18-second giant cowl thing

I have to say I’m not usually a big fan of big yarn.  The skein takes up too much room; the needles are unwieldy; and from a purely economical perspective, there’s proportionately less knitting entertainment per penny spent!  But even I have my moments of Big Yarn Love, and a convergence of circumstances brought me to break from my wont and wield the unwieldy.

First of all, I always have the hardest time settling on what to knit while traveling.  At home, I usually have three or four projects on the go (we call these WIPs in the industry: Works In Progress), and I work on them as fancy and necessity prescribe.  When I’m packing for a trip, though, I can’t just cram all my projects into carry-on luggage if I have any intention of changing my clothes while I’m gone.  This led me not to pack any knitting at all.  On my way to a knitting convention.  Can you believe it?  What was I thinking?  I really did intend to bring a set of size 5 needles, which is one of my standby sizes, but I guess it slipped my mind.

After languishing around in booth 923 and moaning at poor Joelle about how I had nothing to knit (mental image for you: I was standing in a booth filled with beautiful yarn, and even some spare needles), I decided to meander around the marketplace.  In my first walk-through, I passed the Romney Ridge Farm booth, a booth just brimming with color, a booth framed by a stand of seriously bulky yarn. I glanced at that bulky yarn and went on my way.  (FYI “Romney” is a breed of sheep, folks; does this look like a political blog?)

But that yarn just kept popping up in my head.  Those pretty colors, that half-inch thick single ply of wooly alpaca naturally-dyed goodness.  Raised in Maine, no less.  So I went back the next day and snagged the last skein of the ‘blush’ color — a really light pink dyed over a grey base, so it looks kind of muddy-in-a-cool-way.  I also picked up a skein of a deep goldenrod worsted weight wool, and I had a plan.

I bought a set of chunky needles from a neighboring booth, wound up my yarn, did a couple of practice swatches, and set my plan in motion.  The result is grand!

It’s kind of a cowl and kind of a wrap.  Depends how you wear it.

other-side-out:

unsightly seam there; am experimenting with design elements to hide it.

As soon as I had cast off my stitches, I passed my needles over to Joelle, who whipped out a longer, narrower version in about 18 seconds.

I don’t suppose you knitters out there would like the pattern?

18-Second Giant Cowl Thing

Materials

• 50-80 yards of something HUGE & WOOLY, such as Romney Ridge Bulky
• 200-250 yards of something worsted weight and single ply (because it looks so cool when you hold it double)
• Big ol’ needles: 24″ or 32″ circulars in size 13 or 15

Here’s How:

For my pink and gold cowl:

• Using long-tail cast on and bulky yarn CO 80 sts
• Being careful not to twist, join and knit 1 round
• 1. Let the bulky yarn wait at the beginning of the round, then holding 2 strands of worsted weight yarn together, work 2 garter ridges: *knit 1 round, purl 1 round* and repeat between * *
• 2. Let the worsted weight yarn rest and knit 1 round with the bulky
• Repeat steps 1. and 2. until you’re about to run out of yarn (I got 9 sets of garter ridges before I ran out of gold, and only used half of the pink)
• Bind off loosely using the bulky yarn.  Weave in ends and put it on!

For Joelle’s green and green cowl:

• Using long-tail cast on and bulky yarn CO 120 sts
• Being careful not to twist, join and knit 1 round
• 1. Let the bulky yarn wait at the beginning of the round, then holding 2 strands of worsted weight yarn together, work 2 garter ridges: *knit 1 round, purl 1 round* and repeat between * *
• 2. Let the worsted weight yarn rest and knit 2 rounds with the bulky yarn
• 3. With worsted weight, work 1 garter ridge: knit 1 round, purl 1 round
• 4. Let the worsted weight yarn rest and knit 2 rounds with the bulky yarn
• Repeat steps 1. through 4. three times, then steps 1. and 2. once more.
• Bind off loosely using the bulky yarn.  Weave in ends and put it on!

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