Justa Scarf

With my sweater design coming along pretty well, I decided I was up to trying a scarf. :D Here is Ralph, sitting pretty in 100% chunky baby alpaca.



31 stitches across, 50 inches long, 2 skeins of Baby Chunky Alpaca Paints from Mind's Eye Yarns. I think this stuff could make a process knitter out of anyone. I think I was drooling the entire time I knitted it up. Not my usual style at all, but considering that I lost my old scarf, I had no choice but to give in. ;)

The Justa Scarf is just a scarf; I cast on 31 stitches and knitted 1x1 rib until I ran out of yarn. The only chances I got for that knitterly extra touch were the ends. Both are done nicely with special techniques for 1x1 ribbing:



I was having a little too much fun reinventing the Kitchener stitch from first principles, and managed a sort of purl Kitchener first:



Though I picked it out in order to do a normal graft, I do think it's kind of a cool edge, both decorative and with all the stretch of regular grafting. I might keep it in mind for some other time.

OMG applied I-cord

The sweater's neck is done, and applying I-cord to bound-off edges is my new favorite technique. I wish I had a before-and-after picture of the back of the neck -- it really went from ragged to gorgeous in about 30 minutes. Not only was the technique pretty easy (I did it based on instructions in The Knitter's Book of Finishing Techniques) but it matches the rolled edging on the sides of the V-neck perfectly.

There's slight unevenness on both right and left sides where the I-cord meets the rolled edging, but I'm not going to stress about that. After I wash this and the yarn fulls, I don't think it will matter.