While we’re waiting for our yarn and other stuff to arrive and while it’s about a zillion degrees outside, I’ve been working on a few knitting projects. I’m about over the “Fair Isle sweater debacle of 2011”, but I’m not quite ready for more colorwork. Besides, I need to make things for display in the shop.
This is a Mobius scarf that I made from some yarn from local sheep. (No, we haven’t gotten our yarn back from the mill. I bought this skein from the woman who owns the sheep a couple of months ago.) The technique isn’t hard once you learn to do the cast-on and it’s really quite fun. This one is probably going to be a model in the shop for a while, but I may confiscate it or knit another one for myself since my current scarf, while also a really cool Mobius, is made from a cotton blend yarn. Up here in the Great White North, a wool scarf is definitely a good idea come wintertime!
The Mobius scarf is a circle with a half-twist in it. Some people have called them Infinity scarves since there’s no end to it. The rows of stitches are also longitudinal in the Mobius scarf instead of horizontal as in most other kinds of scarves.
When we were at camp, I was working on some bookmarks out of cotton crochet thread, and one of them used a stitch pattern that is a variation of brioche stitch. A few days ago, I looked up how to do two-color brioche rib stitch. It was a little tricky to learn and I had to rip it out a couple of times, but I’ve finally got the hang of it. And it’s totally addicting!! I like how the two sides are different colors. I’m making this with Cascade 220 worsted weight wool in black and red, the colors of the local high school, so it will fit in nicely with our first window display.
My current project for decorating The Knitting Nest is a knitted and felted “nest” (aka bowl). I came across a free Ravelry pattern that uses the Mobius technique for the rim of the bowl that I’ve modified to use with worsted weight yarn. I’m using a bunch of leftover earth tone colors from different brands of yarn. I hope that it ends up looking kind of irregular, like you’d expect a bird’s nest to look. When it’s done, we’ll put some stuffed birds into it for a shop decoration.
The picture is of the rim of the bowl. It is knit with the basic Mobius technique but instead of having 1/2 a twist, the pattern had me put in two more full twists (or 4 half-twists) for a total of five half twists. Now I need to pick up stitches around the rim to knit the body of the bowl. The twists are supposed to be equally spaced so that it looks like flower petals. So far, I’ve done the picking up stitches twice and ripped it out both times. Deep sigh. I think this will look great when I’m done, but it may be a challenge until them.
I’m also working on a pair of socks for my daughter made from some KnitPicks wool. And, I’m making a pair of socks using the “two at a time socks on one circular needle” for the shop using Heritage Paint sock yarn from Cascade. Pictures of those projects to be posted later.
What are you working on? Anything fun and exciting? The Weyauwega Fiber Arts Circle meets Thursday night at 6pm for crafting at The Coffee Klatsch in Weyauwega. You are welcome to come and bring whatever you are currently working on!!
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