The color of the yarn caught my eye and I was looking for 200 yards of yarn for the “198 yards of heaven” pattern. After starting on that with this very fine lace weight yarn I frogged it, deciding that this is not a good yarn for that pattern. I found the Kuusk pattern which I immediately felt attracted to on knitty.com, however the pattern calls for 220 yards. The designer Ashley Knowlton was very nice to get back to me with the advise to keep the designed width, but do less lace repeats: “That’s a good question! I think reducing the number of horizontal repeats would be an ideal option; making it shorter would, I think, make it a bit too short. I wouldn’t personally use a smaller needle, but that could work as well, though I would be afraid of still coming up a bit short for yardage. I think fewer repeats would be the best option”
After a lot of thinking and fretting about it I ended up casting on 100 instead of 120 stitches for an approximately 20 inch instead of a 24 inch version (5 lace repeats). I tried it on after the first five rows and think that I am on the right track to get the look I am after. I want it to fit fairly snug around my neck to keep me warm in winter.
Thanks to my friend “BobbiUnraveled” I have no difficulty making the nupps. She sent me a link to this you tube video for easy peasy nupps. Click on this link to see for yourself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GSIzYLbasHY.

I used the sewn bind off to have a stretchy bind off which I may pull out over my shoulders a little. Now I just have to block my kuusk and it’s done. I feel as if I was trying to catch the summer sun to preserve for winter and I think that’s how I feel when I am looking at this cowl. I like it a lot :) It will go well with much of my wardrobe, my dark-brown winter coat for example.