A Short Story Made Long

A little while ago, maybe a month, my older daughter told me that her friend Dmitri was going to Siberia (something about diamond mining) and she wanted to knit him a scarf like the ribbed one she had made herself - K1 P1 rib - but bright red. I said that I would check at the yarn store when I was there to teach my next class, and let her know what would be her best options. The requirements were that the yarn be thick (to knit up quickly), soft, warm, bright red, and not too expensive. Washable would be a bonus.

Since the red had to be a true red (not pink-red or orange-red) that narrowed the choices to Cascade Superwash, doubled, or Patons Shetland Chunky. The Shetland Chunky was definitely the more economic way to go, wouldn't involve working with two balls at once, and I happened to have two balls (not red) in my stash. So I figured I would work up a swatch to show her how many stitches to cast on, what needle to use, and what it would feel like.

I chose a 5 mm Addi Turbo that was lying about, cast on 36 stitches, and started to knit. I slipped the first stitch purlwise, worked K1 P1 to the last stitch, and knit the last stitch. It felt nice and squooshy and was working up to be about 5.75 in wide (14.5 cm). After knitting about 4 inches (10 cm) I showed it to my daughter, she approved, and I picked up two balls of the red yarn for her.

Since the variegated yarn I was swatching with (Harvest colourway) was doing an interesting stripey thing, I decided to keep knitting. That gift-giving season is approaching after all. The result, you can see below on the left. The finished scarf, unblocked, is 58 inches long, but will definitely grow in length and could easily be blocked to 60 inches or more.



It was such an interesting and unexpected result that I bought another colourway (Winter Moon) just to see if it would do the same thing. It did. Everglades is also working up nicely.



Don't you think it looks like a cross between a plaid and an argyle? I call it Plargyle. Give it a try. If you can match my gauge it should work. It is fun and makes you look very clever. But...



Not every colourway will work. Ashes of Roses just wouldn't, so it is being bias knit in garter stitch. I have a few more colourways that I want to try, so I will keep you posted on what works and what doesn't.