Carmen’s Shawl

I’ve just finished a shawl for my other daughter (well I didn’t want her to feel left out!). I mad this one with some left over Sirdar Blur, and it only took a few hours to finish. The pattern is available in the Free Patterns category in my sidebar.

It’s another top down pattern, similar in shape to Eva’s shawl. It can also be worked with any yarn – I’ve also crocheted a sample in the same pattern with lace weight mohair and I think it works quite well.

 Not much knitting done recently. I did take the angora shrug to my local SnB group this week and managed to get a fair bit done. I’ve just started going to the group, and I’m really enjoying it. It’s a nice, active and varied group, and it’s great to get a chance to see and feel other people’s projects in real life.

Eva’s Shawl – Pattern

I’ve had a few requests for the pattern so I thought I would get my act together and write the pattern up. I will be putting together a pdf with a more polished version of the pattern soon, but for those who are impatient to start, here are the rough instuctions.

***Full pattern in pdf form (US terminology) is now available here ******

This pattern should work with any weight of yarn. I am using heavy lace weight for my shawls with a size 4mm hook, and a decent sized shawl takes about 100g of laceweight yarn. The shawl is crocheted top down, with increases every row, and can be made any size – just stop crocheting when it’s a bit smaller than the desired size (bearing in mind that if you are using blockable fibres (e.g. wool , alapca, cashmere) it will increase in size when it is blocked). To get a nice lacey shawl you will need to use a larger hook size than that normally recommended for the weight of yarn – play with different hook sizes until you are happy with the results.

Very important! – These instructions use UK terminology, and I will be using the following abbreviations

TC = UK treble crochet = US double crochet

DC = UK double crochet = US single crochet

Ch = Chain

Ch Sp incr = TC, Ch1, TC into Ch Space

Instructions

Chain 4 and join with slip stitch
Row 1: Ch 3 (counts as 1st TC) One TC into ring, Ch1, (2 TC into ring, Ch1) x 2, 2TC into ring, turn
Row 2: Ch 3,1 TC into base on turning ch, 1 TC into next stitch, Ch sp incr, (TC into next 2 stitches, ch sp incr) x 2,1 TC into next stitch, 2TC into top of turning ch, turn
Row 3: Ch 3, 1 TC at base of turning chain, (TC to ch1 space, ch sp incr, placing marker in ch 1 space)x 3, TC to end working 2 TC into top of turning chain, turn
Row 4 (eyelet row): Ch 3, TC at base of turning chain,ch1, miss one TC *(TC in next 2 stitches, Ch1, miss one TC) to stitch before next marked Ch 1 sp, 1 TC, ch sp increase, remove marker and place in ch 1 space of Ch Sp incr, 1 TC, ch 1, miss one TC, repeat from * 3 times, (TC into next 2 stitches Ch1, miss one TC) to end of row, 2TC into turning ch, turn
Row 5: Ch 3,  1 TC into base of turning ch,* work across to next marker, working 1 TC into each stitch and each ch 1 space, ch sp increase (replacing marking in ch 1 space), repeat from* twice, then work to end of row working 1 TC in each stitch and each  ch 1 space, 2 TC in turning ch
Here’s how it should look after the first five rows…

Row 6: repeat row 3
Row 7: repeat row 4

Repeat last three rows until shawl is desired size, ending with a Row 6 row

Border
Row 1: Ch 4, skip first stitch, (DC into next st, Ch 3 skip next stitch) to end of row
Row 2: Ch 4, DC into first Ch space, (Ch 3, DC into next Ch Space) to end finishing with a Ch 4, DC into base of turning Ch from previous row.

Fasten off, weave in ends and block.

Eva’s Shawl

The shawl I’m making out of the botched dye-job yarn is coming along nicely

It’s not a colour I would wear, so I am going to give to to my youngest daughter Eva, as she loves to borrow my shawls for dressing up. I do really like the pattern however, and I have started one for myself in the Navy Fyberspates alpaca laceweight (see previous post). I will post the pattern here in the next few days when I have worked the border out.

I’ve also finished the Ruffle Sweater I have been test crocheting for Diana from Mooseknits.

It’s a really nice pattern with an interesting construction ( seamless, top down with set in sleeves). It’s comfortable and fits really nicely. It took less than 3 balls of Schoppel Admiral sock yarn. She will be publishing this pattern on her blog in the near future.

More laceweight

I’m really getting into crocheting with laceweight yarn at the moment. I love the malabrigo laceweight and have been looking around for other nice lace weight yarns. I ended up having a bit of a laceweight splurge. I think I’ve got enough now to keep me busy for some time!

From top to bottom they are: laceweight alpaca from Fyberspates, Cobweb Mohair from the Natural Dye Studio and Margaret Stove Artizan Lace from the Woolly Workshop. It’s the first time I’ve ordered from any of these shops and I in each case I was very impressed with the custormer service – all the yarn arrived within 48 hours of ordering. They are all gorgeous – I’m not sure which I want to use first.

My dye experiment

During a recent clearout, I rediscovered this yarn

It’s a cone of over 600g of a heavy lace weight yarn that is simply labelled “mohair” and came as part of a mixed mohair pack from yeoman yarns. As I am currently into laceweight knitting and crochet, I thought I would have a go at dyeing some of it to make shawls, scarves etc.
I’ve had fairly good results using food colouring to dye yarn in the past, but the mohair content of this yarn must be pretty low as it didn’t take the dye well at all (I was aiming for a dark purpley colour!)

A bit disappointing, but still a pretty colour. I am using it to crochet a shawl for one of my daughters and will be posting the pattern if it turns out OK.

My old knitting bag

I designed this knitting bag in 2002, and it is still going strong!

 The pattern was available for a while on another website, and I have just added it to this blog under the free patterns category along with the Ribbed Slotted Scarf pattern.

I bought the handles in a little craft shop in Brighton, which has now closed down, but similar handles are available here and here.

I thought I would post another photo of the laceweight crochet shawl.

This photo shows the stitches stretched out, which is hopefully what it will look like when it is blocked. I think it looks so much prettier like this and can’t wait to see what the finished blocked shawl will look like.

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