Work in Progress - December 2021

After lots of finished projects in November, there's only one ta-dah moment this month and my WiPs are now packed away in a box.

Like last December the coffee table has been stored away so I can comfortably fit a Christmas tree into the living room. So I'm hoping that I will have lots of finished projects in January 2022 like there was in January 2021.

So... the no progress projects first. I've not touched my Sami jumper or any of my multiple cowls. 

But I have been working on the Myssoni Shawl.

Myssoni is an asymmetrical shawl designed by Susan Ashcroft. I'm using Crazy Zauberball in shade 1660.

You can buy the Myssoni pattern on Ravelry.

I finally added my Colour Block Shawl to the Gallery along with a new free pattern and new yarn kits.

This has been finished for ages. First making an appearance in August WiPs.

You can read all about here. It was delayed as I wanted to include the free shawl pattern with our scarf yarn kit.

They both use 4 balls of Rowan Alpaca Soft, so with one yarn kit you get a choice from 2 projects. Obviously I'm now working on a third pattern - a Colour Block Wrap. 👇

The Wrap is a version of our Simple Shawl, a free pattern that uses 4ply yarn.

I think with 4 balls of squishy Rowan Alpaca Soft DK it'll come out nice and big.

So... the Colour Block Scarf is a scarf because it's a long and thin asymmetrical triangle.

The Colour Block Shawl is a traditional triangle shawl shape.

And this new Colour Block Wrap will be very long crescent shape.

Confused? Well... they can all be classed as things that go around your neck, if that makes it easy 😆.

There's another new cast on. An impulse cast on inspired by a new shade in Fyberspates Vivacious 4ply - Coral.

The coral looks amazing with the Denim Vivacious shade and rather than doing a stripe, a colour block or stranded colour work project I decided to tackle two colour brioche.

This is a new technique for me. I love the look and feel of two colour brioche but never fancied knitting it. I tried years ago but I just didn’t get it. It didn’t flow and I wasn’t interested in learning it.

For this shop sample I tried to pick a 'simple' project. With Briochette by Nadia Crétin-Léchenne there is no increasing or decreasing in the brioche section. So I can just concentrate on the brk and brp stitches. There are also bands of garter stitch which gives you a break

It’s not quite intuitive yet, and I'm ticking off every row, but I hope by the time the shawl is finished I'll have a much better grasp of what it is I'm doing. 😆

If you're unfamiliar with Brioche it's the ribbed sections in the shawl shown above.

Brioche knitting produces a thick and springy fabric. By working yarn overs with each stitch you add stretch and spring to your project. By slipping every other stitch you produce a knit stitch that stands out, making a rib that is squishy.

When knitted in two colours the colour placement is reversed when looked at from the back - great for shawls when the back side can be seen.

If you want to learn (a lot) more check out Nancy Marchmont's website. Or for a quick intro to flat two colour Brioche these tutorials are good.

From Knit Picks - Learn Brioche Two-Colour Flat

The Unapologetic Knitter - Brioche Flat Two Colour

Stolen Stitches - Learn to Knit 2 Colour Flat Brioche

Spruce Crafts - How to Knit Two-Colour Brioche Stitch

There are lots of other tutorials for knitting one colour and for knitting Brioche in the round. I have been told that Brioche in the round is easier (and that using two colours makes it easier to keep track of what you're doing) but I am a complete Brioche beginner so I can't confirm that.

HOWEVER! I find Brioche tutorials a bit intimidating. It is definitely much easier with the needles and yarn in your hands. You could try making a swatch if you want to practice before diving into a pattern. And that swatch could easily turn into a scarf.

A good pattern should explain the brk and brp abbreviations. I found the Briochette pattern easy to dive into with it's small number of stitches.

I have made a few mistakes on my shawl but nothing I'd rip back to fix - mainly because I haven't worked out how to do that yet. 😆

And even though I haven't finished this, my first brioche project, I am eyeing up another pattern - Beginners Brioche Cowl by Lavanya Patricella available on Ravelry. Perhaps in one ball each of  WYS Retreat Chunky and Rico Melange Chunky.

I've also been working on an old project... my Crazy Zauberball socks started in 2019.

For these socks I'm using shade 1507 and one of my favourite 'techniques'.

I split the 100g ball of yarn into two 50g balls. I then knit 5 rows from each ball to force the yarn to stripe differently on the leg. You don't need to cut the yarn, just carry it loosely up the inside of the sock.

This time I knitted the foot all from one ball, mixing up the stripe effect further.

I first saw the 'technique' used in Tofutrulla's pattern Magic Socks (available for free on Raverly).