As soon as I saw this beautiful yarn from My Yarn Place I knew I had to get some! First, of course, it’s completely gorgeous, and it’s hand-dyed in North Wales, which is where my husband’s from, and it’s named after the Welsh patron saint of lovers, St Dwynwen, the Welsh equivalent of St Valentine. Through my husband, I also happen to know someone with this name, so making her a gift with this yarn gave me the perfect reason to try it out.
Here it is: a gorgeous peachy pink speckled yarn, made from 100% superwash Polwarth wool, making it soft and easy to care for.
I’d already decided to make an infinity scarf, and here are a few pics of the finished item. I’ve named the item after the beautiful walled town in North Wales sitting right on the River Conwy, home to home to Conwy Castle, close to where this yarn was created.
Before starting work on the scarf I experimented with the yarn by swatching with several different hooks and stitches. Eventually I landed on Lemon Peel Stitch (LPS) – alternating sc and dc, sometimes known as griddle stitch – which I thought created a soft and feminine texture that complemented the yarn well. The 5.5 mm hook is a bit larger than is usually recommended for DK yarn, but I chose it for extra drape.
I’d intended to put one twist in the scarf but accidentally ended up with two which I decided to leave in, as I liked the effect. I really think the twist(s) give it a more organic look and make it easy to wear.
I like the length, too. I think it gives it versatility, with more options for styling and wearing in different ways. And I wanted it to be long enough to go over the head a few times without unduly disturbing a beautifully coiffed hairstyle.
What I Did
My supplies were:
- Stitch Markers
- Two 100g skeins of Dwynwen DK yarn
- 5.5 mm crochet hook
- Ruler or tape measure
- Scissors
- Tapestry needle for weaving in ends.
If you’re interested in making something similar, here are the steps I followed:
- First I grabbed a long scarf of my own and wrapped it round my neck a few times until I created the sort of effect I was aiming for. I measured the amount of scarf I’d used, roughly 220 cms (87”). That would be my length (actually, circumference).
- Next, I chained with my 5.5 mm hook until reaching a length of 220 cms. I did NOT count the number of chains! (Actually LPS does need an even number of stitches but I didn’t count. If necessary I would have simply adjusted by adding an extra stitch at the end of my first round.)
- At the end of my chain I slip stitched to the first chain, leaving one twist in the chain.
- Then worked alternate sc and dc all around the chain, then sl st to join, ch1 and turn.
- And next, worked back in the other direction, working all around with 1 sc into the top of every dc, and 1 dc into the top of every sc to form the LPS pattern.
- I continued until I was nearly out of yarn. In my case I got to a width of 11 cms (4.3”). I didn’t count the number of rounds but from the photos it looks as though it might be 17.
How Did I Know When to Stop?
As I was approaching the end of my second skein, I naturally began to wonder how I could avoid running out of yarn midway through a round. So here are the steps and calculations I followed to make sure that didn’t happen:
1. How much yarn do I need for a full round?
- The circumference of my scarf is 220 cms.
- I needed to know how much yarn I was using for a given length in my chosen stitch. It happened that I had 48 cms of a new round already worked so to keep things simple I undid those stitches and measured how much yarn had been used to create the 48 cms. I then wrapped the undone yarn around my ruler (which measures 46 cms) and noted it wrapped completely around five full times, with roughly one length left over. So that’s 5 x 2 lengths of the ruler, plus one single length of the ruler, multiplied by 46 cms (the length of the ruler).
That is:
((5 x 2) + 1) x 46 cms =
(10 + 1) x 46 cms =
11 x 46 cms =
506 cms of yarn needed to create 48 cms of LPS. - Of course, I needed 220 cms of LPS, not 48 cms, to complete another round. And since 220 ÷ 48 = 4.58, I needed 4.58 x 506 cms of yarn to create 220 cms of LPS.
That is: 4.58 x 506 cms = 2317 cms of yarned needed to create 220 cms of LPS.
2. How much yarn do I have?
- Again, I used my trusty ruler as a measuring stick and found that the yarn remaining in my skein wrapped fully around the ruler almost exactly 22 times. Thus the yarn I had remaining was:
22 x 2 lengths of the ruler x 46 cms (length of ruler) =
22 x 2 x 46 = 2024 cms yarn remaining.
- Now, the yarn needed was 2317 cms whilst the yarn remaining was only 2024 cms. Clearly the yarn I had was insufficient. Although my methods weren’t 100% accurate or precise, I didn’t want to take any chances so called it a day at the end of the round I was then working. At this point the scarf measured 11 cms in width in any case, which I felt was about right.
I then had some yarn left over at the end of the project which I rolled up and gifted to my friend along with the scarf to keep in case it was needed for repairs at any future point.
There we have it. I hope you’ve found these notes helpful and would love to see your work if you decide to create something similar.
Thanks for dropping by!
Debra x
P.S. You can follow My Yarn Place on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/myyarnplace/.
