Thursday, January 10, 2008

Christmas Scarves and My Little Helper

The infamous gift scarves! Actually, there's nothing infamous about them. These are just two scarves, modeled by their recipients, that I made in December for two female relatives. The light blue started out as a straight garter stitch, but the yarn was a pain to work with, so I frogged and started doing it in the round so that I only had to knit, not purl. I realized a couple dozen rows in that this scarf was going to be far too thick for Arizona and that I might run out of yarn. So, I got creative. I think the Yarn Harlot would be proud.

I stopped working in the round by reversing at the end of one rotation and then decreased a stitch at the end of the row. Repeat back and forth until you have a flat panel half the width of the loom and you get a scarf end with a tube and a V-shaped opening. What I did then is knit garter stitch to the end of the skein, repeat the same procedure to create another short tube and length of scarf of about the same size, and seam them together roughly in the middle. Finally, I seamed up the end of those tubes so I'd made a scarf with pockets. I would actually do this again if I was going to make another scarf - for an impromptu fix it worked out really well. She dug the pockets, and I certainly didn't tell her they weren't part of the plan.

The other scarf suffered a similar glitch of a different nature. I was using Lion Brand Homespun to make a chevron pattern, which is really a waste of neat stitches since you can't see them in the yarn. I got about 20-25 rows in (I wasn't counting since I planned to do the same pattern for as long as it took) when I realized I wasn't going tob able to finish these in time for Christmas. I needed help. (As it ended up, we were still knitting on Christmas.) Well, my husband isn't a knitter; the chevrons would have been too complicated for him, so I had him knit about half of the scarf in a wide rib pattern, then I made the other end approximately the same squirrelly series of chevrons, and seamed it up. The result? A scarf that looks vaguely frilly on the ends, which is nice enough I guess.

Now I am trying to finish up my Calla Lily bag but struggling to spend as much time as I'd like given that classes started this week. I got a lot done last night despite thanks to My Little Helper, pictured here in a poorly lit shot. :) Fortunately, I'm only 15 rows from the end of the strap, which is my last section, and then the seaming will begin! That's going to take a long time - there are eight 70-stitch seams to attach the four panels to the strap. And then - the last step - I have to felt it.

I'll take progress shots and share the whole thing with you and my Ravelry buddies as soon as I can - hopefully over the weekend. Happy Friday!

1 comment:

Turtle said...

Hey Jeanne, I saw your post on another blog and wanted to say hi. I did not eat meat for 30 years, all of those years living in a mixed eating household (vegans vs carni's) Usually i was also in charge of the cooking. I found that any recipe i chose i would cook as directed and cook the meat separately...soups, casseroles, stir fries, etc. The meat can be added to the individual person's plate and mixed in from there. Plus you can buy the bags of meat pre frozen...the bags of chx tenderloins, etc are so easy to use. Little prep for you, simply stick in a pan and bake, they can then be chopped, etc and you didn't really have to touch them either...and healthier than processed/boxed food. I do now eat a little meat here and there (my irish hubby happy with this) but for the first 14 years of marriage i cooked this way.