Tea House

Originally this shawl was going to be called Knit Night, after thinking it over I didn't want knitters who don't have a knit night to feel excluded or think the pattern wasn't for them .

What this shawl really is is a take-along project for whenever you have some time to knit, whether you are by yourself, having coffee with a friend, or at knit night. The next name was going to be Coffee House, I don't drink coffee so that was nixed. 

My best friend and knit companion Cameron is a voracious tea drinker so whenever we are knitting together that is what she will usually order. The pink color in the shawl is named Tea Rose, so as inspiration from her and the yarn name Tea House was born! 

Tea House is a hybrid shawl shape, deeper than a traditional crescent but not a half circle either. So simple to memorize and a great way to combine some colors. Tea House is pretty much the same row over and over again while changing the colors. 

The yarn I used is a Merino/Cashmere/Nylon blend but as usual any fingering weight yarn will work. Only part of this shawl you have to pay a speck of attention to is the picot bind off. I've included a video link for a tutorial incase knitters have never used this bind off before. 

Lane Shawl

 Hi Happy Shawl Knitters! 

This post is focusing on my new shawl design Lane. This is my first collaboration with a dye company! So let me introduce to you the lane shawl is Madelinetosh Tosh Merino Light, a gorgeous single-ply fingering weight yarn. The yarn for this shawl was provided by Madtosh through their MT Studio program, a program that provides yarn to designers. You can take a look at the program here. 

I chose Copper Pink Solid as my color for Lane and I am so happy with it! Lane was originally submitted to a different company for design call and was rejected. I took that as the perfect opportunity to apply with tosh. 

Lane was inspired by the changing grounds on a farm. I've talked about before that I am a nanny, right now I have a 1 year old boy named Lane. The family home is situated on a farm and I've been able to watch the whole process from planting, to harvest, to restart with a new crop. 

As for other yarn choices for Lane, any fingering weight yarn will work. My testers have used a variety of different fingering weight bases and they all look great! I would suggest using a solid or tonal yarn so that all the stitch patterns show well enough. 

Wishing

Hello Knitters! I have a new shawl pattern to share with you! Wishing, comes from my desire for fall weather, everything Pumpkin Spice (not coffee), and knitwear season, this is what I told everyone the name came from. The name actually came from wishing for fire season to be over, wishing racism wasn't a debate for people, wishing people were better. But, it takes more than wishing, it takes action. Call your local representatives, VOTE this November, take action and educate yourself. 

Now, the actual shawl information. I used a Merino/Cashmere/Nylon blend that was designed with 150 grams or ~600 yards. So the shawl is easily made larger or smaller by increasing or decreasing the number of repeats you knit. As for the fiber content you can pretty much use anything that is a fingering weight. Though, as with the majority of my shawls, you can totally use a different weight to knit them and adjust your needle size. 

The fringe for Wishing is made entirely from my scrap bins. As I've talked about before, I cannot throw those little nuggets away so I have to find design ideas for them. Using this border requires no ends to be woven in! Thank The Lord! There is no way I plan to ever design a shawl with that ends to weave in, that hurts my soul. 

I hope I get to see your combos soon! 

Sienna Cowl

This is the first time I've designed a cowl! Sienna was inspired by the gorgeous book Sequence Knitting paired with the luxury blend Epiphany by Cascade. Unfortunately this is a discontinued yarn but as always I put other yarns that will work in the Ravelry suggestions. 

Sienna is a simple cowl with a two row repeat that is so easy to memorize. As stated above I used a luxury blend but my testers used sturdier wool and came up with beautiful cowls as well. If you want a cowl with drape then having some amount of alpaca, silk, or bamboo would be an excellent addition to your fiber content.

If you are looking for something a bit sturdier that will have more structure then I would use a merino wool or a wool nylon. Acrylic or cotton would work for Sienna as well but make sure to use a corresponding needle size so the cowl doesn't end up too stiff. 

Free the Fringe

Free the Fringe is so fun and easy to knit! If you are looking for a first shawl project this is the perfect one! Free the Fringe uses only knit stitches, KFB increasing, and K2TOG decreasing. 

I knit Free the Fringe in fingering weight but the size of the shawl depends on how much yarn you have. You can knit it with any weight of yarn and the corresponding needle size. For this shawl the stitch numbers aren't important the grams amount that you knit per side is what is important. Keeping track of how many grams you use will let you know when you are done with increasing to switch to decreasing. 

I added extra colors of yarn to my fringe to give more color but that isn't necessary for a successful knit. I can't wait to see the combinations you come up with! 

Henness Shawl

Henness is my new pattern and it's fabulous! The main attraction for Henness is the cabled bind-off! This shawl is a crescent shaped, fully garter stitch shawl that alternates a variegated and a solid every 2 rows. 

The cabled bind-off is what really sets this shawl apart. The body of the shawl is soothing knitting that is so easy to memorize. 

The yarn used is a 100% Merino fingering weight by Miss Babs but any fingering weight yarn will do. There is no reason you couldn't use leftovers as the variegated paired with one solid skein. I used ~25 grams of yarn for the bind-off by my testers are using between 16-25. If you are looking to make the shawl larger you could use all 400 of your variegated color and then have ~500 yards of the solid. That extra 100 yards should be enough for you to do the edging. 

                              

The style of this shawl makes it so that the stitch count isn't important at all except for keeping the shape of the shawl. I hope you have so much fun with Henness! Can't wait to see your combos, if you need inspiration you can check out the test knitters projects here! 

Happy Knitting! 

Sierra 

Pay What Works

When you've purchased a pattern from my store you've noticed that there are multiple options that you can  pay for pricing. This is the Pay What Works scale and it allows for a tiered pricing system to help makers on all income levels purchase my patterns. 

I have heard quite a few arguments that this makes people uncomfortable to use. As a knitter who lived on a strict budget in college, only people who have financial privilege feel uncomfortable with this system. They usually want to pay a lower price because it's available but they can really afford to pay the higher one. The price difference allows for me to get paid a fair wage for my patterns from people who can afford it. Pay What Works helps alleviate some of the privilege that is associated with the fibers arts world. 

There are many designers who find the idea intriguing but aren't sure its financially feasible. From my experience it most definitely is. 

These are all slides that I have up on my Instagram to help other designers decide whether or not this system works for them. It's hard to jump into this system without knowing if you'll make your money. I hope that if any designers or knitters have more questions for me that you'll send me an email. I'd love to help other makers open up their patterns to more knitters and make our amazing art accessible to more people at all income levels.