Not surprisingly, I got in a pinch with my Christmas knitting this past Christmas. I wanted to make some knitted gifts for a few lovely ladies and time was running out. What I needed to find was a simple, easily memorized pattern using one skein of variegated sock yarn. The quest began by looking through my many books and magazines, as well as the Ravelry patterns database.  In the book Scarf Style edited by Pam Allen,  I found a pattern called Misty Garden. It is a 4 row pattern, basically Knit the first row, Purl the second row, 3rd row has the pattern K2 tog x 3 times, YO, K1 x 6 times, K2 tog x 3 times and repeat, Knit the last row.

Easy peasy! I came to realize that this stitch pattern is also known as Old Shale, or the Feather & Fan stitch pattern. I started with one scarf, and managed to get six of these done in time for Christmas!

I love this pattern! When I started my scarf #2 for the 11 shawls in 2011, I saw the Multnomah shawl, and loved the way gradient dyed yarn looked in this shawl. Thus, I started Multonomah Makes Two on January 15th and completed it on January 27th. The shawl is a top down knit shawl, and the beginning is basically done in garter stitch. When I got to the lace portion of the shawl, low and behold the pattern was the feather and fan pattern!

I finally got it blocked and finished:

I loved knitting this shawl. The only drag was the Crazy Zauberball yarn which I ranted about a few posts back. (I really disliked the way the yarn went from thick to super-thin cob weight). All in all, I love the effect of the gradient colour, and I didn’t even have to use a lifeline! A first for me when knitting a shawl.

I would certainly knit up another, or several more Multnomah Shawls. I would love to try it with variegated yarn, and other yarns that gradually change colour.

I just picked up this terrific yarn on a Ravelry destash:

This yarn is from Unique Sheep, it’s Luxe a 25% Tussah Silk, 75% Merino Wool super soft blend. There is a total of 400 yds, with four X 100 yds of gradually darkening colourway of green called Herb Garden.

I’m not sure if I would want to knit another Multonomah with this, I’m thinking maybe Citron Shawl designed by Hilary Smith Callis, and found free at Knitty.

However, I definitely want to knit another Multnomah, and I may even be brave and give another Zauberball a go. I also have some Knit Picks new Chroma yarn, which I think will knit up somewhat like Zauberball. Noro Silk Garden would also be nice.

Over the weekend I started and finished my Skiing Piggie, or Pigtail hat:

This is my new favourite X-country skiing hat!! The Dream in Color Groovy yarn is super soft.

I plan to knit a matching pair of mittens with this.

On another note, received an email shipment confirmation from Woolgirl last night for the Victorian Writer’s Knitting Club. The theme for this first kit is all about Sherlock Holmes and I’ve been reading  The Sign of Four along with a Rav group in anticipation of this kit. The dyer is Zen Yarn Garden and the designer is Anne Hanson. The project will be socks. Really looking forward to getting this!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 8th, 2011 at 10:47 am and is filed under Finished Knits. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.