground around here for a bit. I'll be Tweeting and updating Ravelry fairly regularly though, so you can always find me there. Ta!

It's a big week for patterns: Denbigh Cowl in Knit Now Issue 23!

This week, the latest issue of Knit Now hit the stands, containing my Denbigh Cowl pattern.

Photo credit: Dan Walmsley

This pattern grew out of a designer challenge, where the editor of the magazine sends around a call for patterns that utilize a specific yarn (usually with only enough yardage for an accessory). I came up with the idea for this cowl after seeing Kate's Pinterest board for the challenge, which featured lots and lots of graphic designs with strong contrasting lines.

The yarn is from Blacker Yarns - their Swan DK and Pure Teeswater DK. This was my first time working with yarns from this company, and they were absolutely gorgeous.

Something I didn't realize beforehand, but that ended up working out perfectly for the design: the Swan DK is on the heavier end of the DK range, while the Teeswater DK is practically a sport/fingering weight! This meant that the yarns fit perfectly into my plan to use the Swan DK (made from Falkland merino) as the background color, thereby putting the softer yarn against the skin, and put the more drapey Teeswater yarn into play as the accent color.

There's my swatch, edged with i-cord that's worked as the cast on and cast off for the cowl. It's a bit easier to see the stitch pattern here - it's a very easy pattern to work, with only two rows where anything happens that you need to pay attention to. And it is totally addictive!

While the pattern is currently only available through the magazine, I will be releasing it in the fall with an additional, larger infinity cowl size. And once I decide which colors I'm going to use, I'll be getting some more of that gorgeous yarn!

Leaf Peeper Cowl

Some of you may know this already (ha-bloody-ha!), but I really, really like knitting with handspun yarn. I mean really, really like it. If given my druthers, I'd probably never knit with commercial yarn again. So it seems only reasonable that I might start designing some patterns for handspun yarn, right?



Meet the Leaf Peeper Cowl (attractive posed amongst the dead ferns in Richmond Park). Knit from side to side out of just under 100 yds/92 m of bulky weight handspun yarn for a cowl that is about 18 inches in circumference unstretched. If you want a longer cowl, simply keep going until it's the desired size. When it's long enough, graft the ends together and voila! Instant neck cuddles.

The sample was knit out of 3-ply BFL from my shop, in the Leaf Peepers colorway. The fiber was split into three equal lengths before spinning, and then two of the pieces were split further lengthwise. Final yarn was 95 yds/3.5 oz, or approximately 450 ypp.

This is the perfect quick cowl for holiday presents - I think mine took me a couple of nights to whip up, and the stitch pattern, while it may look complicated, is pretty easy to follow once you get going.

Pattern can be found on Ravelry in my store, or you can get it here for $5.00.

FF: Just in time for spring

Last week I finished up and photographed an absolutely lovely pattern - the Matanuska Eternity Scarf, created by one of my fellow Hello Yarn Fiber Club Members, Melinda Peiserich. It rocks!

It's a very simple pattern with slipped stitches, which is perfect for breaking up the stripey nature of most handspun yarn. I used 3-ply Finn in "Buckland", which was the club fiber from November 2008 (!). I loved spinning this yarn and was saving it for something really special - I had two skeins of 3-ply and one of 2-ply, so I used up all the 3-ply on this piece, a total of 472 yds.

More details:
Needles: US 6.0/4 mm
Start/finish: 3 February - 21 February (it's quick too!)

I love the colors in this yarn knitted up even more then I loved them in fiber/yarn form.

I'm particularly taken with the Bright! Chartreuse! Green! that shows up next to the richer red/brown/pink combination. I was a bit concerned that the Finn would be a bit scratchy around my neck, but it is getting softer and softer as it gets worn.

Sadly, the days for wearing it are probably numbered, as this interloper

is now wide open. Welcome to spring!

Imaginary post

Warning: picture-overloaded post ahead

I was absolutely convinced that I'd started a post about my finished Sour Fig yarn, but Blogger says no. I'll just have to blame my aging Mommy brain for that little mental hiccup. So this post will be a finished yarn and a finished object all in one!

First up: the yarn. As previously described, I took my spindle on our trip back to the US, and after a horrible injury and fabulous repair, I whizzed through 4 oz of Sour Fig Shetland from Adrian.

That's it in the lower right corner - sadly I have no photo of the original fiber, but there's a bunch here.

It took me about four days to spin up the six singles and do the 2-plies. This included spinning in the car, and spinning at every available second during the day. I was determined to ply in one go, so I ended up with a very full spindle, to say the least.

When it was all wound off and soaked and thwacked and dried, I had 56 yds of super bulky yarn with a very interesting texture.

The next problem was to figure out something to make out of it - 56 yds is not very much, but I thought I could maybe get a cowl or a hat out of it. I went for the one willow cowl by Jennifer Casa, and 3 hours later I had a finished object.

The pattern is a simple 1x1 twisted rib cowl, where you knit through the back loop but purl normally. I kept going until I ran out of yarn, which meant I had to tink back several rows so I could cast off successfully. But there it is - instant gratification knitwear, and it's thick enough to ward off some serious winter weather.

