Hogwarts Herald

While I don’t have time to knit up house scarves for all of my Potter Pals before the end of July, I do have time to knit one scarf to give away as a sort of “door prize.”

The contest could be:

- a guessing game - have a large number of pennies (un-inflated balloons, ) in a container and the person who guesses closest to the number wins;

- a trivia quiz that you create (or borrow from the internet) and the guest with the highest score wins;

- a random drawing of your guests’ names in a hat (a sorting hat, of course).

But, back to the scarf…

There are a multitude of Harry Potter inspired knitting projects on the internet (and, of course the new knitting book, Charmed Knits) and the most popular (and researched) item is the House Scarf. Knitters have, for years, discussed and debated the structure of the scarf, the number of rows, the height of the rows, the pattern (mostly influenced by the movies), and the color choices (the most bitter battle of all - book versus movie color schemes).

The general consensus, however, is that the original house scarf is long, has large stripes and is “knit in the round.” Knit in the round means that you use circular needles and, basically, make a long tube of color. The huge benefits of this method are that you can use just the knit stitch (no purling required) and your color join seams and weaving in are hidden inside the tube!

For colors - I’m going to make a Griffyndor house sweater in washable wool. I really like the colors from the movies - so I’ll use a burgundy and a yellow gold.

Materials: size 8 (or whatever size is recommended for the yarn you choose) 16″ circular needles
2 100g skeins of burgundy wool (about 400 yards total)
2 100g skeins of yellow/gold wool
stitch marker
crochet hook (for fringe)
yarn needle

Cast on 70 stitches with first color - place stitch marker at beginning of round.
Knit in the round for 23 more rows (total 24); switch to second yarn and knit another 24 rows. Knit as many stripes as you like - but do an odd number of stripes so that you end up with the blocks of the first color on either end of the scarf. Weave in ends as necessary.

For fringe - add fringe in alternating colors, again with an odd number. Trim fringe to even.