Super Easy Curly Wurly Scarf

Are you looking for an easy, lazy knit for working on in the shade of a parasol during this glorious heat-wave? Well, I may just have the thing for you.

I recently put this pattern together for my lovely guests on the Spring Colours tour to the sunny Costa Brava. Knit with our own, double knitting weight variegated bamboo yarn, there's enough interest in the colour work of they yarn to sustain a fairly simple pattern. It made for a relaxed project for guests to work on without having to think too much about what came next, which was all the better for shooting the breeze and chilling out.

It's a really, really easy knit, worked in double knitting on 3.75 mm needles (UK size 9, US size 5). In garter stitch it knits to a tension of 20 stitches x 30 rows for a 10 cm square. To make a scarf that measures a very generous 158 cm you will need 3 balls of 50 g bamboo.

Ivy leaf wool wash

OK ... you're thinking. She's finally lost the plot. The sun has addled her brain.

But bear with me. There's been a lot written across the internet recently about how you can use ivy leaves as a wool detergent. With all this warm weather I don't have much need of my woollies, so it seemed the perfect time to get things laundered and try out this crazy idea.

I went off into the wilder reaches of the garden and gathered myself a big bowl of ivy leaves, which I washed under the tap to rid them of their cobwebs and dust. Next I tied the leaves in an old T-towel so that they wouldn't escape and mess around with the inner workings of my washing machine. I placed my trial woolly jumper in a mesh wash bag, and placed it in the machine along with the bundle of leaves and popped them on the wool-wash cycle.