Left-Handed Moebius Knitting!!!

What a HOOT!! Check this out...

Somewhere along the way in recent weeks, while trolling for small gift-friendly projects like scarves & neck-warmers, I ran across the Moebius cowl known as Harmonia's Rings by Sivia Harding. It uses Cat Bordhi's ingenious Moebius cast-on (YouTube instructions here), and I became so curious about what would happen if I tried the technique left-handed that I finally dove into my stash this morning and came up with some natural ivory Brown Sheep wool yarn that could be employed for an experimental run.

I had no trouble at all following the instructions and got it to work on the first try, simply by doing a mirror-image of whatever Cat Bordhi did. My lefty Moebius may be twisting the other way from the right-handed version. I can't quite tell. But that won't matter. It's a really fun knit, fast & easy. I'm using US size 9 (5.5 mm) needles, which are a real change of pace from my usual tiny-gauge stuff. Just click on the image above to get a closer look.

If this first attempt with the Brown Sheep works out as nicely as I expect, I'm hoping to make a second deluxe version of the same pattern with some mohair yarn that I have left over from about 20 years ago. I'll probably have to combine two different colors of the mohair, because I don't have enough of either one, so I wanted to complete the pattern in a single color first, both to learn the Moebius technique and to get to know the architecture of the design so that I could then decide how to place the colored bands.

If you can believe it, the pattern actually calls for a ring of *BEADS* around the neckline. Sivia Harding is nuts about beads, as she confesses in this often-cited Knitty editorial. I've ordered some special beads to go with the mohair (heck, it helped fill out the emergency order for the Queen of the Night's extra magatamas), but I'm not sure if I will try to pair anything with the ivory yarn or not. One of the topazes might work, or maybe I'll stick with a simple picot edging this time. We'll see...