Creative Linen: one, two, three, four.

Creative Linen is one of the newest yarns from Rowan. It's a light worsted weight blend of 50% cotton and 50% linen that comes in twenty colors; and yes, we do have all of them.

The blend and the weight make this yarn a lovely three-season choice for our climate. One of the nice things about knitting summer-weight pieces from a light worsted yarn is that you won't need many skeins, especially when they come with 219 yards. Today, we have three projects to share - taking one, two and three to four skeins each. Better yet, all the patterns are free on Ravelry!

First, a single skein cowl Gossypium . 

copyright Jenn Kinzel

We love this in a neutral to layer over white or black and it looks great with blue denim, too.

size 9 needle; 6" high and 33" long knit as written

suggested modifications: cast on an additional 36 stitches to add about 9" in length (and use up more of that single skein)

Next, a two-skein cowl Casu . This one also looks great in two colors.

copyright Galia Lael

size 8-9 needle; 9" high and 45" long as written

suggested modifications: none!

And finally... a sweater. Yes, even for the summer. Gemini is written for a cotton/linen yarn and the lace detail at the neck will allow plenty of circulation...even on a hot day. One of my favorite things about the design (of course it's seamless...that's a given, right?!) is that it's reversible.

copyright Jane Richmond

We chose a not-quite-navy blue for this one - perfect to pair with white, black or khaki.

size 5-6 needle (gauge matters to ensure fit - check it before you start!)

the pattern suggests up to 4 inches of negative ease (i.e., the finished bust measurement of the sweater could be up to 4 inches less than your bust measurement). the Small (30.5") size takes 2-3 skeins, and the Medium (34.25") and Large (38.5") take just 3-4 skeins.

Have we convinced you to try the yarn? We'd love to help you choose a project and a color!

How Many?

As in "how many girls does it take to get 228* skeins of Madelinetosh Tosh DK ready for you?"

It took two on Monday (Kathy and Diane) to check in and sticker (and of course I wasn't there, so there's no photographic proof, but you can trust me!)

Then yesterday it took two more.  Marci cleared out space,

while Jessica sorted it all into piles.

Marci hung it on the wall...in color order of course.

So now we're up to four.

Plus one to take photos. Did you guess? it takes FIVE!

And now I'm thinking we need to rename that back wall the Madelinetosh Wall.

*12 skeins each of 19 colorways = a LOT of yarn!

Bandit!

We've been smitten with this project since it debuted at Stitches South in April.

photo credit 

the Louet/Claudia linen

Louet sportweight linen, 2-3 skeins. check

or better yet, Claudia's handpainted version? double check

(...oooohhh or Shibui's new linen?!)

Looks great on everyone. check

Simple simple simple knit. check (as long as we're in a very social setting)

KAL? check plus!

Yes, this is our formal announcement for the next Knit-Along.

Bandit. Recommended for a sport-weight linen. I love a project where the hardest part is choosing the yarn.

These are close-ups of my two favorite rows of colors from the display above. (note that I wasn't kidding about choosing the yarn!)

We'll be casting on next Friday, June 8 at 2:00pm. Hope you'll join us!

Wishful Wednesday.

This week, my wish was for self control.

I favorited this pattern back on May 14. I think that was the day Kirsten Johnstone (the designer) posted finished photos on Ravelry. You can tell from my tags - "seamless", "shibui", "fingering" - what drew me to the design...and of course that last "love" tag sums up what I thought about it!

Fast forward to early this morning when I read this post on the Shibui blog and immediately fired off an email to Theresa about how much I loved the design.

And later about how perfect it would be in the twenty some colorways of Fibre Company's Canopy Fingering that arrived yesterday.

(she agreed).

Unusual for me for a Wednesday, I worked in the shop this afternoon. So I had plenty of time to think about which colorway I might use.

A green, perhaps?

Or maybe a neutral? Or a fabulous rich pink?

Like I said, I was wishing for self control.

"was" being the operative word...

on my desk, 7:00 pm today

Wishful Wednesday.

This week, I'm wishing for a teapot, specifically a 4-cup brown betty,

photo source

to go inside my new tea cozy.

