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Something a Bit Different is something that normally feels a little tricky for me to get my head round. Last year I did a simple slide show of photographs set to music. I've done that one now and it wasn't particularly imaginative. It's hard for me to do things that require physical effort, such as "interpretative dance", which is always suggested for some reason. I did think of doing some live blogging thing but I am going out today to catch up with old friends. Therefore that plan is out of the window. So I've come up with this;
and this;
I am going to create a project from these yarns. It doesn't sound very different yet does it? Well here comes the interesting bit - you are going to help me design my project.
I'm going to start with a basic pattern that is already written, my More Than a Triangle Shawl pattern. It's a really simple pattern that creates a basic shape and in the photo below you can see a striped version I created.
So, with this pattern as the basis of the design, I am going to let you determine how the project knits up. I want you to leave a comment, and in that comment I want you to leave a number between 1 and 8, and where in the world you are, just country or state, nothing too specific. Each number represents one of the colours in the first photograph (I won't tell you which is which as I want it to be really random). I will then knit one stripe in that colour. The coloured stripes will be alternated with the cream coloured yarn in the second photograph.
I will knit the stripes determined by the comments left until I reach the end of the numbers, and then I will repeat that stripe pattern until I either run out of yarn or get a decent sized shawl. I want to know where each comment comes from not only out of sheer nosiness, but also because, as I said on the first day of this Knitting and Crochet Blog Week, I am excited about how this event draws people from across the world together.
Once I have knit the shawl I will put all the commenters into a random draw and the winner will get the finished shawl. Even if your stripe isn't included in the finished shawl, because I had loads of comments, you will be entered into the draw. I will, however, only keep the comments on this post open until the end of this event. I will close this contest at Midnight, GMT, on Monday 30th April.
The yarn is pure wool and it is approximately 3-4 ply in weight. You will have to hand wash the shawl, but I hope there will be enough people interested in the shawl, despite that, to get enough stripes to make a decent shawl size.
I can't promise how long it will take to finish. The above shawl took me 2 weeks but you might have to allow 2-3 months as I won't be working on the shawl exclusively.
I will blog about my progress on the shawl and I hope that you will be interested in the progress of something you have helped design! My comment system doesn't post until I approve each comment, so your number won't show immediately, which means no one will know what the preceding numbers are. I might end up with several stripes being the same colour or just three colours in the whole shawl.
I won't make the draw until the shawl is finished. I think my comment system makes you leave an email address so I should be able to get in touch with the winner, but even so, I will announce the winner in my "ta-dah, I've finished" post.
As you may have already guessed from my "tell me where you are" requirement, I will send the shawl to anywhere in the world, so anyone can enter. I hope you do join in with this Something A Bit Different, as now I have thought it up I'm kind of excited about placing myself in your hands. This will be a shawl created with input from around the world and will be sent to someone who joined in with the fun.
I look forward to casting on, help me get started!
UPDATE
I decided to make the start of the shawl begin with 30 rows of the main colour, to make sure that every stripe got a decent length. I have my main colour all done and I'm ready to start striping.
Apologies for the poor photo quality, it was taken with my phone using a flash because it is so dreary here today.
I've also picked random numbers and assigned them to the yarns. I then tied the numbers to the skeins so I don't forget which colour is which number.
I hope I haven't given anyone any clues as to which colour is which number! Thank you so much everyone who has left a number so far. It is so much fun finding out where everyone is reading.
Update @ 01/05/2012
I have started knitting the stripes now and this is what I have produced so far.
And you will be pleased to note that I am weaving in the ends as I go!
Comments are now closed!
