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There is a yarn made by Lion Brand called Homespun. It is absolutely gorgeous, and oh-so-soft. It is a bulky weight textured yarn that is offered in a great array of colors. It knits quickly, and each 185-yard skein is enough to make a scarf.
It is evil.
I originally bought four skeins of the yarn to make the Comfort Shawl for a colleague with cancer. I cast on with my KnitPicks Options, and all was going well—for a few inches. Then my hands and forearms started to hurt. I set it aside.
Every few days I would pick up the shawl again... and be in pain a few rows later. When the shawl was about a foot long, I found a dropped stitch several rows down. I hadn't seen it earlier due to the texture of the yarn.
I frogged it.
I cast back on, this time on my plastic vintage size 11 straights (thank you, Jeanie's mom!). I knit a row. Squeak squeak squeak.
Did I mention that Homespun is acrylic? This usually doesn't bother me, but then again I'd never knit with plastic needles before. It wasn't quite as bad as nails on a chalkboard, but close. However, the pain that I had experienced using the Options went away, so problem solved.
Or so I thought. After knitting about a foot and a half of the shawl, I found another dropped stitch, several rows down. Damn damn damn!
Bye-bye shawl. Hello scarf. I ripped it back again and cast on a smaller number of stitches. As I came to the end of each row, I carefully checked for dropped stitches. And four days later, I had a scarf to wear with my beige trench coat.
As for the rest of the Homespun, it's going to a knitter who knits hats for charity. She is welcome to it. The pain, the squeaking, and the dropped stitches just about sent me over the edge. I don't know how many times I swore I'd never ever buy this yarn again.
But it is quite pretty. So maybe I'd buy it again. But just for a scarf... I swear!
(The bowl was made by my friend and colleague Linda. Among Linda's many talents are crocheting, knitting, spinning, and throwing pottery. She gave me this bowl for Christmas.)
Yarn
Lion Brand Homespun in Meadow
Needles
Size 11, 8 mm
Pattern
Cast on 18 stitches. Garter stitch all rows until skein is nearly used. Bind off.
1 comment:
I have similar feelings about Homespun. So pretty! Warm but lightweight! So many colors! But gads, the squeaking and the pain. My fingers hurt as I knit with it. It's impossible to crochet with, as it's so easy to hook extra fibers. All in all, I've got to give this a big thumbs-down.
That's a lovely scarf, though! :)
Shannon
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