North Harding Cowl

Following a random ball purchase on holiday - you know the "ooh that's nice, I have absolutely no ideas what to do with it but I'll get it anyway" - I ended up with one lovely ball of chunky yarn and a desire for knitting a scarf or cowl that all take several balls, so I had to improvise! The cowl will take 30 - 40g of yarn plus tassels if desired.

Using 7mm circular needles and a bulky yarn (I used Louisa Harding Rossetti, or Debbie Bliss Riva)

Cast on 86 stitches
Knit, join into round knitting last stitch together with first stitch
round 2 - purl
round 3 - K1, YO, to end
round 4 - P1, slip YO off needle, to end
round 5 - knit
round 6 - P1, 2YO, to end
round 7 - K1, slip YOs off needle, to end
round 8 - purl
round 9 - K1, YO, to end
round 10 - P1, slip YO off needle, to end
round 11 - knit
round 12 - P2TOG and slip stitch back onto left needle. Repeat until one stitch remains, thread yarn through and pull taught.  This creates a loose cast off.

Wrap around neck twice to wear.  If desired, you  can add tassels, cut 84x 6inch strips of yarn, use 3 to form tassel every 3rd stitch on cast on row (when worn doubled up this will be top row so look double sided).

Manly Mini Scarf

For that man who doesn't want a special hand knitted scarf....

My partner wears a scrappy little thing for work and always gets very very cold outside in thermals and umpteen jumpers. Decided it was time he had something to keep the neck properly warm but still retain his manliness. Its a manly version of a cowl, the ribbing providing practical heat retention and the shortness meaning no long flimsy ends to have to tuck in anywhere.  None of the ribbed scarf patterns I found offered stripe options and so decided to tackle it the other way round and do horizontal rather than vertical. I wanted to make the hole without interrupting the colour trail of the wool (vertical ribbed scarves make you leave half the stitches on a neelde and do the other half before returning back and then joining - this would be havock with self striping/varigated yarn). So my horizontal option lets you make the hole via cast on/of without interrupting the colour flow and keeping it all as one part.

Two main stitches used here; stocking (knit right side, purl wrong side) and reverse stocking (purl right side, knit wrong side) in quartuplets of rows, to give a mock ribbing effect equivalent to K4, P4, but it ends up looking softer as the purl takes dominance instead. [right side are odd rows, wrong side are even rows]

Using DK and 4mm needles (I advise using circular to fit stitches on)...

Cast on 105 in blue
rows 1-4 - stocking
rows 5-8 - reverse stocking
rows 9-12 - stocking
rows 13-16 - reverse stocking
change to grey
rows 17-20 - stocking
rows 21-24 - reverse stocking
rows 25-28 - stocking
rows 29-32 - reverse stocking
change to blue
rows 33-36 - stocking
rows 37-39 - reverse stocking
row 40 - cast off 15 stitches, knit 90
row 41 - knit 90, turn needles and cast on 15 stitches
rows 42-44 - stocking
rows 45-48 - reverse stocking
change to grey
rows 49-52 - stocking
rows 53-56 - reverse stocking
rows 57-60 - stocking
rows 61-64 - reverse stocking
change to blue
rows 64-68 - stocking
rows 69-72 - reverse stocking
rows 73-76 - stocking
rows 77-80 - reverse stocking and cast off

In grey pick up 22 stitches along right hand edge (the bit that splits into two sections)... 2 stitches from each wrong side 'rib', and one at the end of the each section (which will be from right side 'rib').
rows 81-84 - stocking
rows 85-88 - reverse stocking
rows 89-92 - stocking
rows 93-96 - reverse stocking
change to blue
rows 97-100 - stocking
rows 101-104 - reverse stocking
rows 105-108 - stocking
rows 109-112 - reverse stocking and cast off


In grey pick up 22 stitches along left hand edge... 2 stitches from each right side rib plus the first and last stitch.  Follow rows 81-104.

Patterns I love that helped give me some inspiration to put this pattern together include:

• Knitomatic.com Easy Mobius Cowl
• Nebula Designs Ribbed Mini-Scarf

Bobble Lace Scarf

Ok, so this isn't a new pattern, it's one I did nearly a year ago, but still worth putting up here whilst I refine my new pattern with the remaining ball of pompom yarn!

I used Rico Design Pompon Print yarn and rather than doing the plain looking chunky scarf advertised in the design on its label I wanted one of those whispy evening scarves I'd seen. So ignore the K2 between each bobble written on its label to keep it whispy. To cast on, simply loop the thread between the bobbles and twist before putting on the needle. In three simple rows you have knitted your scarf.

Using 8mm needles (circular helpful due to knitting scarf length wise) and pompom yarn...

Cast on 85 (this counts as a row)
Knit one row
Knit with 3 bobbles between each stitch
Instead of doing a knit cast off for the final row (you don't want another chunky row) slip each stitch but then cast off. (so, slip stitch, slip stitch, pass first stitch over second, slip and so on...)