I decided to decrease my yarn stash by using up partial balls of Morris and Sons Empire 8 ply merino on this free shawl pattern called Kottarainen by Heidi Alander.

The original pattern uses two colours but I had three shades of green and three lighter colours of grey, beige and white, so I began with the darkest of the light colours and the lightest of the greens and switched colours as I ran out of yarn.

While the pattern was written for 4 ply yarn, this fabric is still wonderfully flexible, soft and cosy, and I now have a large 200cm x 72cm triangular shawl.

If you use the English version of the pattern, note that in the bind-off the k2tog is through the back loop – it seems like it from the instructions but I wasn’t certain until I checked the Finnish version to be certain.

A few more details can be found on my Ravelry project page for the Kottarainen shawl.