Which means it will probably go in to the gift box. Because no matter what my office mates say, London winters are so not bad. But there's one Christmas item done!

The last of the Christmas knitting. Finally.

A quick (approximately 4 hours) cowl in squishy alpaca blend, using only half a skein so I can make another one.

The Guy Next Door cowl by Devin Fredrickson, Berroco Ultra Alpaca (50% alpaca/50% wool), 110 yds on US 6/4.0 mm needles. Started 17 December during "The Illusionist", finished 18th December during "The Golden Compass". Max of four hours to finish, but probably more like 3 if I hadn't messed up and dropped a stitch. The pattern calls for five repeats of the stitch pattern (12 rows), but I did an extra half-repeat for good measure.

My only beef with the pattern was the fact that the stitch pattern was set up so that it didn't repeat evenly - the last repeat of the pattern in the round was shifted a bit to avoid doing something funky over the start of the round. I think, with some judicious shifting of the start point, I can make it so there don't need to be any hijinks, which would be fabulous because I love this stitch pattern, and I think it should be a hat and maybe a men's sweater.

Just lovely movement. This was my first time using this particular yarn, and I really like the feel. It was quite crisp while knitting, maybe even a bit rough, but after a bath it bloomed nicely and is really soft.

My other final project was re-knitting my too-large Cool Beans sock. Now the pair matches (more or less).

The only thing left to do now is haul down to the post office, and pray to the weather/Royal Mail/USPS gods that packages arrive in time. They really should have been mailed a week ago, but maybe I'll get lucky? I can only hope...

Yummy distraction

Dear Lion and Lamb,

We need to talk. Because I've got this List I'm working on, right? But last Friday I took the girls down to the stash to find some yarn for scarves, since it's really starting to get chilly in the mornings. While we were digging out blue and pink yarn for them, I found you buried in the bottom of a bin. And in pawing through the bins, I came across you again. I looked at you fondly, remembering that day almost a year ago when I found you all by your lonesome in the sale bin at Stash, and brought you home with me.

However, the problem lies in what happened next. Even after going back up to the house through the rain you kept calling out to me. And boy were you persistent! You promised me the coziness of wool, the sheen of silk, and you were just the same exact color as the lining of the winter coat I'm working on.

So I did something dumb. I listned to your siren call, pushed the IM Aran sleeves under the couch cushions and wound you up. Then I cast on for a cowl. A few obsessive hours and a couple of bad movies later (Men in Black, The Legend of Baggar Vance - a fine illustration of the extremes of Will Smith's acting career), there it was.

One Darkside Cowl, with gorgeous cushy stitches and brilliant colors,

and a good third of a skein of leftovers, maybe for some matching mitts?

I apologize for ever doubting that your high price wouldn't be worth it, and I now understand why a Clapotis knit out of you might be just the most luxurious thing ever. I have to say, I don't think you're cut out for sweater-dom, but if I ever come across more of you - even at full price! - I'm going to be taking some of your cousins home with me.

Much love forever and ever,
porpoise

FO: Ply by Night cowl and mitt set

Pattern: cowl blogged here, mitts just made up out of my head using linen stitch and more or less the same made up pattern I used for the manly mitts.
Yarn: handspun BFL singles from Chris at Briar Rose Fibers, blogged here in its final form. I used about 3/4 of the yarn, lets say 180 yds for the pair.
Needles: US 5/3.75 mm
Start/finish (for mitts): 12 December - 14 December 2009
Comments: No mods because it's my own pattern. I cast-on 47 stitches and worked in linen stitch pattern for 2 inches. Then I increased one stitch at beginning and end of row (2 sts increased) every third row five times, working new stitches in pattern. worked for about 2 more inches, then put 10 extra stitches on waste yarn, rejoined and worked 2 inches. Bound off in purl. Picked up 10 extra stitches plus 3 more and worked in linen stitch for 0.75 inches around the thumb, then bound off in purl.

Thankfully my mom's hands aren't too big, because the linen stitch has very little elasticity. But the set was very well received!

FO: Chickadee Cowl

This past Sunday, I picked up my handspun Briar Rose BFL, and wound it up to cast on for the March/April project, the Chickadee Cowl.

Approximately 30 hours later, I was done. Wow. Fabulous, instant gratification, assisted by the fun of knitting with handspun, and a totally addictive combination of pattern stitch and color progression.

Pattern: Chickadee Cowl by Kirsten Kapur
Yarn: BFL handspun singles, dyed by Chris at Briar Rose Fibers for the Ply By Night SAL/KAL group on Ravelry.
Needles: 16 inch US size 10.5/6.5 mm circulars.
Gauge: totally off from the pattern, which called for 13 stitches/4 inches. Mine was about 20 stitches/4 inches. Thankfully, it stretches enough to fit over my big head, so anyone who might get it as a present should be ok.

The yarn is lovely and soft, and has a phenomenal sheen. I will definitely be getting more fiber from Chris in the future, since it was so fun to spin and knits up so beautifully.