Tuesday 7 August 2007

Ireland, Here I Come!!

Here is my completed Irish Hiking Scarf, knit in Irish Moss coloured yarn.


This scarf was probably the hardest project I have undertaken in my knitting career, but not because of the cables. Those were actually fairly easy (although most impressive looking I must admit). No, the tricky part was more that I was making a pattern in the scarf and any mistake would stand out. My other projects have either been felted (which hides all mistakes) or else socks (where I manage to fudge through my mistakes and doubt they would be noticeable to anyone but me). So for this project, when I knit where I was supposed to purl or purled when I was supposed to knit, I had to learn how to purposefully drop a stitch and pick it back up in the way to make the desired stitch. As a knitter, dropping a stitch is something you work very hard not to do so I really had to talk myself up before dropping stitches, especially when it was many rows back. But I finished it and I like the way it looks - and it will definitely keep me warm walking the foggy roads of Ireland (<-- subtle hint to my husband).

I had a little yarn left over so I decided to try to make a matching hat. Can't have a cold head in Ireland!!

I have no idea if I will have enough yarn to complete this hat but still, I knit on. This is when I realized that I do 'fingers-crossed' knitting or 'optimistic-thinking' knitting. Otherwise, I would be stressing out after every row, picking up and squeezing the skein of yarn to try to figure out if I will have enough to finish. Knitting should be relaxing, so I will continue knitting my hat and know that I will have more than enough yarn.

8 comments:

Nicola said...

It's beautiful Samantha. I often think about making something with cables because I love the way they look and then I chicken out of actually doing it!

Is the pattern online? I think I've seen it somewhere.

Katherine said...

Blimey! You're brilliant! What a lovely scarf, Samantha. Lovely colour for you to wear on your trip to Ireland.

Anonymous said...

When I started reading the blog, I thought it was Nicola, the knitting master! I was so delighted to see it's my little girl! Ohhhhh I can't wait to see my headband!

I'm sending this to Mrs. G, she will be tickled pink!

Momma

Nicola said...

I just found the link to this pattern
http://www.helloyarn.com/irishhikingscarf.pdf
I knew I'd seen it somewhere

Samantha said...

Yes, that is where I got the pattern. I started it a couple of years ago with a thicker yarn but I didn't like the way it was turning out so that got frogged! When I saw the irish moss, I knew the colour would be perfect!

Nicola chickening out of a knitting challenge??? The only thing is that cables slow down the knitting a bit but since you only need to cable (on this project) once every 8 rows, it isn't too bad.

Stacie said...

Love your Irish Moss IH scarf, Samantha. The green is perfect, and from the photos so are your stitches! I tried this one last summer and was so frustrated and got tired of tinking back or tearing out rows that I put it away for a long time. Fortunately, my skills have improved so finishing it was a snap this year. I have used that Peruvian Highland wool for a project and it was lovely!
~Stacie

Samantha said...

I can't believe all the postitive feedback I've gotten on the scarf! Now I can never knit anything plain again ;o)

Anonymous said...

What a gorgeous scarf! wishing I could knit...sigh.