Fancy a Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy themed MKAL for August?

Yardage info

Please note these yardages apply to the yarn used in my sample (VFA Lux) a light fingering tencel yarn. For other yarns, please remember that your yarn usage may be different.

Small: row 132 uses 115g/488m/533y (From any point after this, you can BO after any row.)
Medium: row 145 uses 135g/572m/625y
Large: row 145, with 15 repeats of ending uses 193g/814m/890y.
Extended: In my sample, I extended the edging to row 176 using 209g/880m/970y. (It would be possible to extend for at least a further 20 repeats. Edging rows used 2.5g each.)

8g used to bind off (this is included in above figures).

Extension

If you still have a lot of yarn left..

The suggestion I was referring to was to widen the panels in the edging, as per the little chart on the left here. You can add quite a few extra rows that way.

From row 146 of Don’t Panic, it’s also possible to jump to row 31 of Draconis, if you happen to have this pattern. Then you can continue on as far as you like into that chart.
(Actually you can jump to either 24 or 31 - if you’d like another repeat of the 6 stitch wide repeat, go to 24, and if you’re ready to increase to the 8 stitch, go to 31.)

Dates

The design has five distinct parts to reflect the story. To keep the element of surprise in the design, the pattern has been separated into these parts, however each requires more knitting than the last. The release dates have therefore been spaced to reflect the amount of knitting involved.

Part 1: Aug 1
Part 2: Aug 3
Part 3: Aug 7
Part 4: Aug 12
Part 5: Aug 19

This is a semicircular shawl, like Illumine and Ren Fan. It’s not a simple expansion as in those patterns, but more a dynamic narrative full of transitions and echoes, as in the series itself.

While not recommended for beginner knitters, it may offer some nice challenge to intermediate knitters, and is unlikely to be any trouble for advanced knitters.

There are ‘no stitch’ squares, a variety of increases of the make x from 1 stitch variety, lots of double yarnovers, and there are a very small number of 3 into 2 sts and 9 into 2 sts.

On the other hand, the WS rows are generally restful, mostly purled across, with some double yarnovers, and a section of purl columns. The more challenging of these techniques are introduced in simpler forms which help built confidence, and none of the more complicated stitches are as hard as they sound on first hearing. It is a more challenging knit than Radiata/Ren Fan/Foliata/Illumine, but if you had no trouble with one of those, this should be manageable. (Remember, don’t panic! :)

Starting with 157+27+28-3g rem =209
(For comparison’s sake, this yarn works out to 420m/460y per 100g.)

Amy sent me 2 extra minis of end yardage, so I have deliberately used as much of this as possible in the run on ending. This is optional.

If you’re looking for a place holder image for your project, there are some beautiful (Creative Commons) images of galaxies and skies here.

34 beads per wedge, plus 5 at the starting side.
I used Miyuki 5/0 col lined sea blue, size 5 only so they’d be easy to see in the photos. 6/0 or 8/0 would probably be better.

Large size measures 160cm across the top, radius 80cm
Extended size 170 or larger/85 or larger.

This is for a half circle. To add extra wedges, divide above yardages by 8 to calculate amount per wedge.

Small (r132)115g/8=14.3g/61m/66.5y per wedge
Medium (r145)135g/8=16.6g/71m/78y per wedge
Standard size 193g/8=24.2g/102m/111y per wedge
Ext size (sample) 209g/8=26g/110m/121y per wedge

End of part 1: 9g used, 49 beads.
End part 2: 22g used, (135g rem) 16 beads.
End part 3: 45g used, 49 beads.
End part 4:68g used, 34 beads.
Part 5: 125g used to row 140 (large size), 105 beads. (253 beads total.)