Renew - the struggle

Rowan Renew

I bought this yarn because I liked the colours and the concept (it's mainly recycled wool), but I just don't seem to be able to make anything with it that I like. I've tried out about 10 different stitches and nothing seems to work as a scarf.

I have seen a short jacket called cyclamen and that looks good, so maybe I should use fisherman's rib, but then what about edge stitches?

Anybody got any ideas? Because despite it all, I still really like the wool.

January - a month for colour

Here in Northern Europe, January tends to be a long, grey month, so I thought I might try to counteract that by posting a "colour" picture every day (or as many days as possible).

More sweets ... these are a Belgian speciality known as "cuberdons" - they are hard on the outside and have soft centres ... and are very, very sweet. They come in range of fruit flavours.  



p.s. If you have good eyesight or can zoom in, you might get a chuckle out of the translation of "Fruits des bois" (fruits of the forest) as Fruit woods. If that sort of thing makes you smile and you haven't already read Lost in Translation: Misadventures of English Abroad by Charlie Croker, you might like to take a look at it.

Colour is all around us...

I emptied the oranges out of my new bowl so I could take photos for my ravelry stash.

Then I plonked the yarns down to wait for their turn in the bowl ...  

Instant still life!

My turn!

Colour inspiration ?

Possible colours for Ispira Cowl by Celery Stalk ? Take a look

for more colour and inspiration.

Time to Go To something else?

After 9 Go To Scarves it may be time to move on...

Katia Azteca - Dr. Who?

It all started with Lydia asking for a long, wide chunky scarf using some Lang Mille Colori Big I already had - this resulted in The Lydia. It's about 30 cm wide and over 2m long!! And weighs 400grams, but is fantastic on a tall trendy young woman.
 

Lang Mille Colori Big - The Lydia

 In fact, I originally found the stitch in someone's notes, but I find it fun to link to a pattern on ravelry and then see what others knit or have knitted with the same pattern, so I linked to this one:

Pattern link: The Go To Scarf.
Ravelry link: Ravelry The Go To Scarf page

It's a great knit - the same on both sides so you don't even have to think about whether you are on the RS or WS - just turn and go... I slipped the first stitch on every row to make a smoother edge.

I don't think I could have made so many if it hadn't been for all the variations I tried - different yarns, different colourways all produced very different results. Some a big longer, some a bit wider...

All of the scarves can be found on my ravelry projects page. The photo captions here indicate the name of the yarn used and the name of the scarf on the projects page.

Mille Colori Big - City Lights

Lang West - you can get a reasonable scarf out of 3 skeins (approx. 22 x 160cm) - 150 g.
Lang Mille Colori Big - you can get a good scarf out of 1.5 skeins, but a huge one if you use the full 2 skeins. However, it's pretty heavy at 400g. And also the most expensive version.
Katia Azteca - this works out very well with 2 skeins - 200g. The shading of Azteca is particularly well suited to a scarf like this.


Katia Azteca  - Cranberry Sauce



Lang West - Hidden Gem

 

Katia Azteca - Ice Maiden




Lang West - Northern Lights



Katia Azteca - Amethyst





Azteca the wool ...

 



But now it's time to move on - so it's back to lace for me now.

Seagrass Horseshoe Lace











Red scarves in Paris - Darling!



Red scarves in Paris



Graffiti near Nation - Darling!



More graffiti near Nation - with red scarf, darling!


 

Happy New Year

I hope that this will be a very happy new year for everyone - with lots of joy from making, wearing and sharing stitches.