Cast On, Cast Off

See that thing up there? That's my melon stitch scarf from Victorian Lace Today, as inspired by Grumperina. I just cast that sucker off. And as you may or may not know, casting off means only one thing: Completion nearing. Huzzah! I can't even begin to describe how long it's taken to make this wee little scarf. Small needles, thin yarn, and all those dainty stitches sure are time consuming. Though I suppose that's obvious.

Now a little bit about that strange blue blob at the bottom of the scarf. That's the cast-on method I chose. To be more precise, it's the "waste-yarn cast-on" from page 166 of the book. I wanted to give it a try out of curiosity more than function. The instructions merely said to cast-on with waste yarn, knit for four rows, switch to the main yarn, and then remove. Not very specific. And with the pull of the stitches when I did actually remove (thank the ninja gods I waited until the end), I wonder if I did it correctly.

Now for the bind-off/cast-off, which I really do find quite clever. I found a "lace cast off" from Elann. It's very tidy, but loose enough for knitting-on a border. My normal cast-offs tend to be quite tight unless I put forth great effort to make sure they're looser. And even then, the stitches still aren't loose enough to match all that effort. I'll definitely use this cast-off method again.