I don’t usually create a vision board when I create a project. It’s more likely that I’ll bookmark a bunch of designs and have some sort of theme in mind, influenced by the colors of the yarn.

This seemed like a good project to build a quick vision board for and make a list of all the other patterns and designers that went into this idea. While most of this pattern is the free Texture Mix Scarf, there are some fun twists and turns ahead that stand out.

The photo of skeins I used in the vision board is courtesy of Cathy of Mooncat Fiber in Taos. She took photos of the Wooly Wonka kits she had for sale as New Mexico shut down in March. I didn’t have any pattern in mind at the time.

The color-way, which I thinks is called Chaco Love, always made me think of a photo I had taken during a visit to Chimney Rock in 2014 of a wall showing some Chacoan influenced construction with some golden grass growing on top. We’ve visited Chaco Canyon as well and live about 5 miles—as the crow flies—from Chimney Rock National Monument.

Fast-forward from March to earlier this month when Andrea Rangel posted a giveaway for the SKY ebook and the Morning and Evening scarf caught my eye. It was the inspiration I needed to jump into figuring out the oversized scarf I wanted to make.

It got me looking at mosaic knitting and how to use Jennifer Steingass’s motif in her Meadow Moon sweater yoke to represent the grass in my scarf. After two quick and failed attempts at figuring out how to turn the design into a mosaic version of the stranded color work, I decided to just duplicate all the stitches and knit in the round and create two sides. I had every intention to join them back together to meld back into the body of the scarf, i.e. pick back up with the Texture Mix Scarf Pattern. What I didn’t expect was how warm, cozy and perfectly sized the pocket that formed would be.

I embellished and finished it with some more garter stitch, and the plan formed to knit to the middle of the scarf and then start another pocket from the other side and join the two pieces together like Alexandra Tavel’s Coast to Coast Wrap. I also like the way she adds the border to the sides to finish it off. I’d like to add that to mine as well as the tassles if I have enough yarn.

I thought I might use some purple I have in the stash for the borders, but it seemed like it wouldn’t be enough and the tone blends with the browns. It wasn’t until I was driving to Durango, passing by Chimney Rock, that I realized what was missing. Trees! Chaco doesn’t have a lot of trees growing around, but around Chimney rock, evergreens march up the hillsides.

So I’ve ordered two different greens (Winterfell & Forest Primeval) from the only place to get Wooly Wonka yarn these days, Wall of Yarn. My order was in the mail within hours and should be here in a few days. I’m not sure what the knit pattern will be just yet, but I’m sure the yarns will tell me soon.

In the meantime, I’ve finished the first half of the scarf and started the second pocket. You’ll notice when I got to the diagonal stripes, I threw a little of the straw color back in using mosaic knitting. This idea comes from another textured, sampler sort of free pattern, Louise Robert’s, Knitting-101 Scarf.

If you need some more inspiration of textural, brick like scarf designs, check out my favorite scarf bundle.