TWO WRONGS MAKE A RIGHT, RIGHT?

I did mention in THIS POST that I have a penchant for plied yarns with slow color changes, right? I recently became aware of a relatively new sock yarn, Crystal Palace "Sausalito" that is soft and lovely, with gorgeous color shifts in the plies. I am already a fan of their "Mini Mochi" yarn, so how could I go wrong?

I ordered two balls of Prism, and two balls of Firebird. You need two balls to make two socks. The Prism is shown above. Whoa, Nellie! While I do like socks that are more like fraternal twins than identical, these don't even look closely related. The difference is that the colors of the plies line up in the ball at the right, but contradict in the ball on the left. So, the way to solve this dilemma is to: 1) make stripes by alternating balls, or 2) buy another two balls and hope to get a closer match. I chose to buy two more balls. The new ones are at the top:



I WIN!!!

Now that it appears that I can make two pairs of rainbow socks, I have read the Ravelry reviews of this yarn, and it seems that socks made from this yarn do not hold up well in the wash, even with gentle treatment. So maybe I will try gloves, hats, or a scarf instead.

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RUFFLY CURLY SCARVES

Remember those curly crocheted hair ties? These are a larger knitted version, designed to be worn around the neck as a fashion accent. Possibly even for warmth, if it isn't a windy day. Anyway, they are a lot of fun to make, and free patterns for them abound. A quick search on Ravelry turned up 132 free ruffled scarf patterns for knitting. There are lots more if you include crochet patterns as well.

I made these two as a fun easy diversion from the continuing sweater knitting. The lighter blue scarf on the inside is Helene Rush's "Kurly Kid Scarf", designed to be used with kid mohair. I made mine from Knitpicks Chroma Fingering. The darker blue scarf on the outside is the Curly Sausalito Scarf by Susan Druding. I made it with Universal Yarn Classic Shades. (I hated this yarn, but the colors are awesome).

The general idea for both of these scarves is to make one side edge much longer than the other- that's what makes it curl. The cast-on edge is the short one, and determines the scarf's final overall length. The scarf is knit side to side, and there are several rows in which the stitches are doubled either with yarnovers or simple increases. The more doublings, the more intense the curling will be. There were three increase rows for the light blue scarf, and only two for the dark blue, so the curls are less intense, and the scarf is lighter in weight.

At the final row, you have a ruched-up mess on the needles! Then you can release the magic by binding off LOOSELY, and allowing the curls to be free. It sort of reminds me of taking my hair out of rollers as a teenager. Whee!



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