Some of my favourite travel souvenirs have been fabric or yarn.

This scrumptiously soft possum/merino blend was bought in Te Anau, New Zealand when we were on holiday in January 2018. I could not resist the colour. The yarn is Amuri 4 ply, from Naturally. The possum fur component is 25%. Possums are a huge pest in New Zealand (they’re an Australian import, not native to New Zealand and they cause significant environmental damage). Possum fur is incredibly light and warm, and makes a fabulous yarn. It’s taken a little while to decide on a pattern that would do it justice.

The outdoor photos show the yarn colour more accurately than the indoor ones, but the indoor ones show you the stitch definition a little better! The pattern is Leaves Shawl, by Ana D. I enjoyed crocheting this so much that I have bought more of her patterns.

This has been designed so that there is a little ‘hole’ to thread the pointed end of the shawl through, which helps to keep it in place. A clever design trick! Once I got the hang of the pattern repeat it became quite fast to crochet. There was a pleasing combination of lace edging (requiring a little concentration) and solid (mindless tv watching crochet).

As with most crochet (and knitting) this really benefitted from blocking. I tend to just steam block smaller projects like this one, smoothing and pressing the crocheted fabric into place after a huge blast of steam. This technique seems to work quite well for me.

I’m currently crocheting cotton placemats while I wait on some yarn to arrive for a poncho type garment – although at the rate that the weather is warming up, that might be for next winter!