spring knitting

Quite a while ago, my mom found a lot of red merino wool yarn at an estate sale, and she bought all of it for me! At fifty cents a skein, it wasn't a bad price. I've been enjoying making things out of it - here's the most recent project!

It's a spiral-y, ruffly scarf. It's light and airy, but still warm - just right for spring! I found the pattern on Lion Brand's website. It's called the Spiral 'Ruffled' Scarf. They recommend using a thicker yarn for most of the project, and then switching to mohair for just the outside edge of the ruffle. However, I used mohair for the entire project, making it a much lighter weight scarf!

Here's the ruffle scarf, folded in half, with the ends tucked through the loop!

The construction of a ruffle in knitting is really ingenious. For this one, at least, you cast on 100 stitches - this is the length of the scarf, rather than the width. Then, increases are made by yarn overs (abbreviated yo) for ever stitch in the first row, doubling the stitches. The stitches are doubled twice more for about 800 stitches! The rapid increases make the fabric appear to ruffle as it spirals on itself. Neat! I like the pretty pattern that is created by the yo - lots of lacy eyelets in the fabric.