The shrug that wasn’t

Finished. One shrug, knitted in a variegated 30% silk, 70% merino blend made by Manos del Uruguay. If I could only knit with one yarn for the rest of eternity (which would be a shame, but still) this would be it. It knits up beautifully into springily cushy soft snuggly silky non-itchy adorableness. This is colourway 7325- a variegated mixture of blues, purples and greens. I kept on having to stop while I was knitting it and admire ever new shades and tones which kept on appearing. (Manos del Uruguay have just brought out a few new shades and colourways in this yarn, in both multi-colours and solid colours, and I’m very keen to try more…)

The shrug was knitted following a free online pattern from Interweave Knits. It basically uses an easily memorised 12 row pattern repeat, which requires you to actually drop stitches on purpose (which I thought would be right up my street). However, although not a bad pattern, this project was not a particularly interesting knit: the shrug is knitted in one long piece, with only the occasional decrease and increase to add the odd moment of excitement. My concentration kept starting to wander and I would actually FORGET to drop stitches, (which has to be a first). The actual drop stitch pattern I quite like. The way it snakes up the arms and horizontally across the back looks very organic.

The long main piece is simply seamed part way in from each end to form arms. I’m happy about that as I’m going to unseam the arms and turn it into a scarf. Trying it on in excitement for the first time I realised I have nothing that really works underneath it. Anything sleeveless reveals a flash of armpit, and anything with sleeves has to be skin tight to fit under it. As I’m not going to buy a whole new wardrobe to go with it, and as I find it hard work to wear (the back keeps riding up in the middle), it’s silly to keep it as it is. I’m sure it’ll make a cosy scarf though!