It turns out that my spree of hand-made gifts didn’t end with Christmas! For my friend’s birthday, I decided to make him a scarf. The problem was finding a pattern that seemed “masculine” enough. However, it was pointed out to me that most of the masculine / feminine vibe of a scarf depends on the colour choices, rather than the stitch or design. With that in mind, I happily settled on a scarf pattern that provided enough interesting detail while seeming safely gender neutral.
- 1 skein of Caron Simply Soft- a worsted weight (4) yarn (above colour A: Grey Heather)
- 1/2 skein of Caron Simply Soft – a worsted weight (4) yarn (above colour B: Country Blue)
- Size J (6.0 mm) hook
Pattern by Sarah at The Caped Crocheter
MODIFICATIONS by tick-tock hobbies
I decided to add stripes to this pattern since I thought a monochrome scarf would be a little boring. As seen above, I used Grey Heather and Country Blue as my two colours, with Grey Heather being the more dominant hue.
- Colour A = 14 rows (alternating between what Sarah calls Row 3 and Row 4)
- Colour B = 7 rows (alternating between what Sarah calls Row 3 and Row 4)
I ended up having seven Country Blue sections before the scarf was deemed to be long enough.
This was actually really good practice for me in terms of learning to add yarn and change colours, as this was the first time I’ve ever made anything striped. I’m still not quite sure if I’m adding yarn 100% correctly, but this method seemed to work for me without anything unraveling.
- (left) Yarn over with the new yarn (Country Blue), and pinch the position where the yarn loops. Be sure to leave a tail long enough for weaving in later on.
- (right) Pull through the loop already on the hook (Gray Heather). This will count as the ch-1 stitch for the turn.
Of course, along with all of these colour changes, there were also lots of ends to weave in at the end of the project! This is another part of crochet that I really need to improve on. I love the beginning and middle of projects, but I dread finishing because I feel like I always do such a poor job of weaving in ends and making the end look as beautiful as the middle. If I could find someone else to finish my projects, I’d be a happy camper, but for now, I’ll continue to persevere. I found it was helpful to have nice long tails for the weaving, and that giving the scarf a little tug before trimming the tail helped the ends stay in a little better. At the end of the day, I think there’s nothing to it except for practice, so hopefully it’s all up from here.
Here’s a quick picture of me modelling the scarf before handing it off as a gift. I ended up really happy with the stripes, so hopefully the birthday boy likes it even half as much as I enjoyed making it.
Let me know about your experiences with stripes and adding yarn, and if you have any tips about weaving ends in, send them my way!