KnitDesigns by Tian: New year, new project.

What did you do for New Year?

Did you knit or crochet?

All week (last week) I racked my brain trying to figure out what to cast-on for New Year’s Eve. In my mind, I wanted to start the year off with family and knitting close.

Mentzelia Shawlette

So, a few days ago, a couple days after Christmas, I decided to make a Mentzelia Shawlette using Caron Cakes using colorway 17003 in Buttercream.

Have you heard of this yarn? If not, you have to go check it out. I’m not affiliated with this yarn and company in anyway. I truly love this yarn.

Caron Cakes

This yarn is so fun to work with. Even though the yarn is mostly acrylic (I hear you yarn purists out there yelling at me, but trust me? It's a lovely yarn and feels great with 20% wool. There is so many color shifting yarns out there right now, mostly light weight yarns. While that is fine for many project, sometimes I just want to whip out the larger needles and get a project done, quick-ish. So, needless to say, when I heard that Michael’s Craft Store had a worsted weight color shifting yarn on Nadiratani’s Quirky Monday Craftcast on YouTube. Even though I hadn't been to a Michael’s in like forever, I made the effort to seek out this yarn and walked away with 3 cakes, on sale for $5 each (regular price of $7.99) just before Christmas. You can't beat that price for 383 yards of worsted yarn beautifully dyed, right?!

The best thing about this yarn, besides the color shifting on this heavy weight yarn is that it's already caked up. Bonus. I don't have to whip out my swift and ball winder. I can just start knitting.

This was part of the problem. This perfectly lovely cake is sitting there on my desk in my office mocking me. Every time I walk into my office during the holiday break it sat there daring me to just start knitting. I am so weak. I took the bait (don’t judge me) and while watching my own Criminal Minds marathon on Netflix on Friday afternoon December 30th, I cast on. I couldn't help it.

So, instead of casting on for New Year’s Eve, I was binding off. Like I said, this yarn works up fast, especially using needles that are two sizes larger than that recommended on the ball band. I really like how the pattern turned out with this yarn.