ReCycle

It’s been a while what with taxes and life, and only 4 days after Earth Day I’m finally posting the result of all that double knitting Moebius swatching.

My new headband. I call it ReCycle. In the spirit of recycling to protect our environment, conserve our resources and as well as sparking our ideas and imagination. Here’s the reverse side.

And in action.

I like having the arrows circling my head. It feels like there are ideas brewing in there, so it’s become my inspirational band like a thinking cap.
I didn’t make my Earth Day deadline, but Knitty Gritty reran the episode where Cat Bordhi demonstrates her moebius technique today, so I guess that’s appropo of something.

Though one of the reasons this headband is late is that the cast on she demostrates in that show, the MCO , and that I modified in my previous swatches, doesn’t work for this particular pattern. That cast on builds the overlap in as you go. This is fine if you just want one color on each side. However here, the color changes so often in the middle (where you are casting on) to prevent twisting, especially for a multiple moebius like this one, casting on separately with a provisional cast-on gives you the neccessary control over how to align the stitches. I wish I could say it was easy but, the cast on took more time than the rest of the knitting (except the tubular bind-off) and involved waste yarn, and a crochet hook. Needless to say, I probably won’t be making another one of these any time soon, at least not in this exact same pattern. I am writing up the pattern and will post it here if anyone is interested. For the headband I used a sportweight yarn, but if you use a heavy worsted wool it makes a wonderfully warm ear muff for winter.

Speaking of writing up patterns, I’ve working on charting patterns for some of my other projects. (Contrary to the my entries on this blog, I actually do knit things besides moebius strips and weird swatches.) I have to say that that the quest to find the perfect pattern and chart drafting software has occupied as much of my time as any actual knitting has. In fact it’s safe to say I’ve been a bit obsessed with it, so my next few entries will likely document that process. Moebius has officially been replaced.