Classy* Baby Scarf

Sometimes yarn remnants sit in my stash for ages with no identifiable future.  Other times, their destiny becomes obvious.  When I made the Tulip sweater for Ms. Z, I had bits of all the colors left over.  At the time, I was not entirely sure what to do with the bits, but they were far too pretty to condemn to the stuffing bin.  Once I had a mobile winter outdoor-going toddler, their ultimate home became clear.

I might not be able to convince her to wear mittens, but I didn't think she'd have a problem with a scarf (or, more to the point, I didn't think she would be able to figure out how to get the scarf off once she was bundled into her coat).

The scarf is knit in the same color order as the sweater.  I knit with each color until I ran out.  Since I had different amounts of each yarn, that meant that I got a lovely, random rainbow scarf.


It ended up being an almost perfect length for a toddler.  In fact, I think she's likely to get more than one year out of it.

I wanted a pattern that would lay flat, but still not be deadly boring to knit.  So I started out with K2 P2 rib and then on every right side row I shifted the pattern one stitch to the right or one stitch to the left depending on which color I was knitting -- every time I changed colors, I changed the direction of the shift.  This pattern resulted in something that both kept me entertained and created a fun textural detail in the scarf.

Simple, fun, washable and soft -- perfect for an inquisitive toddler girl with an active lifestyle.

The scarf's first outing was to one  of my mom's LYS -- Knit Around.  Z has a habit of going crazy whenever I let her near my stash, grabbing yarn and throwing it everywhere before finally grabbing something and running off all over our upstairs with it (which is completely forgiven when she looks at me and says "Yarn, Momma.  Yarn!") so I figured I needed to be prepared for similar exuberant behaviour in a yarn store, even with grandma helping to keep an eye on her.  I also figured that a baby in hand knits might be more easily forgiven her transgressions.  I need not have worried.  Knit Around has a toy box near the front of the store (and a coffee machine and two lovely seating areas -- it's a store that I like a great deal) and once she discovered those toys, you would hardly have known she was there.  So both momma and baby had a good time and both momma and Grandma came a way with sock yarn.  A good time for all concerned.  Z left the store with a sucker.  The scarf got sticky, but the baby was happy.  And that is what superwash scarves are all about!

And even better, Z never tried to take her scarf off

* Updated to add... I can't believe that I forgot to mention that the yarn is Dream in Color Classy.  Nice yarn for baby sweaters and scarves.