Knitting Tips: Should You Block a Cowl?

I just finished knitting a mosaic knit cowl (I’ll share the pattern when it’s live next week!) and I knew that I needed to block it before I took photographs because blocking helps even out the stitches and makes it look nice and smooth when the tension on colorwork isn’t always even.

You might think that you don’t need to block things like cowls and scarves since they don’t need to be a particular size, but Olive Knits makes a good several arguments for why you might want to give them that finishing touch.

I will fully admit that I don’t block everything I knit, but I never regret taking the time to do it. So I probably should block everything. Maybe you should, too?

Check out the very valid reasons you should block your knit cowls on Olive Knits, and let me know: do you block cowls and other projects that don’t need to be a specific size?

[Photo: Olive Knits.]

Next Pattern:

One great thing to knit when the weather is warm (or honestly any other time) is dishcloths and washcloths. They are fun and easy projects and a great way to play with new skills. Pretty washcloths make cleaning a tiny bit more fun, and they’re great to have on hand as a quick addition to a store-bought gift.

The Daisy Delight Dishcloth from Yarnspirations is a fun one for using leftover bits of green in your cotton yarn stash. What looks like the bottom in the picture is actually the left side as you knit it, and each little color section is worked with its own ball of yarn, intarsia style.

That’s a little fiddly for a washcloth, but the effect is cute, and it’s a simple way to learn the basics of intarsia knitting (as well as reading a chart) if you don’t already have those skills.

One the knitting is done, you add the flowers with a bit of lazy daisy embroidery, which is really easy to do even if you’re not that into embroidery. You could also potentially add flowers in duplicate stitch if you’d rather.

This may be the most work you’ve put into a dishcloth, but isn’t it adorable? It would be fun to use as a hand towel through the spring and summer, and if you already have some leftover green yarn from other projects it should be pretty easy to do.

You could also take this same concept and make it different colors. All dark green stems with stars on top might be reminiscent of Christmas trees, or brown with daisy stitch on top in different colors could be trees in the fall.

However you stitch it, this looks like a fun little project for knitters who are comfortable with intarsia and reading charts or who are ready to try those skills.

You can grab the free pattern from Yarnspirations.

[Photo: Yarnspirations]

Book Review – Dishcloths for Special Days [Knitting]

Book Review – Holiday Knit Dishcloths

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Have you read?