Scarfing Along

My RSVP (Retired and Senior Volunteer Program ) charity knitting group makes hats, scarves, slippers, laprobes, etc. for local nursing homes and a hospice group, among others. We use donated acrylic yarn; today we got some with a Montgomery Ward label. That's HOW old??? We have a holiday boutique in November to raise money for support of local causes that can't use our knitted, crocheted or quilted items. Plus one of the groups we support has a holiday party for their kids, who are in the foster care system, and they want 80, yeah, EIGHTY, scarves by mid-November. Last year they didn't ask until October, and my group all had aching fingers.

Anyway, I've been trying to complete my mental quota of scarves and hats so I can clear the way for my planned Christmas gift knitting. The last couple of weeks have been productive, and I'm showing off my latest - and nearly the last - FOs. I've sworn off using basic Red Heart acrylic, since I've come to hate to work with it. So I'm finding slightly better acrylics and having fun making the most of the colors even in simple designs.

The V-shaped design is Angular Angus, a free pattern from Silke Hupka , who designed the charming Edgar scarf in the Fall 2005 Knitty. The yarn is TLC Essentials acrylic. The 'tiger' striped scarf and hats are made with a new-to-me and rather nice Bernat acrylic called Camouflage, in the Outback colorway. The jewel-toned scarf is Paton's Rumor yarn, worked with a strand of plain black. The photo doesn't do it justice: the colors are vivid and opalescent. My friend J said she thinks it looks as if it is beaded. ;-)

The scarf in blues and tans is my first project using Paton's new SWS yarn (one skein), which is 70% wool, 30% soy. It knits rather nicely, though frogging means dealing with a few snarls of fibers stuck together. I tried a horizontal design first, but that left inch-wide stripes that didn't show a nice color change.

Sorry for the boring line-up of photos; I haven't gotten the knack yet, and accidentally backspaced a couple into oblivion. Grr. I think I saw a link to a utility program that will help, but that was in the middle of the umpteen help screens I've used so far.