Color Affection [Rachel Knits]

I love to knit and when I first started Tangled Yarn I thought there'd be lots of time during the day to knit. Mmm no, that's not how I spend my days, I do though get up extra early and try to do a few rows before I start work and my evenings are spent knitting which is great! I'm not the fastest knitter either, so I don't often have projects I can share, but just lately I've been working on Color Affection by Veera Välimäki. 

 Photo credit: Veera Välimäki 

I had seen on Ravelry that Rosy from Rosy Green Wool had knitted her Color Affection in Cheeky Merino Joy using the colours Cornish Slate, Isar Pebble and Moss.  I love this colour combination, but for my shawl, I wanted to include one of my all-time favourite colours, blue. So when the new limited edition shades of Cheeky Merino Joy arrived in late January, they spoke Color Affection to me and so I just had to cast on!

 "Cornish Slate, Isar Pebble & Moss" in Cheeky Merino Joy | Color Affection

Well what can I say other than my needles have been flying, I've loved every minute of this project from the yarn to the garter stitch stripes. There is a lot of garter stitch, but this project didn't get boring as the design incorporates short rows, which are the easiest short rows ever! There's lots of colour change with both blocks of colour and then stripes. I also find real comfort in knitting garter stitch; I think it's the memory of learning it as a child combined with the squishy fabric it produces. 

  "Feather, Fish & Magellan" in Cheeky Merino Joy | Color Affection

Color Affection is for anyone looking for a knitting project they can do while they have distractions around them.  So it's perfect if you are watching TV or at knit night. The pattern is well written and easy to follow with the option to knit in either a lace weight or 4ply/fingering weight yarn. 

Cheeky Merino Joy is considered a sport-weight yarn, but I followed the instructions for fingering weight, and I knit on a 4mm knitting needle. Take care when carrying the unused colours up the side of your shawl that they are not too tight. If you chose to knit in a superwash yarn, which is what Cheeky Merino Joy is, then don't over block your shawl, you don't want to lose any of the bounce from those wonderful garter stitch bumps.

I used the Icelandic Cast Off which I felt was just stretchy enough for garter stitch; I followed Clare Devine's video tutorial which was very helpful. Another cast off worthy of consideration is Elizabeth Zimmerman's Sewn Bind Off which was recommended to me by Sarah Knight from Crafts from the Cwtch, Sarah has a great tutorial on her website.  

If you chose to knit in a superwash yarn, which is what Cheeky Merino Joy is, then don't over block your shawl, you don't want to lose any of the bounce from those wonderful garter stitch bumps. 

WHERE TO PURCHASE THE COLOR AFFECTION PATTERN & CHEEKY MERINO JOY

Color Affection is available to purchase on Ravelry as a downloadable PDF.  Colour Affection

We carry the full range of colours in Cheeky Merino Joy, which is 100% organic merino. I used one skein of each of my three colours in Feather, Fish and Magellan, sadly these have now sold out, but there are an endless number of colour combinations if you fancy knitting Color Affection in Cheeky Merino Joy. What three colours would you choose?