Becoming a habit..

Remember when I'd almost finished Olivia, and I ran out of yarn?

I was lucky, I went to work and there was one lonely skein in the right dyelot just waiting for me.

It's becoming a habit, and I've not been quite so lucky again. I mentioned a couple of posts back that I'd started a Lily cardigan. It's looking good, coming along nicely.

Awesome right? I thought so. Then I realised that I was using yarn at an alarming rate. I weighed the yarn, then did two rows and weighed the yarn again. It's not going to happen.

I purchased it from the Wagtail Yarns farm, and I'm not sure if it's 80/20 or 60/40 blend. I've emailed Wagtail and will have to wait and see if they can identify it so that I can get some more.

Into the naughty corner with Lily.

And so I cast on a Dollheid hat. It's been a while since I did some colourwork, and I'd forgotten how much I enjoy it.
It uses a gorgeous icord cast on.

Followed by corrugated ribbing.

I'm using Jamiesons Shetland Spindrift in Natural White, Blossom and Raspberry. And I'm nearly done, only about 16 rounds to go!

But guess what?

Yup. I'm out of the Natural White. I got the yarn at Loop, and they're out of stock for a few weeks.

Into the naughty corner with Dollheid, too! Things happen in threes, right? I'll be all good if I start something else, surely!

The easy lace cowl

I love it when an easy project flies off the needles, is wonderfully wearable and easy to boot. Love it.

Such was the Easy Lace Cowl. I decided I needed a cowl. Didn't really find anything that was what I was looking for. So I made one up. Easy stitch pattern, rough guesstimate of numbers, off I went.

And I promise that it's easy! a simple six stitch, four row repeat. And two of those rows are plain knit rows.

Specs:
Pattern: Easy Lace Cowl (by me!) You can get it for free from Ravelry here.
Yarn: Rowan Wool Cotton DK in "Misty" from Calico & Ivy, 3 balls.
Needles: I used 4mm, which means that everyone else should probably go with 4.5mm.

The finished cowl is 23cm wide and 130cm long. Goes twice around my neck nicely!

I'm really happy with this! The only stitches you'll need to know are Knit, purl, yarn over and a centred double decrease, which is much easier than it sounds. It's worked over three stitches, and you just slip 2 stitches together as if you're going to do a knit-2-together, then K1, and then pass the two slipped stitches together over the Knit 1.

It makes a lovely pattern that looks harder than it is.

You can find the pattern for free on Ravelry - Easy Lace Cowl pattern