Shrug saga part 1

Enter the shrug saga...
I've been thinking of making the Hot Lava shrug for a while, and recently Kish has been encouraging me to make a start (see Kish's shrug). I had around 450 g of hand dyed bulky yarn which I thought would be great for this project and even have an outfit to go with it.

So last week I swatched the yarn, and found my gauge was more like 8 than 12 ; so my yarn was actually extra bulky. Yes, I could have altered the pattern, but I was worried about the drape and also about my limited, non-repeatable amount of yarn. I was disappointed, but started surfing the web to look for another pattern. I was delighted to find that the designer of Hot Lava had just posted a new pattern, the Gray Ghost, for extra bulky yarn! Serendipity.

Of course, I bought the pattern and got going. I was away for Easter with 12 hours of car journey, which gave me plenty of time to complete the back and sleeves. The pattern is nice, easy holiday knitting, and I think shows off the beautiful handspun, handdyed Teeswater wool.



The next problem... I ran out of yarn. I know I started with 50g less than the pattern demands, but I think I'm going to need maybe another 150g. Now remember this yarn is non-repeatable; once it's gone, it's gone!

I needed an alternative to make the collar, front and waist. Digging deep into my stash, I found some bright pink, which did indeed match. I swatched it, but wasn't happy with it. The colour looked too stark against the soft variegated wool.



Next port of call was John Lewis (an exception to Stashalong granted as this was to finish a project). I found that the knitting wool department has been re-located from a prime spot on the ground floor to a poky corridor way up on the fourth floor! Still, a helpful assistant pulled yarns out of the stock room for me, and I found a kinda, sorta match with Rowan Soft Tweed.



Great, I can get started. Swatched the Rowan; it looked pretty good. Then I looked more closely in daylight. Hmm, it's nearly right, but a bit too pastel, and very matte. Fortunately, we had an informal SnB today, so I took the various wools and swatches along for a second opinion. Unfortunately, the general consensus was that the Rowan didn't work! Back to the drawing board...