V-Stitch Scarf

Some months ago I watched my friend Rachel work on a v-stitch crocheted blanket and completely fell in love with the repeating zigzag pattern. It's easier than a ripple or chevron design, without any need for counting, but so effective and pleasing to the eye. Rachel referred me to the lovely (and new to me) blog Le Monde De Sucrette and Angie's pattern for her v-stitch design. I didn't want to make a blanket, but I did have a bag of scraps and half balls of cashmerino yarn, and a yearning to make something cosy and mindlessly enjoyable over the Christmas period, and I thought it might be a good basis for a scarf. 

Cashmerino is a yarn I like to use very much as it's soft, easy to work with, washes well, and comes in a good selection of colours. My stash looked like this:

I added more green, yellow and white, to balance it out a bit. Funny how all stash-busting projects seem to involve buying more yarn...

I decided to separate each row of colour with a row of white (partly to stretch my leftovers as far as possible) and I really like how this came out. It looks fresh and crisp. Although, I have to be honest, darning in the ends took as long as crocheting a row. 

I made it long, long enough to wrap all the way round my neck once then still knot loosely underneath. I kept thinking it was nearly there, but no...a bit further.

The colours are supposed to look random but, let's not kid ourselves, you all know I worked out how much I had left of each colour and wrote out a chart. 

And then the question of whether to add a fringe or not. People suggested pompoms, but I didn't have enough yarn. I tried an all white fringe but thought it looked a bit boring.

In the end I decided on a multicoloured fringe, using the six colours I had left with white between each, just like the scarf. I kept it short and neat and have to say I love how it came out. It is just fringe-y enough without being too long.

It measures 94 cm or 37 inches long and 21 cm or 8 inches wide and kept my neck warm all day today.

I don't have a name for it. I am rubbish at naming things I make and can't think of anything beyond "my V stitch scarf". But I like how the colours have a bit of winter and spring in them, a sort of crossing over of the seasons. A reminder that spring is coming.