Fruitless

This post will not showcase fruit thus making it fruitless.  Instead it will focus on the other thing Miss M´s mom asked about for her birthday, a scarf.

Here´s my not so happy girl all dressed up in her new snowsuit for winter.  She has on her favorite hat and rain boots too.  What she doesn´t understand is why her mom and dad aren´t letting her out to play in this outfit on a rather warm day a few weeks ago.  BTW, it looks like the snowsuit is a perfect fit.

So this is the pink colour to use for inspiration for a new, small scarf.  As I was looking for zippers last week I also did some searching for the right colour in pink.  I had just the right combination in my stash.

The band was missing so I don´t know the brand, but it a very soft wool

This variegated yarn should somewhere in all those pinks, peaches and maroons have the right colour to match and it doesn´t look too babyish either.  Then there was a need for a pattern and Ravelry offered several toddler ones to choose from, but I picked a Jane Comyns design called Kid´s Keyhole Scarf.

Note how it is meant to fit close to the neck not outside the jacket

This design uses a mock cable stitch and requires knitting and purling stitches.  I knew the mock cables would not show up so clearly in my variegated yarn but the texture should be interesting.  Truth be known there were two reasons for selecting this pattern; first, it is designed for a toddler and second, it would allow for practice in purling.  Let me explain.  I have a secret, although I have been using continental knitting for some time, it has only been used to knit and not for the purl stitch.  Why, you might ask?  Because that flicking motion shown in the video about continental knitting is one I had serious trouble mastering.  So, this small project would be the one where I figure out how to purl using the continental knitting style.  Or at least that was the hope at the onset.

As you might expect progress was slow (really, really, really slow) at first as I tested different ways of doing that flick, but after several inches I was purling like I actually knew what I was doing.  And since I was on a roll, I knit up a quick matching cap as well.  The design for it is one I made up (it still needs a tassel at the top).  Here´s the final results:

What a fun set of projects that were anything but fruitless, as in failing to achieve the desired results, but rather they were quite fruitful.  I can now use the continental knitting style for both the knit and purl stitches and Miss M should have a warm set of a scarf and cap for this winter.