The Phoenix has risen!
In the fall of 2019 I purchased a large quantity of discontinued Dark Horse Yarn from a yarn liquidator. The yarn is beautiful and was very inexpensive and I was in the midst of knitting blankets for friends. Therefore, I purchased 4 different colors of the Boucle yarn. Very soon after receiving them I started a blanket with my favorite of the colors, #18. I do not know what the official color name is as I believe Dark Horse has gone out of business and I can't look it up. Their website is still up but isn't fully functioning. You can still find their yarns for sale on eBay if interested.
Anyway, I started a blanket with color #18, which is a white to red to black mix as you can see in the photo. Because it is a boucle, it can be a bit difficult to work with. The loops get caught on the needle tips all the time! But this was my first foray into boucle yarn and I was excited to knit something new. Plus, I was also using size 15 needles for the first time and the knitting was going quickly, minus the snags on the loops.
After several skeins I realized a problem with the yarn dye. Even though I purchased 4 bags of skeins with all identical dye lot numbers the color shade varied from skein to skein. This became noticeable once knitted up, especially where one skein stopped and another started. I am a bit of a perfectionist and this was my first blanket I was creating with the intention of selling, so that wasn't tolerable. I left it to sit, frustrated, and perhaps a bit enlightened as to why the yarn was discontinued and inexpensive.
After some time away from the project, it occurred to me how I might remedy the situation. I divided the yarn into two piles, those that looked darker and those that looked lighter. Then I switched between the two while knitting. I knitted 2 rows in the darker yarn then 2 rows in the lighter yarn and then back again, as if I was knitting with two entirely different colors. Because the yarn is a boucle, with no discernible yarn definition, the two shades blended. Viola!
After fixing that problem I now had a new one. I had to pullout 3 feet of work, which is never a fun thing to do. The project sat again and since my yarn stash is plentiful it was very easy to start another project in the mean time. And another one. And another one. Over a year and half later the blanket was still in a bag, in a tote, patiently waiting for me. I was reorganizing my yarn stash earlier this month and found the neglected project. It spoke to me and told me it was time to work on it again. I took it out of storage, unraveled it into two big balls, one dark and one light, and started the blanket anew.
By now, Metz and I had started this business and I started naming my knit creations. When I started knitting the blanket again I thought, what am I going to call this one? Immediately, because of the color and the story behind it, the name Phoenix came to mind. So utterly obvious and fitting. I can't wait to finish it and for someone to find it a home!