Warmup Excercises

This has been a fruitful summer. I've been dyeing out here in the heat, from cool blues and cooled-down reds and browns to a sunset-inspired set and even an attempt at Noro-style long-striping patterns. In fact, it's the "seconds" from this that I felt I could play with that led into a cabled hat with earflaps, for which I'm writing a pattern currently.

The hat, however, is merely a warmup for the next thing I've signed up for: a commission for a For those not familiar with this bit of pop geekery, Doctor Who, which first aired on the BBC in 1963, is not only the longest running sci-fi show on TV, but, even accounting for a major hiatus, from the early 80s to the mid-naughts, it has run for over 30 seasons, making it one of the longest running non-news shows of any genre. There have been, to date, 11 actors who have played the time-traveling Dr. Who, each of whom develops a particular take on the character. Dr. Who scarf. Tom Baker, as the fourth iteration of the Doctor, quite notably wore a series of exceedingly long striped, knit scarves. The longest of these measured in at nearly 20 ft. Even the shortest of them was nearly 14 ft long.

So, I'm making one of these. And it needs to be done by the beginning of the school year, or I don't know when it will actually get finished. A friend from my knitting group worked on his for well over a year, and, since he moved away before it was done, I'm not sure if he ever finished it. I realize that Though there is rigorous documentation of how to make an exact replica at a website dedicated to this subject, Commissioner Shalinor is looking for a somewhat more interpretive version with some change in color, with more of a focus on greens than browns, and is looking for a scarf that is only 12-14 ft. long.

Initial swatches suggest that at the designated width of about 8", I knit at a rate of about an inch every 5 minutes, which means about a foot each hour. I figure that I can pull this out in two weeks without any kind of grueling heroics, as much as you can have them with a knitting project (holidays and other gift-worthy celebrations aside of course—then comes the blood, sweat and tears). Still, it's anticipating a rate of completion that is unlike anything I would expect during the school year, so I will be documenting its progress here.

The yarn (which I ordered for a variety of reasons) should get here sometime today. Up until then, it's a race of seeing how much pattern-writing I can get done before then. My warmup project worked too well: originally my challenge was just to finish a hat.