I used the Churchmouse Ribbed and Ruffled Tea Cozies pattern , a little less than one skein of Noro Kureyon, and size 7 needles (16" circular and dpn's). It took me just a few hours to knit.

The Churchmouse pattern is easy to follow and includes instructions for multiple versions. This is a great quick gift (for yourself or someone else)!

Wishful Wednesday.

Alliterative post titles and themes are all the rage in blogland. I regularly participate in Ten on Tuesday and Wordless Wednesday on my personal blog and I've been wanting to introduce something similar here.

Say hello to Wishful Wednesday!  And this week's wish. More Time. 

Yep, as simple as that. Two patterns and one yarn have been calling my name (and a few of yours as well!) lately. But I've got to be honest. I don't have the time to knit them (at least not right now!) And that's too bad, because I don't need to wish for More Money to tackle any of these. They are all sweaters. and they can all be made for around $60 or less.

First up - and coming in at $20 to $30 depending on your size - Gretel. This pattern suggests Habu cotton gima which we have in plenty of colors. I love the light pink. (and a project that takes only two cones of yarn so it must be a pretty quick knit!)

Then the gorgeous Araucania Lontue, a light-weight cotton linen blend yarn in fabulous variegated colorways. We've seen this knit into Liesl and it's fabulous! The yarn has a generous 250 yards per skein, so most sizes will take 4-5 skeins.

Another pattern suggestion is Kat Coyle's Linen Top , and it's free.

And finally Sabine. A top-down cardigan with a suggested gauge of 4-1/2 stitches per inch. Maggi's Linen, perhaps? This is another great spring/summer/fall yarn, made with 52% cotton/48% linen. Most sizes would take 6-8 balls...this is the biggest project on my wish list (in terms of time and money), but it's still a reasonable $60.

What are you wishing for this Wednesday? please share!

Sand and Sea. Sizing and Short Rows.

We love the response to this knit-along! It's fun to see all the color/yarn pairings...and to have all the input on knitting it.  One of my favorite things about knitting along is the sharing of ideas and learnings. And from the first week, the main topics have been about sizing - making it bigger - and about short rows (aka "w&t" or "wrapping and turning").

First up, about sizing. The shawl as designed is only 48" long. If you want to make it bigger, the easiest  modification is to use bigger needles (and more yards) with the suggested fingering weight.  I have about 400 yards of the main color yarn and I'm using a size 7 needle, compared with 250 yards and a size 6 needle that the pattern suggests. As a rough rule of thumb, going up a needle size will increase the piece by about 10%. So I'm hoping my piece works out to be about 110% of 48", or about 53" long (and it should take less than 300 yards - I'll let you know!)

You can also add stitches, but you'll need to add a number that will work with the feather and fan lace pattern (an 18 stitch repeat) for the border, taking into account the increase row (just before joining the contrasting color) that adds one stitch for every two. We worked some math on Friday and think adding 48 stitches to the cast on will add 72 stitches for the border (four feather and fan repeats). The original cast-on is 253 stitches, so going up to 301 stitches is almost a 20% increase. Yes, you'll need more yarn! And you might want to consider modifications to the short rows, but, assuming you account for the extra 48 stitches in your stitch counts (i.e., add 48 to the number of stitches left between wrapped stitches), you don't have to.

And then, the short rows. The first short row is actually executed on a knit row that follows another knit row, so it's really in garter stitch. Which means you can wrap & turn, but you don't need to worry about picking up the wrap later. The second and all the subsequent short rows, however, are executed in stockinette stitch.

If you hate picking up wraps, why don't you try "shadow wraps". The folks at Socktopus put together a great photo tutorial for the technique. Best I can explain it, the "wrap" ends up inside the turning stitch, so there's no need to pick it up later. But really, you should check out the tutorial for a full explanation. And lots of great photos.

Way better than the one I have to share!

click to make bigger!

Are you knitting along? Please share questions, comments and photos!!!! here, on our Ravelry forum, or on Facebook. The photo above is my shawl as of this afternoon. I hope to have something more to share next week. Stay tuned.... and happy knitting!