The Zen Leaf

I’ve moved to northern Wisconsin, and I have way too much yarn. It only makes sense that I create tons and tons of winter accessories to wear! Today’s post features scarves, shawls, and cowls that I’ve crocheted over the last few months.

The first scarf I crocheted was extraordinarily simple, just one stitch all the way through. However, the scarf looks amazing because of the yarn I used. This is Lion Brand Scarfie Yarn in charcoal/magenta, and the pattern just came straight from the skein. It was tons of yarn (over 300 yards) and the entire skein was used. The transition from charcoal to purple and back again is perfect, and the yarn is lovely-soft. Despite how simple this is, I know it’s going to be one of my most-used scarves this winter.

I loved that Scarfie yarn so much that I bought a second skein of it, this time in forest/black. I found a cute chevron scarf pattern at Grow Creative, and got to work! This was the super-satisfactory result!

What would moving to Wisconsin be without a fun autumn rainbow scarf for my niece? Pattern from One Skein Wonders, yarn is Red Heart in Earthy.

This twisting infinity cowl is a pattern of my own design! Mostly I just had a bunch of chunky yarn lying around, the dregs from other projects, and decided to play. I’m really super happy with the results. The cowl is comfortable, reversible, versatile, and in colors that both feel like fall and remind me of my mother’s favorite flower (Indian Blankets), which is perfect when I’m so far away from home. [Yarn: Lion Brand Woolspun in Cranberry, Pumpkin, and Oxford Grey]

This was another dregs project: the leftovers of many skeins of yarn that I wanted to use up and a pattern for a “Mulberry Shawl” I bought awhile back from The Hook Nook. The pattern was fairly simple, basically a triangle granny square with a scallop edge that I ended up nixing in favor of a picot edge anyway. It turned out really cute with all my dregs, though! Nice and soft, too. [Yarn: Caron Simply Soft in Woodland (Camo), Woodland Heather, Peacock Feather (Paints), and Dark Country Blue]

One Skein Wonders had a bulky-yarn pattern for a mobius cowl. Unfortunately, other than the little twist in the infinity cowl, the pattern was kinda boring. So I played. I got a super-bulky yarn that was this beautiful gradient of greys and pink, plus a 10-mm hook, and I modified the pattern a bit. It’s still a simple concept, but I like it much better than what the original calls for. Plus, this was my first time using such a large hook as well as super-bulky yarn. It was a fun experiment! The whole thing took maybe an hour to work up, which was nice! [Yarn: Lion Brand Hometown USA in Salem Creek]

Both shawls I’ve made over the last couple months have been triangular and didn’t give me enough arm coverage, so I decided to make a very large rectangular shawl/wrap. I chose the Hoover Dam Shawl from Expression Fiber Arts, which took a bit over 1000 yards of yarn to crochet. I’m in two minds about the end results. On one hand, I love the pattern and the end-product. On the other, I was very disappointed with the yarn itself. This is my fourth or fifth time trying out Yarn Bee skeins and each of them have been frustrating in some way. This particular yarn had at least 1-2 knotted breaks in each skein. Beyond that, it didn’t work up very well. I could block the entire thing to make it neater, but it’s over six feet long, and considering the yarn is acrylic, I’m just not sure blocking would make much of a difference. So the shawl doesn’t look nearly as professional or smooth as it would with a higher quality yarn, but it’s warm and comfy, so I love it anyway. I just don’t think I’ll pick up Yarn Bee again. [Yarn: Yarn Bee Soft & Sleek in Blushy]

Lastly, I decided to make myself one more twisting infinity cowl/scarf. I’ve long loved the rainbow Landscapes yarn from Lion Brand, but I thought it would be too bright on its own, so I mixed it with some leftover brown yarn for a more muted effect. I absolutely love the way it came out, and the double strand made the scarf thick and super warm. As you can see from the photo, I can wear it as a single loop or doubled, and it appears darker or brighter depending on the light. [Yarn: Lion Brand Landscapes in Mountain Range, Lion Brand Heartland in Sequoia]

I have a lot more of this kind of thing that I’d like to make in the future, but I’m set for the upcoming winter season, and so will turn my brain and fingers to a different kind of project now!

I’ve moved to northern Wisconsin, and I have way too much yarn. It only makes sense that I create tons and tons of winter accessories to wear! Today’s post features gloves and socks that I’ve crocheted over the last few months.

