My Birthday-Worthy Cowl!

My Mum gave me this lovely, unusual yarn for my birthday.

Actually she gave me two and I so wanted to do them justice! They are so beautifully PINK, in such a delicate, understated way (except for the white ball of course) and my Mum really loves pink! So to do honour to her obvious good taste I wanted to make something that the play of different textures wouldn't get lost in.

At our local post office/gift store they are selling these lovely long cowls, the sort you can loop over your neck again to make a short cowl and I was pretty sure it was in a kind of flat brioche stitch. 

I've only relatively recently made the acquaintance with this lovely stitch and my first excursion into that terrain had been in the round with a hat. 

This was quite different. But I thought this particular pattern was just what I was looking for so, nothing daunted, I grabbed my yarny gift and extra yarn to provide a little contrast to the lovely Casoria’s pinkness and headed off… 

...only to stop because I couldn't for the life of me understand the written instructions. I couldn't wrap my head around how the stripes were to be done and it wasn't until I finally found Verdigris’ tutorial that I finally got my head around it! 

When I was doing Brioche in the round I was used to working one set of stitches all around and on the second sweep, doing the alternate stitches. But when doing it flat of course you knit the first set of stitches and then purl the same set. You only start the alternates in the next knit and purl rows. 

Since the “ball” of Casoria actually consists of four “mini-balls” I knit two of the fluffier yarns with the bulky Twilley’s Capricorn Bulky and the two smoother balls with the silkier Sirdar Spree.

 In retrospect, this wasn't the best use of the yarns properties but I was winging it and I only figured it out when I looked at the finished product. Hey, I have another ball left of Casoria. I can always try again! 

The hardest part at the end was undoing the provisional cast on I’d done (you can see it just at the bottom of the picture here) and doing the three-needle bind off. There seemed to be loops going off everywhere! In the end I just bound off with a haste born of desperation and made sure I had no stitches or things that looked like stitches hanging loose! 

I am very pleased with the results. It definitely qualifies as a worthy project for my Birthday-yarn. It is a very striking and relatively simple knit, once you get the hang of it. I can see me making a few more of these. I did cast on 15 stitches instead of the 13 recommended in the pattern but I think I’d even double that if I did it again! Now if only it was cold enough here to wear it!!

See you all next time :)

Today is My Birthday!!

And I've had a lovely day! My presents all came by post so I've been extra good and saved opening them for today...and that was hard since I knew what two of them were! I've been mooning over this box for over a week!

So, after trying to sleep in and failing thanks to sore shoulders and leg I gave up and started opening my pressies!

The first one - from my Mum!

She loves me and understands my addictions so she got me an Australian Galah cross stitch kit, two balls of novelty yarn from Spotlight that feel and look wonderful, a memory and charms necklace and a memo book with a pen. Really looking forward to making something nice with the yarn!

The second one is from Me, really. I have this pattern in one of my magazines, The Knitter with a wonderful pattern for a fair isle vest in lovely colours. So I ordered the yarn kit from Jamieson and Smith - Shetland Wool Brokers Ltd.

I'm kind of nervous now. The pattern has all the traditional attributes of fair isle, the stranded colour-work, corrugated rib and steeks and everything! But I'm going to put it aside until I've finished everything else I've got going. Even the cross stitching might have to take a back seat! But I'm really excited to actually do a honest-to-goodness Shetland Island item with the proper wool!

And lastly, another present to myself.

I've always loved the Anne of Green Gables collection but I've never had a chance to read all through the series in the proper order. I only had the first book and I've read the others at different times I think through library loans but I really wanted the whole set so I could go through the journey properly...and now I can! They look so cute and their in their own box and everything!

Everyone I loved rang and wished me happy birthday, and Hubbie bought me chips for lunch (in a little town like this, you're grateful for any take away food you can get and I love chips!) and all in all it was a lovely pleasant day. I am so blessed and days like today remind me that I have so much to thank God and those he's placed around me for. Sigh...

Oh well, another year passes by and time marches on. See you all later :)