Cowls and Blocking

It's been a very busy two week!  I didn't think it had been that long since I last posted, but I've been hard at work on several projects, hoping to finally finish some I've had in the works for a while.  I was going to mention two of them here, but I forgot to get pictures of one of them, so that will be for later this week.

In my last post, I had featured a recent design of mine (the Lacy Cowl) with yarn from the Neighborhood Fiber Co.  Of course when I bought the skein for that project, I had to buy two more skeins as well.  And buying only three skeins of this fantastic yarn was actually restraining myself!  I used the other two for this project, another cowl but from a pattern by Cecily Glowik MacDonald called 'Brooklet'. I saw this cowl made with Neighborhood Fiber yarn, and it inspired me to make it myself.  Below is the picture from the pattern...  

...and these are from my version (though the picture quality probably would have given that away for me).

This is knit in the round and then folded over where the yarn changes so you can't see a join in the fabric.  I'm gearing up for winter with all these cowls, with hopefully more to come!

Since I can't get the pictures of my other project yet, I leave you with this plug for a new favorite product of mine. I resisted blocking any projects for years, convinced it was difficult to do and not worth it.  Finally, i caved and bought the blocking mats shown in the photos so I could block the Rill Scarf I made (I loved that project so much I was willing to do whatever difficult process I needed to make it work!).

After using these mats, I finally realized how easy blocking a project is and how much it really helps!  Granted, you can use a mattress or towels instead of buying these, but these mats enable me to block on my dining table instead of using a bed that has potential for dog hair to transfer over (I love my dog but she just sheds way too much!).   And blocking makes such a huge different, really puts the finishing touch on a project and makes it just pop.  I'm just now getting to the point where I stop worrying when a scarf finishes smaller than I anticipated, because once I block it, it lengthens the fabric and I can breathe a sigh of relief.

I got the mats in the photo from www.knitpicks.com.  Very highly recommended!