Sunday, February 12, 2012

Cowl Mania~

At any given time I usually have at least 5-6 projects on the needles. Great plan for an easily distracted knitter, because my mood and situation determine what I can knit...

There are those projects that take serious brain involvement, and they are my favorite. Original designs, or complicated modifications to sweater designs... Right now I have two sweaters on the needles, but neither are visually exciting enough to photograph... they resemble blobs of knit fabric right now... I am taking copious notes and will share them with you once they are more photogenic.

My most frequent go-to quick knit right now is the cowl.
Pattern is the Dragonfly Fire Cowl by Mia Valcarcel~  (Here is the Ravelry Link)

I think I have made about 10 of these (not all shown here), they make awesome gifts!
For a man version I eliminated the yarn over rounds, making them plain stockinette except for the edges.

The pattern calls for double stranded fingering weight sock yarn, which is perfect for those of us who are not fans of knitting socks. Gives us a great reason to buy yummy sock yarn!
I have also used a straight worsted, which makes a more fluid fabric cowl, but works up beautifully, especially in a painted yarn.

Details following each picture... click image to see a larger version~

Red Cowl (Ravelry Link)
Red Cowl is knit from yarn by The Alpaca Yarn Co.~ Paca-Ped fingering weight sock yarn...
this skein is one of their one-of semi-solids. 

Liz's Cowl (Ravelry Link)
Liz's Cowl is also knit from yarn by The Alpaca Yarn Co.~ Paca-Ped fingering weight sock yarn...
this skein is also one of their one-of semi-solids. 


Purple Alpaca Cowl (Ravelry Link)
This cowl is thick as it was knit from worsted weight alpaca by Debbie Stoller (Stitch n' Bitch yarn)
I only cast on 80 st for this cowl and used a size 9 needle.

This was the first cowl I made using this pattern.

Knit from Miss Babs Superwash Sock yarn in "jazz club"

Last is the Silk Tree Cowl (Ravelry Link)
I am beyond in love with this color way, but alas, sigh... it is no more.
A one-of batch from Miss Babs and I only ordered one. doh!
Yowza! What a Skein worsted yarn by MissBabs.com~
Used about a third of a skein... Yowza's are huge- 560 yards per skein.


Phew!
That is all for now...

This photo is entitled "My Mom Knits".. haha
Ann is wearing the Red Cowl and Eve the Purple Alpaca Cowl~


I think my next cowl will be knit from handspun that I have in my stash~ yum.

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