In part one of The Vanishing Shawls Mystery:
http://yarnstylist.com/2014/02/the-vanishing-shawls-mystery-the-100-day-challenge-continues.html
I described the jacket disaster which led to wispy skeins of white Cocoon yarn haunting me like little ghosts. To exorcise these spectres of my unravelling, I have been using Cocoon to make a cowl or two:
In my "vanishing shawl mystery" post, I described how I scavenged the cable panel of Olso and built it out with garter and double slip stitches to create a simple, elegant cowl. I love it and I have already worn it several times. But at the end of it all, I still had Cocoon yarn left and those wispy skeins continued to mock me. So I decided to get with the current fashion trend of checked woolens and make a cowl. For the checks, I used the slip stitch/fair isle pattern from Dhurrie in Rowan Magazine 54:
Nothing can equal the drama of this cape/scarf ensemble, but it is not extremely practical for everyday wear in sunny California. A friend knitted Dhurrie to wear on her ski trips to Lake Tahoe and has been a bit mystified by the length of the scarf, which requires double or triple knotting to keep it from flopping around. She is also about five inches taller than I am, and she carries the cape well, but the scarf is long even on her model-like figure. By contrast, I don’t spend time in the cold, except when I stroll out in the evening and the thought of me striding through the manicured suburbs of Sunnyvale in a tweed cape makes me giggle. Nothing could be more banal and perfect than this neighborhood, mainly because of the neighborhood garden police. Yes, that's right, garden police. These pesky neighbors report you to the city, resulting in a citation, any time your front yard develops a few weeds. Apparently a cranky old lady who lives somewhere on our block is mostly to blame, but imagine the result--expanses of concrete sidewalk and flat clipped lawns where a few old men stand out of doors watering their concrete into an immaculate, shining surface. If I popped up suddenly, wearing the checked cape, it would be like a strange fungus had sprouted in one of my neighbor’s perfectly manicured yards. No, for me a cowl is a much more practical alternative for an evening stroll.
To knit my cowl, I used Karabella Aurora Bulky, which I had in my stash, in charcoal, combined with cream Rowan Cocoon yarn. It is hard to tell since it was all stash yarn, most of it unraveled, but I think I used about seven balls of Cocoon and nine balls of the Aurora Bulky. To convert Dhurrie into a cowl is very simple. Just cast on half as many stitches as Dhurrie requires for your size—I used 119. I wanted to knit the cowl flat and seam it because the pattern requires strenuous blocking, but you could probably knit it in the round if you don’t care about that.
Cast on 119 rows. Garter four rows in your dark yarn, then pattern 42 rows according to the instructions for Dhurrie, and then garter another four rows in your dark yarn to finish and cast off. I ended up decreasing 10 stitches in the middle section, one every four rows, to draw the neck in, but I don't know if it is really necessary, it depends on the shape you want. Block it strenuously, sew it together and fold it in half to wear. The cocoon is extremely soft so it feels great against the sensitive skin at my neck. One little point about knitting Dhurrie—the way you create the black and white pattern is to knit a whole row in the white, slide the stitches back to the edge of the needle where you started and knit the same row again in black. So you knit every row twice to get just one row. Those 42 pattern rows are really 84! And it is not something you can do while chatting and watching television, it is a rather complicated pattern. But it is not too hard to pick up, and it is fun to knit. I am very pleased with the result, and I have exorcised my Cocoon ghosts at last!
I have now perhaps atoned for losing my two beautiful shawls by knitting two cowls. But the truth is I am still mourning their loss. Particularly Aimee, which was a great favorite.
It is knitted in Kidsilk Haze Aura, which is now discontinued and cannot be purchased anywhere, so I will never be able to make another.
Heartbroken, I decided to search all my closets and shelves one last time, just in case the shawls were mislaid during my home remodel last April. I knew it wasn’t very likely, as I last saw my shawls in Paris, but I decided this time I would employ the perfect wool-seeking weapons at my disposal:
If anyone could find a stray knit or ball of yarn, I knew my yarn-crazed kittens would. We set systematically to work, going through each storage area
Peering into back corners
and even searching unexpected areas:
But although the kittens and I systematically searched each shelf, to my dismay, no shawls were discovered. However, I was consoled by a different find. Just like a heat-seeking missile, my kitten Miro has a nose like a bloodhound for yarn, and he turned up a long-forgotten treasure trove.
Inside the box I found some very old yarns I had bought in Holland in the 1990s and a bold French knitting magazine, a Georges Picaud:
What fun! I'd forgotten about the long-ago magazine, with its bold style and color combinations:
How outrageous, some of these sweaters seem now with their giant sleeves and large doses of novelty yarns:
What a blast from the past! If we couldn’t find the shawls, at least we were consoled by this knitting treasure. Now that I have put to rest any doubts about the shawls being found here at home, perhaps I should take my readers’ suggestions and search Paris next! If my search happened to take me through some pâtisseries, soufflée restaurants or the Louvre museum, it would be only fair—after all, I need to retrace my steps from the last trip!