Pattern: Solitaire

Guys, I’m so, so excited about this. I’ve written my first legitimate grown-up pattern: Solitaire, a worsted weight cowl knit from end to end and seamed.

The idea for this cowl started in the winter, when my local yarn shop got a huge shipment of SweetGeorgia. It was absolutely beautiful, and I knew instantly that I wanted a bright, squishy scarf made out of it. But at the time, I really only felt like I could justify buying one skein, and I couldn’t find anything like what I wanted to make on Ravelry.

Basically, one thing led to another, and I ended up knitting this cowl, which was the prototype for Solitaire. It’s SweetGeorgia Superwash Worsted in “Boheme,” and very pink. Naturally, I love it.

When I decided to write this up as a real pattern, I had to knit a second version that would photograph a little better – the SweetGeorgia version is gorgeous, but the variegation hides the stitch pattern more than I’d like. The green cowl was done in Cascade 220 from my stash, and photographs much more nicely.

Solitare is available for $2.50 US, as a Ravelry PDF download.

fo: holding hands, feeding ducks cowl

My entire Halloween weekend was, unfortunately, pretty unremarkable. I had other things that needed to get prioritized over dressing up and acting like an idiot (which is a shame, because that is my favourite). I did, however, cast on and cast off for something new.

IT’S AN UGLY TUBE!

Just kidding. Okay, well – it is a tube. But it’s not anywhere near as boring as it looks in that picture. If you arrange it right, it can look like this:

Or like this.

Which I think is much, much nicer. This cowl is based on the stitch pattern from the Holding Hands, Feeding Ducks scarf, one of those patterns that I’ve always loved but never found time to knit. It’s also dead easy to turn into a cowl, and leaves a fabric that’s really springy and dense, but doesn’t curl (even though it looks very stockinette-y).

Pattern: Cowl modified from Holding Hands, Feeding Ducks
Yarn: Nearly a skein of Lorna’s Laces Shepherd Worsted, in Pewter.
Needles: 5.5mm

Directions: The pattern calls for a multiple of 4 sts plus one, so I cast on 41 stitches using the long-tail cast-on and leaving a VERY long tail, on purpose. This made my scarf about 8″ wide, unblocked.

Then I worked in the star stitch pattern established in HH,FD for 25 inches, give or take. I was going for a big, floppy cowl, not a nice, tight neckwarmer. If you wanted to make one of those, though, you could just knit for fewer inches.

Then, I stopped (ending on a knit row), but did not bind off – I left my work on a holder. Using the tail from my cast on, I picked up 41 sitches at the cast-on edge of my work, and then I believe I had to knit a row so that the working yarn was on the same side of the work when I held them both together. Finally, using the tail from my cast-on (but you could also break the working yarn if your tail wasn’t long enough) I grafted the two ends together.

This left me with a big, floppy tube. I blocked it out a little, so that the finished dimensions ended up being closer to 9 inches wide and 23 inches long (11.5 inches with the ends grafted together). It’s so, so squishy, and perfect for throwing on when it’s chilly out, but I don’t want to carry a scarf around indoors all day.