A Plaid Journey

One of the features that pops up on the Ravelry homepage from time to time is groups of similar objects—similar in color, style, or function. There was a display of David Bowie inspired items in the wake of his death, and two weeks ago there was a post on plaid projects. I was intrigued, and tried out a crochet plaid dishcloth almost immediately. I found the technique interesting, but I felt like the dishcloths was a) too thick, and b) too stiff. Both symptoms of crochet. I made it smaller than the instructions called for as I was using a heavier yarn, and I was seized with the desire to turn this pattern into knitting.

My first attempt was basically the same idea as the crochet, but with yarn overs instead of chain spaces. Drawback—I was cutting the yarn each time and had a ton of ends to weave in, and the pattern required you to pay a bit of attention. When I finished it and started crocheting the vertical strips through the yarn overs, I realized that they were too big, and it looked lame.

So, I’m trying a much simpler tack. Carrying the yarn from the stripes up the side isn’t the tidiest looking, but it sure beats weaving in all those stupid ends. I’m considering doing one row strips…who knows how far this madness will go? Now to see how the vertical stripes look over the stockinette…

While up super late writing report cards on Friday evening, I took a look at the new Knitty, and immediately fell head over heels in love with a scarf (they call it a shawl, but it’s totally a scarf!) pattern. I had the perfect yarn for it in the stash, and as a treat to myself for finishing I cast on Saturday evening while enjoying some Downton Abbey. Loving it so far!

Now that term is almost over, I’ll have time to do more work on creative things. I never get the half of what I planned done over the term breaks, but I’m going to try and make April really count. I don’t plan to go anywhere this holiday, so lots of cleaning, knitting, sorting, and reading should happen. Who knows? I might even go crazy and do some writing!

Parting shot: Lame pudding pie for pi day. Hey, anything was better than marking!