Knitting

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Stitch of the Week: Trinity Stitch

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trinity stitchBack in the day when my About site was young, I worked a swatch of some common knitting stitch almost weekly. (You can find them in my stitch pattern glossary.) I guess I got busy and had covered so many of the common ones that I started accidentally repeating myself, so I got out of the habit of doing it.

I also had a really bad camera back in the beginning, so some of these need to be reworked, or at least reshot if I could find the old swatches. Which maybe sharing them with you will inspire me to do.

In any case, I think it’s inspiring to look at different stitch patterns and see what people have done with them, so that’s what this stitch of the week post is for.

First up, trinity stitch. This is not an easy one to start with, because there are lots of similar stitch patterns that go by different names. You might also hear this one called blackberry stitch, bramble stitch, cluster stitch and I’m sure other things I’m forgetting right now.

To form it, you work three stitches into one stitch, then purl 3 together. Purling 3 together is rather a pain. Pointy needles will help.

Still, I like this bumpy stitch pattern, and once you get the hang of it, it’s not too much trouble. I’ve actually used it in two projects: a headband and a baby-sized prayer shawl.

Some other free projects that give you a chance to try this stitch include the Trinity Stitch Hat from BreadnBadger and Rag Lana’s Blackberry Street No. 1 scarf. And for a variation on trinity stitch that looks pretty much exactly the same, check out this post on Not Trinity Stitch at the Knitting Fiend/Diet Diary.

Have you ever used trinity stitch? I’d love to hear what you used it for.

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Knit a Mosaic Shawl Inspired by Mythology

Sometimes when I’m scrolling through Ravelry a pattern will catch my eye as much because of the name as the look of the design (which is a little hard to see in those little thumbnails sometimes, anyway). 

So it was with the Stellify shawl by Paola Albergamo. Stellify means to turn into a star, and the name and the story behind the shawl come from the story of Ariadne. The better known part of her story is that she helped Theseus escape from the Minotaur, but he then abandoned her. What comes after in many stories is that Dionysus found her, fell in love with her and later married her. 

When he threw her jeweled crown into the sky, the Corona Borealis constellation was formed. 

What does all this have to do with shawl knitting? 

The shawl itself looks like it has a scattering of stars on it, as if it, too, has been stellified. The shawl begins with an I-cord tap and is shaped into a triangular shawl with both lateral and central increases. I-cord edging is incorporated into the sides, and the colorwork is done with mosaic knitting, which means this shawl is easier than it looks. 

Mosaic knitting has you working with just one color per row, slipping stitches that appear in the other color to make the colorwork visible. Even better for people new to this kind of colorwork, the pattern includes written and charted instructions throughout so it should be easy to follow along. 

The pattern comes in two sizes (the larger one is shown here) and calls for two colors of fingering weight yarn. It looks great in black and yellow, but don’t miss the other projects on Ravelry to see other fun and beautiful color options. 

You can find the pattern in English and Italian on Ravelry. 

[Photo: Paola Albergamo]