Once upon a time, my weekly knitting group decided no one ever knits for knitters, so we should knit for ourselves. Each year at the holiday party, we draw names and six months later at our anniversary party, we swap gifts in the form of things we’ve knit for each other.
I’ve received some terrific knitted items, a pair of socks, a felted bag that I carried everywhere for at least a year, a westknits cowl that I never would have knit for myself.
I’ve taken different approaches to what I knit each year. Sometimes, there are many consultations with other people, will so-and-so like this? Knitting by committee is definitely a thing with a project by a knitter, for a knitter, in a knitting group. One year, I openly blogged about it. One year, I forgot to take pictures almost entirely.
This year, it’s been completely secret! I didn’t share who I picked or what I was knitting at all. I mean, I told the group I was knitting a pink fringed poncho. We’re celebrating year 8, pretty sure no one believed me when I said that.
So, without further ado, I present this year’s super secret knitting…the Dragon Wing Cowl!
Details: Pattern – Dragon Wing Cowl by Jessie Rayot, Yarn – Cephalopod Yarns Beastie in Man-Eating Tree, My Ravelry Page.
The construction is super fun! You start off with a long garter stitch rectangle…
It’s got a series of increases to give you the wing effect. The spines come from dropping stitches all the way back to the cast on…
and then picking them back up in segments of stockinette stitch…
Lots of fun! and they look great!
Block the points out, add some real bone buttons…
and it’s a cowl fit for a Khalessi! Thanks to HBO, it seems like I planned this perfectly!
Best news of all, it was very well received and as soon as the recipient put it on, she had styled it better than anything I had managed to do in two months. That made me very happy! It was super as I finished it but it came to life as soon as she put it on. It was clearly meant to be!
And in true O.Henry fashion, she was the same person who picked my name! I’ll show you what she knit me after I’ve had some daylight to take pics! Hint: Cat Socks!!
FogKnits 
I love this knit!! Good choice of colour to. Never seen that drop stitch and pick up before. Its such a cool effect. Now I’m wondering if you could do this on a larger scale for a blanket….
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It would definitely work for a blanket! And depending on gauge, you can use as many strands of yarn as you like. This pattern called for 4 strands but you could definitely go 3 or 5 depending on the effect you want.
I didn’t take too many pictures of the edges but it creates a really lovely selvedge but placing the ladder/rehooked column one or two stitches in from the edge!
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I WANT ONE!! That is brilliant :D THe design and the yarn and the buttons – just perfect.
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When I went to buy the buttons, I wasn’t sure the guy who helped me was going to let me out of the store with it! He settled for taking pictures–lots of pictures! He said he had a leather working friend he’s love to show it too. I should go back and see if he talked his friend into making him a leather dragon wing!
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I’m not sure I would have let you leave either ;) This is definitely going on my to-do list
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Ooh, I was already thinking about knitting this (one of my friends has written some stories with pet dragons which curl around peoples necks) so now I’m veering even more towards doing that :D
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I wasn’t so sure about the pattern until I looked at all the other FOs on Ravelry. They all look great so that sealed the deal! There’s very few patterns where ALL the projects look good! Seems this one is fool proof!
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what a great idea to do like a knit “secret Santa”! your cowl looks great!! 😊
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That’s exactly what inspired us but there’s too much pressure with other christmas knitting, hence the picking names in december and giving ourselves until july to do the knitting :)
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What a great cowl! It looks like a really fun knit, too!
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Yup, that drop stitch was fun to do and super easy to pick up the stitches again!
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What a fabulous idea!!!! I want to do this with my knitter friends immediately!! Can’t imagine how much fun it would be to gift a knitter something like your wonderful cowl! :)
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Of course, we always oooohh and aaaahhh over each other’s knitting but it’s extra fun when it’s been a secret for six months!
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I love to swap and give gifts. This looks like a lot of fun too. How amazing is this! I bet it looks perfect. Well done.
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That cowl is beautiful! I love the cowl
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Wow, that is a grave project. Dropping all those stitches?! #hero
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Despite my worry, it was quite simple! I had fun doing it…definitely looks worse than it is!
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BRAVE, not grave.
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