New shawl pattern: Bougainvillea.

Bougainvillea pattern is available at introductory price of $1.99 until Thursday, April 12, 10pm PST. The pattern will be available for $5.00 after that. https://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/bougainvillea-7

Bougainvillea is my third design in the series of Shawls for Friends. I designed and knitted this shawl (the purple one in the pics) for my friend JoKaren, who is a fellow knitter I was lucky to meet some years ago through Ravelry. She is kind, wonderful person, supportive friend and has a great spirit about her. She has knitted so many things for others and I wanted to make something for her. A year ago she moved from the sunny California to cold Utah and I thought the lightweight and very warm alpaca shawl will be perfect for her. Also, unaware that this shawl was for her, she suggested the name Bougainvillea for this shawl when I asked for suggestions on my FB page. I hope she will like this surprise shawl ;-)

The yellow Bougainvillea shawl I made for myself. It uses one strand of fingering weight merino/silk and one strand of kidsilk. For details on this shawl see my project page: https://www.ravelry.com/projects/deenulya/bougainvillea-2
Happy knitting,
Diana

 

New Free Pattern: Sweet Nothing.

Sweet Nothing is an airy scarf/wrap with beautiful beaded picot bind off. This design takes advantage of the subtle difference in color and texture created by consecutively knitting with light kidsilk yarn and more darker alpaca. Alpaca stripe is knitted in st. st. and kidsilk stripe is knitted with dropped Yos to make it wider then alpaca stripe. “Sweet Nothing” can be easily worn for an evening out or for a casual occasion paired with an everyday outfit.

I have started this scarf as a travel project and then put it aside and finished it during the December holidays. Perfect little something to keep your hands busy when there is not enough time for more involved and complicated projects. Also, perfect project for watching Elementary ;-))
I wanted to use Miyuki beads for BO, but my favorite Bead shop near my house closed ;-((((( I could only find the Czech glass beads at Jo-Ann’s in the color I needed. Worked out well in the end.
6/0 Czech glass e-beads in colorway Crystal/Gold, about 74
A free pattern for this simple design is now available on Ravelry and my blog.
My project on Ravelry is here.

Happy knitting,

Diana

New design: Grandes études {Part I}

Today I would like to show you third design from my planned e-book “Variations on a Theme”.
Caprice No. 24 in A minor is the final caprice of Niccolò Paganini’s 24 Caprices, and a famous work for solo violin.
The caprice has provided a rich seam of material for works by many composers. One of them is Franz Liszt.
The Grandes études de Paganini are a series of six etudes for the piano by Franz Liszt. The pieces are all based on the compositions of Niccolò Paganini for violin.

 For this cowl I have used 3 skeins of Classic Elite Yarns Frescо (60% Wool, 30% Alpaca, 10% Angora, sport weight 5 ply) yarn. The yarn is so soft and pleasant to knit with. It is bouncy and shows stitches very well. The alpaca fuzz did not bother me at all. It is very slight and only visible on black.
Love how this cowl turned out :-) It folds so nicely around the neck and I love how the stitch pattern looks in a cowl. Some of you might recognize this stitch pattern from one of my previous designs "Iva". This stitch might look different from the rest of designs in “Variations on a Theme” collection, but it is not that different ;-) It is the same slipped stitich as in "Caprice No. 24" and "Rapsodiya" changed just a tiny bit. However, the resulting pattern looks dramatically different from the one used in the shawls.

My project called  Grandes études {Part I} and can be found on Ravelry here.
I am currently working on Grandes études {Part II}.
This pattern is going to be available with the rest of “Variations on a Theme” collection by mid March ;-)

Happy knitting,

Diana