Cauldron Full of Hot, Strong Love

 New Release, Patterns, Wraps  Comments Off on Cauldron Full of Hot, Strong Love
May 212013
 

Who doesn’t want to stir up a little love? This triangular shawl begins with many stitches and an enticing ruffle, then decreases the stitch count by 2/3 before the body begins. Strong ribbed lines lead to the top, with optional beads added for glamour. The reversible stitch pattern is bewitching from both sides, all in the service of love. The hotter and stronger, the better!

Techniques & Skills Used: longtail CO, knit/purl, beading (optional; prestrung and crochet hook methods, with link to tutorial), decreasing. This pattern is both written and charted, and includes links to my grafting and beading tutorials.

Yarn: Malabrigo Yarn Silky Merino (51% silk, 49% merino; 150 yards/50g; 2 (4) skeins. Size S shown in Cumparsita with beads, and using about 240 yards; size L unbeaded, shown in Redwood Bark and using about 495 yards. The Silky Merino becomes very drapey when blocked, which is essential for achieving a straight top edge, as the body of the shawl is ribbed and the wings must be pulled up to avoid a point at the middle of the top. For a similar result, choose a single ply yarn with significant silk or other non-springy fiber content.

Other Materials: US 7 (4.5mm) 32” circular needle, or size to match gauge; Stitch markers (4); Size 6/0 large hole seed beads 422 (982), optional; 1.25 mm crochet hook for placing beads; Yarn needle.

Gauge: 16 st and 28 rows/4” in K3P1 Rib, after gentle blocking. Gauge is not critical for this project, however a different gauge may result in a smaller or larger finished shawl, and different yardage requirements.

See it on Ravelry or on Payhip, to read more or purchase the pattern.   

    

Big A$$ yarn

 WIPs  Comments Off on Big A$$ yarn
May 132013
 

For whatever reason, I’m working on two projects with two giant skeins of yarn.

BIG yarn | The Knitting Vortex

The silver is a 620 yard skein of sportweight BMFA Woobu, which I picked up during the NJ Yarn Crawl at Knit Knack during my trunk show. The elecrtic blue is all of 1120 yards (!) of fingering weight, from the Sliver Moon booth at Rhinebeck this fall. Together they practically obscure my desktop keyboard.

They seemed like a good idea at the time; top down summer cardigans, no joins, no ends to weave – and I’ve no doubt they will be good. The blue was a bit of a challenge to wind, though; not only did it exceed the capacity of my ballwinder (even with the metal arm pulled as far away as it could go without bending), but it also swallowed the beginning tail of yarn when I pulled it off.  So of course I thought I’d just yank it back out again, and somehow it came out the bottom end in a tangle that refused to pull free of the center. I rewound it from the outside, the last 100 yards or so by hand onto the excessively giant ball.

Now I feel compelled to find the perfect stitch pattern to make it all worthwhile. Meanwhile, back to my last, tiny, manageable 200 yard ball of Canopy fingering:

BIG yarn and baby | The Knitting Vortex