Mermaid Tail Cowl

This was a lovely little knit on Saturday.  I bought one lonely skein of NZ Naturally Harmony, an 8ply double knit pure wool at a local wool store and I knew I was going to knit a cowl.  I have used this wool once before for a cowl and it is so warm and cosy so I knew another one would be great.  I used a fabulous pattern called Mermaid Tail Cowl by Sarah Hood, found on Ravelry. 

I did make a couple of changes, it's called Knitters Licence when one does this.  I used a 4mm needle as this wool is slightly fulled and a little bit heavier than a double knit in my opinion.  The pattern suggests 5 pattern repeats but I didn't have that much wool so I only have 3 repeats which is just right for me.  The pattern uses 'K5tog' which translates to knitting the next 5 stitches together, this is a tricky lumpy manoeuvre.  I did some research in my Principles of Knitting text and discovered a good way to make this decrease centred and less lumpy, it goes like this.  Slip the first 3 stitches together knitwise from left needle to right, then do a SSK (slip, slip, knit) decrease which is the same as the more old fashioned or UK S1K1psso (slip one, knit one then pass slip stitch over) decrease, finally slip the 3 slipped stitches on the right needle over the SSK decreased stitch either individually or all 3 at the same time. 

This was a really satisfying quick knit and also very useful with the cold blast we've had straight off the snow fields.