Dollhouse update

We finally had a snowy Saturday when I could devote the day to futzing around with the dollhouse kit I'm building. It's a frustrating project for me because I like to be able to sit down and make PROGRESS, lots of progress, all at one go - and the dollhouse requires lots of waiting for glue to dry and paint layers to finally cover the plywood. Grrrr. And if I have to sand one more minuscule little window frame I will lose my everlovin' mind!

But today things started to finally make visible progress. Walls got wallpapered, window trim got last coats of paint, and the base of the house got a flooring makeover (ballpoint pen lines + stain = fake hardwood). Still LOTS to do before it's even remotely house-like, but at least I can check a few things off the list!

Free Pattern: Mario's Brother's Scarf

It all started when I tried making the Biryani Shawl, designed by MMario (Ravelry link).  I liked how the stacked yarnovers made an interesting design, but doing that in an ever-increasing triangle required too much pattern-reading for it to be an easy project.  After fiddling around with different yarns and gauges, I found a combination I really liked.  Erika at River Colors Studio donated the yarn to make the prototype, I knit like a maniac for a few days, and voila! A scarf!

(before and after blocking)

This is a great pattern to show off a yarn with long color changes - and it's an almost totally mindless project that's easy to memorize and easy to accomplish.  It's a win-win-win situation!  So, without further ado, I give you ...

Mario's Brother's Shawl
a free pattern by Lazy Mama Designs

Supplies:

• 4.5 mm needles (straight or circular)
• about 400 yards laceweight yarn (I used half a ball of Schoppel Wolle Lace Ball, in color Fuchsianbeet)
• stitch marker

Instructions:

LOOSELY cast on 37 stitches - you may want to go up several needle sizes in order to get the cast on loose enough to block properly.

Note: You may find it's easiest to keep track of where you are in the pattern if you place a stitch marker near the beginning of Row 1, so that every time you start a row with the marker you know you're on the row where you do the [K2 together through back loop].

Row 1: Slip 1 as if to purl, K1, (K2, YO, [K2 together through back loop]) across to last three stitches, K3
Row 2: Slip 1 as if to purl, K2, (K1, YO, [K2 together], K1) across to last two stitches, K2

Repeat rows 1 and 2 until scarf is desired length.  I made mine about 60" long (unblocked).

Bind off LOOSELY, treating each YO stitch as follows: [K the YO stitch, bind it off loosely, move the loop from the right needle to the left needle, K1 through the back loop loosely].

Wet block severely to open the stitches.  Depending on whether you stretch it width-wise or length-wise, you can end up with a longer or wider scarf.  I blocked mine mainly for length, and ended up with a scarf that was 65"x10" after blocking.

***

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have another half of that skein left to play with for another pattern I dreamed up ...

Making things unnecessarily complicated

When LazyKid wanted a pair of plain socks out of solid colored worsted weight yarn, I finally had an excuse to try an unnecessarily complex way of making socks - one inside the other, at the same time, on the same needles! If all goes well, when I'm finished I'll be able to magically pull out a completed sock from inside another completed sock. If things go badly I'll end up with 2 completed socks that are linked together because I screwed up which yarn went with which sock. I live for danger like that!

Anyway, here they are in process (in one shot I pulled the second sock down so it looks like some weird sort of proto-sock for people with 2 legs and no feet):