Pattern available on Ravelry.
Remember the gorgeous sunshine yellow-gold yarn from the first shipment of Round Table Yarn's Tristan and Isolde Yarn Club?? Well, this scarf was inspired wholly by that yarn, I can’t lie! My first thought when I saw it was of all the wild cosmos flowers growing along the roads and in my mother’s garden where I grew up in Arkansas and I knew it would shape this design.
From skein...
to scarf!
And I made the shawl pin, too! Can you see the hearts in my eyes, ha ha? I am completely obsessed with this yarn - and I can tell you from experience that it can withstand some frogging!
I had some difficulty sorting out the “petals” – they had to be worked lengthwise but I also wanted the tall stitches to be right side facing, which meant I was working with the natural lean of all those tall stitches being worked on only even rows. Eventually, I gave up on straight or even angled edges and went back to my inspiration for help. It was then, after SO many false starts, that I realized my petals could be PETALS! So I embraced the form and the asymmetry and the design at last fell into place.
Longer petals are worked by adding chains or foundation single crochet stitches and as the petals get shorter again, we simply don’t work into the last few stitches of certain rows. The pattern also includes a schematic to help you visualize the layout as well as detailed instructions with stitch counts at the end of each row and descriptions of the special stitches used.
The asymmetry of this scarf and varying lengths to the widest and shortest stitches of each petal allow some wiggle room with stitches and in fact, if you choose to make your own Cosmos Scarf, I would encourage you to modify the transitions to please YOUR eye!
It is a short scarf, measuring just 54" long, but it's perfect to wrap a couple times around your neck and tie or pin with a fun shawl pin to show off those petaled ends. Despite all the setbacks (I was SO scared I was going to run out of yarn by the time everything fell into place but I wasn't sure the yarn could withstand any more frogging!) I'm rather pleased with how this one turned out. I think it was just the sort of challenge I needed, in fact, and I can't wait for the next one!
I also want to send a huge thank you to my wonderful pattern testers, who offer incredible support, insight, and encouragement as well as a much needed critical eye or two to help me catch mistakes and make each pattern clear and concise. Okay, well maybe not that concise since I tend to ramble a bit! That's part of my charm, though, right??
They truly make my patterns better, though, and I'm immensely grateful for their feedback. So thank you, thank you, thank you to Denise Smith of Untangled Stitcher as well as Kathleen, who is a prodigious stitcher!!
You can find the Cosmos Flower Scarf pattern on Ravelry and Craftsy. And the gorgeously sunshiney yarn? It's called Avalon and you can get some from the amazing Karen Robinson of Round Table Yarns - and it comes in SO many pretty colors! I really want to see this done in Poisoned Apple...
Happy crocheting!