Crossed Rib Cowl: A Free Crochet Pattern

Normally here in Utah February is still pretty cold. We still have snowy days and have to bundle up to go outside. This year however, has been a little strange. I think the only real snow storm that we have had all winter was on Christmas. It has been unusually warm this winter with no snow. Most days a sweatshirt or light jacket is plenty, some days you don't even need that. For a while every day was in the mid to high 60's, it has gotten a little colder but still not normal for here. The crazy part is that I keep hearing about all of these massive snow and ice storms in other parts of the country. If you live in Utah, today's post may be kind of pointless since you probably don't have a need for a little cowl to keep your neck warm. But, if you live in one of the places getting tons of snow maybe there is still a little bit of scarf weather left for you. 

Today I am sharing the pattern for this little ribbed cowl. I made it using the same yarn that I made my Lace Cluster Scarf with. It is Alpaca Dance by Deborah Norville in Cornflower. It is a medium weight yarn and Ravelry lists it as aran but I feel like it is on the lighter side of medium weight yarns. I bought a couple of skeins really cheap on clearance at JoAnn's last year. I thought it would be kind of fun to try a new yarn and the price was low enough that I figured I wouldn't be out much if I didn't like it. It is a nice soft yarn but I have kind of had a hard time finding patterns that I feel work well with it. I wanted to use it to make scarfs because it is a yarn that needs to be hand washed and in my opinion that means that any clothing items or blankets are out. That pretty much leaves accessories. I have tried several different stitches that I thought would make a pretty scarf but because the yarn has kind of a fuzziness to it some stitches just haven't worked well. I wouldn't recommend it for something really lacy or where you really want to see the stitches. There is just to much of a halo effect from the yarn. 

I decided that since lacy stitches didn't work well I would try texture. This is what I came up with. The stitch uses crossed stitches and post stitches to create sort of a ribbed texture. It creates a relatively thick fabric because of the use of post stitches which makes it kind of nice for a scarf. I think it would be fun to try this stitch with a thicker yarn, it would make a nice thick, chunky scarf.

I decided to just make a small cowl/neckwarmer size scarf this time mainly because I wanted a project that I could finish quickly. I have several projects that I have started recently and they are all kind of big so I wanted a smaller, quicker project. Turns out I am glad I went that route because this is kind of a slow progress stitch. Every other row is single crochet and in the other rows you are working some of the time around the post of a stitch two rows below so you don't get the height that you normally would. It still didn't take too long to make and I was able to fill that need for a quick finish.

My finished cowl is about 13 inches across when laid flat and about 7 inches tall. It would be easy to adjust to any size because the beginning chain is a multiple of 3. I started with 90 so if you want it longer just add more chains in threes until you have the length you want. Or you could use a thicker yarn and a bigger hook in which case maybe 90 would make it longer than you want, just subtract a multiple of 3 to get to the size you want. The height is even easier to adjust, stop adding more rows when it is as tall as you want.

Crossed Rib Cowl

You will need:

• medium weight yarn (I used Alpaca Dance in Cornflower)
• I crochet hook
• yarn needle for weaving in ends

Start by chaining 90, slip stitch to first chain to make a circle

Round 1: ch 1, sc in each ch, slip stitch to first sc (90 sc)

Round 2: ch 1, sc in each stitch, slip stitch to first sc (90 sc)

Round 3: ch 4 (1dc and 1ch), work 1 dc 2 stitches behind, (skip 2, dc, ch 1, dc in first skipped stitch) repeat around, join to 3rd ch of starting ch 4 (30 x's/60 dc and 30 ch spaces)

Round 4: ch 1, sc in each dc and ch space, join to first sc (90 sc)

Round 5: slip stitch in next two stitches, ch 4 (this should be over the top of the second leg of the x), work a front post dc (fpdc) around the first leg of the x in row 3 (the first dc/ch 3 worked in that row) you will be crossing behind to work in this stitch, [skip the next 2 stitches (see picture 1 below), dc in next stitch (see picture 2), ch 1, fpdc around the dc below the first skipped stitch (see picture 3 and 4)] repeat around, join to 3rd ch of starting ch4 (30 dc, 30 fpdc, 30 ch spaces)

Repeat rows 4 and 5 ten more times or until desired height is reached. Repeat row 4 one more time.

Final row: ch 1, sc in each stitch, slip stitch to first sc (90 sc)

Finish off, weave in ends and enjoy your new cowl.