I’m a huge fan of fingerless gloves, and One Skein Wonders (my go-to book for patterns right now) has five different patterns for them! These are the first I made, actually for a friend of mine whose birthday was back in August. I tried them on to make sure they fit a hand properly – it was my first real experience with sewing to join, rather than joining with a crochet stitch – and I loved them so much that I made myself an identical pair later on! [Yarn: Premier Yarns Deborah Norville Serenity Sock Weight in Burgundy]

Next up was some thick fingerless gloves, or a pattern known as “wristlets” in One Skein Wonders (ha!). I made them longer than the pattern called for, and played around with mismatching buttons for the fakey cuffs. Loved the way they came out, especially as they match my newest coffee mug, heh. Plus the yarn is the same used in my quinby hat so I have coordinating accessories! These are extremely warm and will be perfect for this winter! [Yarn: Lion’s Pride Woolspun in Claret and Linen]

Fingerless gloves #3 (also from OSW) feature a shell pattern and a buttoned cuff. Honestly, I think this pattern was misprinted. It features size 1 yarn with a 3.25-mm hook (normal) and says that the pattern will require 198 yards of yarn. The gauge indicates a much larger size per stitch than it’s possible to achieve with this hook and yarn size (like three times too large!). When I tried to make these with that size of hook, these gloves might have fit a toddler. Maybe. Even moving up to a 3.75-mm hook and stitching loosely, the glove is about preteen-sized and very stretched at that (picture in book has very tight stitches). My very tiny son is modeling them here. I can get them on, but the cuff-button is about an inch too wide to actually fasten, and I don’t exactly have giant wrists. Plus, even with the larger hook size and loosely stitching, I used up maybe 100 yards of yarn, max. It’s a neat pattern, but I think I’ll try it again with a size 3 yarn and a larger hook so that I can make a pair to fit an adult hand! [Yarn: Patons Kroy Socks in Sing’n the Blues Stripes]

Technically, socks aren’t gloves, but they’re kinda like foot-gloves, and they’re the only foot-wear I made over the last few months, so I’m sticking them in this post! These are yoga socks, pattern from Expression Fiber Arts, modified as usual to fit. The original pattern is supposed to fit women’s shoe size 3 to 9, and I’m size 8, but this pattern was way too small for my feet. I left the number of foot-rows the same, because I don’t like the socks to go all the way to the toes like the pattern shows, and then I had to add another set of shells to the ankle/cuff section to get them to fit properly. Fun pattern, but definitely needs tweaking if you have average-sized feet. [Yarn: Patons Kroy Socks in Sing’n the Blues Stripes]

These arm warmers/fingerless gloves come from Crochet That Fits. The book is subtitled Shaped Fashions Without Increases or Decreases – and that’s essentially both what I liked and didn’t like about this particular pattern. On the one hand, the book encourages changing the pattern to fit you. I made these shorter (instead of going all the way to my elbows, which I don’t particularly like) and wider (because I like a looser fit on my arm). Because there are no increases or decreases, though, there’s a LOT of extra space around my wrist, so they’re quite floppy in one section, while snug around my forearm and the widest part of my hand. Increasing and decreasing isn’t that difficult, so I would have preferred to just do that! However, they’re cozy and I like fingerless gloves, so I’ll still keep them around for this winter! [Yarn: Caron Simply Soft Camo in Woodland]

After making some Key Tab Fingerless Gloves (Calleigh’s Clips & Crochet Creations) for my sister-in-law last month, I knew I needed a pair for myself. I got one of my favorite yarns – the picture doesn’t do the colors justice – and modified the pattern a bit to lengthen the gloves down my arms. They’re so soft and cuddly that I’ve been wearing them whenever I get the slightest bit chilled! [Yarn: Caron Simply Soft Paints in Peacock Feather]

Last up: Is it obvious by now just how much I love fingerless gloves? This is pattern #4 from One Skein Wonders, called “Astra” gloves (whatever that means?). By now, however, I’ve discovered something very important about myself: I despise working with superfine (size 1) yarn. I thought perhaps I’d try something a little different with this one, using two strands of superfine yarn together with the same sized hook the pattern called for. I’d feel out the pattern size (it had instructions for child, average woman, and average man hand size) and see what I thought. I preferred the double strand a thousand times over! Because of the double-size of the yarn, I ended up using the instructions for the child-sized gloves, but that worked out perfectly fine for me. Snug, soft, exactly the right size, and I like the mottle of two colors together as well! These have become my default going-to-sleep gloves on super-cold nights, they’re that soft! [Yarn: Loops & Threads Woolike in Purple and Navy]

So that’s it for gloves! I’m sure I’ll make a few more variations of a few of these in different colors, and I might eventually try the complicated fifth fingerless glove pattern in One Skein Wonders (with individual fingers!). For now, though, this’ll be a great autumn/winter stockpile!