Cozy Wool Mount Canada

A friend of mine has a lovely fair isle cowl from Poland, and was looking for a hat to compliment it. I've mostly been working in bulky lately, so found this pattern and thought it would look nice with it!

There's no sizing on the hat, so I decided to actually check my gauge. Good thing I did, because it was way off!

The pattern called for size US 10 needles. My four inch swatch was only three inches. So I tried size US 11 needles. My swatch was four inches wide, but way too tall. US 10.5 was just about right, four inches wide, and only one row over on the height. I NEVER check my gauge. Maybe I should try to do that more often..... I know I have a sweater project coming up (just bought some lovely yarn), so I'll definitely swatch that. How much would it stink to get through a whole sweater and not have it fit!

Knit this flat, because that seemed to be what the pattern called for, and when you knit fair isle in the round, there's always that weird place where the pattern doesn't quite meet up.

I hadn't knit fair isle in a long time, so that was another reason it was good to swatch. Got me back into the swing of two-stranded knitting.

Knit with Size US 10.5 needles and Loops & Threads Cozy Wool, MC Black, Color A Claret, Color B Fleece.

 

 

Mizrahi V Shawl

This is a Christmas stashbuster. Using up some yarn AND taking care of a friend's Christmas present.

I thought the V Shawl pattern by Lionbrand looked cute, so I looked through my stash for something to use. Actually, more accurately, I saw two skeins of Premier Yarns Isaac Mizrahi Craft Lexington in Gramercy Park sitting on top of my one of my stash bins, and decided to use it.

I wanted more of a V Scarf instead of a V Shawl, though, and also didn't have much yarn, so initially cast on 36 stitches. I decided that was too wide, ripped it out, and started again with 20.

I quickly discovered that two skeins wasn't going to go anywhere near as far as I wanted it to, so, after finishing the first skein of Mizrahi, switched to an orange ball of Big Twist Yarns Natural Blend Solids. I picked a bunch of this up on sale, so it's just laying around everywhere. I think that's why I'm having such a run of bulky projects with it right now.... Makes sense, right?

I realized about a foot and a half in that I had royally messed up the slipped stitches (I know how to slip stitches! How did this happen?). The friend I knit with hates seeing me tear stuff out, so convinced me to just keep going. So I shall be intentionally making the same mistake over and over again for many more feet......

Before I ran out of the first skein of Mizrahi, I made a tassle and attached it to the point. I'll do the same with the second skein once the sides are the same length.

Once I got a ways into the scarf, I decided I liked the look of the bias and would just knit it straight without the V, and leave it as a straight scarf. So I didn't really follow the pattern.... More borrowed from it.... What with my mistake..... And not reversing the direction. Oh well. I think it turned out nice. And then I put it down for a while, picked it up again, read my stitches wrong, and started on the V after all! Oh well!

Hopefully friendly friend likes it!

Knit with Size US 15, 2 skeins of Premier Yarns Isaac Mizrahi Craft Lexington in colorway Gramercy Park, and 0.5 skein of Big Twist Yarns Natural Blend Solids in orange (don't know the exact name of the colorway!). 31 inches from end to end.

"Seamless" Super Nova Ribbed Cowl

This was a quick, easy project, just 26 stitches in a 1x1 rib. I think my needles were a little too big because the ribbing was a little loose. I have another skein of the yarn in another colorway, so I'll go down a needle size or two on the next one.

The width is about right, but if I'm using smaller needles I might make the next one a bit wider.

I used a provisional cast on and a ribbed three needle bind off. I was going to use ribbed kitchener stitch, but I got intimidated by the directions, and got sick of the project sitting unfinished on my coffee table.

I think my length might be a little long on this one. It doesn't snug up to the neck the way I want it to. I will have to ponder over this.

I also took a chance and did the bind off with US 10.5 needles, because the weave was so stretchy and loose. Seems to have worked.

Next time, I will also make it taller so that it can double as a hood.

This cowl was knit on size 11 needles, bound off with 10.5 and used a full skein of Red Heart Stellar in colorway Nova. The finished measurements are 28" circumference by 10" tall.