October wasn’t a great month for me. I had a pretty bad car accident and whilst I wasn’t badly hurt it really shook me up and took a while for me to get my head around what had happened.
It did mean that my head wasn’t in a good place for work and dealing with spreadsheets and data and instead I focussed on some new designs. Working out the crown decreases on a hat was just enough to absorb me and if my mind wandered and I messed up I could just pull it back and no harm done.
It all started with a hat in a stitch pattern that I had wanted to do something with for a while. I worked out one version and then almost immediately did a modification. I tried to decide which I thought looked best but wasn’t being especially decisive and figured it came down to a matter of preference. Once the hat was in testing I woke up one morning and over my morning coffee the idea of matching mittens came to mind. As I had two styles of hat, that meant two styles of fingerless mitts to match. These came together surprisingly quickly and were put out to testing. Then the idea of a cowl came along. This was a very simple proposition so I worked out a pattern and put that to testing. By this point I decided to stop and really needed to get back to the day job.
Anyway, here are the fruits of my labour very kindly modelled by my friend Debbie. As you may recognise the therapeutic value of this project was enhanced greatly by working in Malabrigo Merino Worsted – so soft and such lovely colours.
Anyway, with 6 patterns, 2 sets of hat, mitts and cowl. I decided to put them altogether in the Small World Collection. The picture on the lect shows the Lily set and on the right is the Angelica set. As these were variations on a theme I named them after the twins, Lily and Angelica in David Lodge’s novel ‘Small World’ after which the whole collection was named.
Each hat, pair of mittens or cowl can be knitted from just one skein of Malabrigo Merino Worsted so a single skein would allow you to knit any two patterns. This yarn is substantial and so incredibly soft it’s a joy to work with and amazingly warm and snuggly to wear even with the lacy stitch pattern. Perfect quick and easy patterns for last-minute Christmas gifts.
The Small World pattern collection containing all 6 patterns is available from Ravelry for £5.00 
The Collection is laid out so each pattern can be printed out as a stand alone pattern as and when you need it.
Each pattern is also available singly from my Ravelry Store
Sorry to read that you had a car accident