A gift inspired by the recipient's affection for the excellent picture book Miss Rumphius and for lupines themselves. Worked mostly in stem, fishbone, lazy daisy, and Quaker stitches, with some French knots and straight stitches thrown in for good measure, in DMC 6-strand cotton embroidery floss, on cream linen.
This cowl was knit holding yarn double to allow for the interesting color shifts and has a clever split at the bottom so it can sit under a coat without bunching. (You knit each panel flat and then join them to work the rest in the round.) The pattern, Flying Solo, is free to download at Ravelry. I know it looks absurdly long for a cowl, but if you look at the pattern, you'll see how it drapes when worn. I used Holst Garn Noble (a fingering-weight geelong/cashmere blend) in Eggplant, Quarry, and Blue Stone. This yarn feels more like linen or hemp while knitting but blooms when wet blocked. Below, you can see the fabric before (left) and after (right) a gentle warm water bath. The stitches filled out and softened, leaving a denser and squishier garment. The bind-off method is no joke, though! It's a tubular bind-off based on the Kitchener Stitch and involves doing this setup step, plus a weird pattern of sewing while somehow not allowing stitches to pop off the four available needle ends ...
Sweet, shy baby bat wrapped up in its garter-stitch wings. This is actually the first time I've ever used plastic "safety eyes"--thanks to my child for letting me grab some from his stash. Knit in Cascade 220 black, stands about 3.5 inches tall.
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