While I was in No. Calif. last fall to pick up my Alden Amos electric wheel, I stopped to visit my long-time friend, Margaret, in Vacaville. She raises llamas, especially for the fleece and for use as pack animals. She had a particularly lovely skein of two ply, lovely dark red color, about sport weight, and only about 400-500 yards. Not enough for a shawl from Nancy Bush's new book, "Knitted Lace of Estonia" .But there was PLENTY for a scarf designed from patterns from the book. Using my Open Office Spreadsheet and the Aire River Knitting Font, I chose patterns that pleased me, and that would be fun to knit. I designed the scarf to narrow around the neck, and knit from the lace edge, thru all the three-st cross center stitches, and then knit the corresponding lace portion of the other end. I always seem to graft WAAY too tightly, so I grafted the seam over a wooden knitting needle a size smaller than the Addi's the scarf was knitted on.
Seam is NOT perfect, but much better than usual. I am very happy with the finished product, and think that Margaret, a new bride, will be as well. Here are pictures of Melody, another of my friends, wearing the scarf and a blocking picture.I loved the math of the gradual decreases around the neckline, weighing the remaining skein of yarn to make sure I used the MOST of the yardage I could.
IAnd here is the jpeg of my pattern:
