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.

i was told we'd cruise the seas for american gold

IMG_8049, originally uploaded by pirateygoodness.

OMGOMGOMG, this is my sweater, just before I bound off for the body. I am so excited about it. It definitely needs some serious-business blocking, as you can tell by the ridiculous, knobbly knitting (I swear, that’s the yarn), but I’ve tried it on multiple times and it totally fits (or will, once it’s blocked and has buttons) and I love the purple and grey together, and like. Basically, this is a very exciting time for me and this yarn. We have worked out our differences and things are going okay.

Please note my kitten on the left. It’s okay to go “aww.”

I’ve been pushing myself to finish the body of this sweater, mostly because I need the 4mm circular for another project that I get to start tonight. I am taking the train to Nova Scotia (26 hours!) on Friday, and I’ll be there for a couple weeks. I’m also trying to do the entire trip with only a backpack, so I’m packing up my needles and a skein of SRK On Your Toes Bamboo to gift-knit an Ishbel, which is infinitely more portable than five skeins of Lorna’s Laces and a fluffy worsted-weight sweater. I probably won’t be posting until after I get back, so – until then!

Song of the Entry: the first three verses of Barrett’s Privateers (Listen)

you're the only one that keeps me singing – la la la

IMG_8038, originally uploaded by pirateygoodness.

First things first: I am knitting my Garter Yoke Cardi like it’s my job and oh man it’s going so well. I am trying really really hard to get through this while it’s still hovering below 20 degrees outside and I can stand to have a giant sweater sitting in my lap, so we’ll see how I do. (I’m also sort of rushing because I hate purling, and once I finish the body I don’t have to purl again for the rest of the sweater, can’t wait.)

This is going way better than my original attempt with this yarn. I’ve tried it on a few times, and it looks like it’ll fit once I block it a little, and the waist shaping works for someone with my short torso, and like. I’m just very pleased with myself, basically. (Even if this is a pretty awful picture of the sweater-in-progress. Apologies.)

Next on the agenda: I did the TTC Knitalong this weekend. There are much better pictures at Glenna’s blog, here, but basically we took the TTC to a bunch of yarn shops and knit on the streetcar and it was a lot more fun than I thought it would be. I met amazing people, saw some stores I wouldn’t normally have made the trek to visit, and I also bought some yarn! (Not a lot, just a little bit.) Most importantly, I bought this yarn:

Three skeins of Cascade Eco Wool, plus a copy of The Opinionated Knitter, because garter stitch is calming and mindless and I want nothing more than to spend September to December of this year knitting myself a grown-up sized Tomten sweater coat.

Song of the Entry: Ashley Tisdale – Hair (shh – don’t tell)