Knitting

SHARING SOME CRAFT WORK

I have been pursuing my art interests during the hiatus in posts. But something else I have been doing is a little knitting.

I more or less stopped knitting several years ago partly because I have arthritis in my wrists and partly because I was putting all my time into the art course at The Learning Connexion.

In the past year, though, I have taken up my needles and knitted some small projects-- several pairs of two needle bed socks, finished a small child's cardigan I had started 5 years ago, and four scarves.

Three of the scarves were knitted from that novelty ribbon type yarn that gives you a ruffled scarf while the fourth was from cotton yarn.

I scanned the scarf. On the right I stretched it so you could see the stitches

I was quite pleased with the fourth scarf and am giving you the pattern that I devised.

Sparkle Scarf

This is a long scarf in black, grey and a paler grey yarn with sequins.

You need 1x fifty gram ball each of black cotton, grey cotton and paler grey and silver novelty yarn.  My knitting cotton was a cotton and acrylic mix.

Use a 5 mm circular needle. Mine has bamboo ends so the slithery yarn didn't slip off.

The finished scarf was 180 cm long and about 6 cm wide. Cast on more stitches if you want a longer scarf. You will have enough yarn to do this.

The scarf is very simple to make as it is all in knit stitch. The four rows of knit 2 together and yarn overs, to make the scarf slightly lacy, are the only parts you need to pay attention to. The only other point to note is that when knitting some rows you start from the opposite end, easy to do when you are using circular needles.

Using black cast on loosely 180 stitches,

1  black, knit to end of row, turn

2  black, knit to end of row

3  grey, start from opposite end, knit 4, (K2tog, yarn over) repeat to last 4 stitches, knit 4, turn

4  grey, knit all the stitches and yarn overs to end of row

5  fancy yarn, start from the opposite end, knit to end, turn

6  fancy yarn, knit to end

7  black, knit to end, turn

8  black, knit to end

9  grey, start at opposite end, knit 4, (K2tog, yarn over) repeat to last 4 stitches, knit 4, turn

10 grey, knit all the stitches and yarn overs to end of row

11  fancy yarn, start at opposite end, knit to end, turn

12, 13, 14 fancy yarn, knit to end of row, turn

15  grey, start at the opposite end, knit to end of row, turn

16  grey, knit to end of row

17  black, start at opposite end, knit 4, (K2tog, yarn over) repeat to last 4 stitches, knit 4, turn

18  black, knit to end, turn

19  fancy yarn, knit to end, turn

20  fancy yarn, knit to end

21  grey, start at opposite end, knit to end of row, turn

22  grey, knit to end of row

23  black, start at opposite end, (K2tog, yarn over) repeat to last 4 stitches, knit 4, turn

24  black, knit to end

Cast off very loosely using the black yarn

If you twist the yarns at the ends each time you change colour you can carry them along so the ends of the scarf are very neat.

Use a bodkin (a special wool needle) or a crochet hook to work the ends of the yarns in so they are secure and cannot be seen.

The ends of the scarf could be finished with a fringe.