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Yarn From Milk?

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This Spring, [tag]South West Trading Company[/tag] released the [tag]Vickie Howell Collection[/tag], a set of three types of yarn. These are [tag]Craft[/tag], made of 35% [tag]Milk Fiber[/tag] and 65% Organic Cotton; [tag]Rock[/tag], made of 40% [tag]Soysilk[/tag], 30% fine [tag]wool[/tag], and 30% [tag]hemp[/tag]; and [tag]Love[/tag], made of 70% [tag]Bamboo[/tag] and 30% [tag]Silk[/tag].

According to [tag]Knitting News Cast[/tag] review of the milk fiber yarn, the organic cotton has a softness and a wonderful drape due to the presence of the 35% milk fiber.

Stefanie Japel of [tag]Glampyre Knits[/tag] used both the Craft and the Rock in creating patterns for SWTC. She mentioned that she liked the yarns and loved the way they worked up.

Other than stores that sell the products, I haven’t been able to find any sites, blogs or usenets that have mentioned these yarns. They really sound like a wonderful addition to the yarn world and would certainly help those who are allergic to wool have additional choices in fiber.

Comments please if you have found the Vickie Howell Collection yarns at your LYS.

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Comments

  2. Thanks Rhonda. I wanted to find more opinions of the yarn also. No one is writing comments on the ‘net about the yarn. Is it because it is hard to get, too expensive, or is everyone in the pool? 🙂

    Laura

Have you read?

Stitch a Scarf with Dreamy Waves

As I write this, it’s probably time to start thinking about winter knitting if you haven’t already. And it’s definitely time to think about gift knitting if you have any of that you plan to do for the holidays.

The Dreamy Waves Scarf from Knit Picks, designed by Stacey Winklepleck, would be a great project to go in either category.

It uses two different multicolored yarns and a simple repeating wave pattern to make a project that looks a lot more complicated and dramatic than it is. The gradient look happens naturally just by switching which yarn you’re knitting with.

This pattern uses worsted weight yarn so it’s a pretty quick project even though a scarf is large and this one is pretty wide. It measures 8.5 inches (21.5 cm) wide and 63 inches or 120 cm long. Of course you can make it longer or shorter as you like. As written it takes one ball of each color so it’s a pretty economical project, too.

It’s rated for intermediate knitters but if you know how to do various increases and decreases you’ll be all set. The pattern uses knit 2 together, make 1 left and right, centered double decrease and slip slip knit. All of the stitches are explained in a glossary in the pattern so even if you haven’t done all of them it shouldn’t be too hard to figure out.

The pattern also includes tons of options for different colorways in yarn that Knit Picks sells,  so you can see how different combinations knit up before you buy the yarn. That’s such a great idea!

Of course if you already have two multicolored yarns with long color runs on hand, you can absolutely use them, too. It might also be fun, but would give you a totally different look, to use a solid color and a bunch of scraps or one multicolored yarn to see how the different colors play together. So many options!

You can grab this free pattern and check out all the color options at Knit Picks.

[Photo: Knit Picks]

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