Harvest Moon Pocket Shawl – Crochet Pattern Review – Crochet With Carrie

This is a crochet pattern review of the Harvest Moon Pocket Shawl pattern from designer Crochet With Carrie. Review done by A Stitch Shy of Normal for EyeLoveKnots.

It’s me, Abigail with A Stitch Shy of Normal.

Visit with me on Instagram @astitchshyofnormal for all kinds of awesome crochet makes and inspiration.

If you’ve been on Ravelry or Instagram or any crafty social media recently, you’ve heard about pocket shawls. They are absolutely the trendy item this fall, and for good reason. They’re adorable, quite comfy and warm, and most of the designs are just a simple rectangle that you can jazz up with various stitch textures. It’s easy to see why designers (and customers!) are enjoying them.

I had not yet tried one of these, for some reason. No, that’s not quite right, I had bought one pattern and then got maybe 20 rows into the ribbing for the edge before I decided I wanted to use that yarn for a different project and abandoned my shawl. I’m not proud of it but it was a gorgeous shade of purple and I really wanted to use that color for this other thing…anyway, I’m getting off topic. When I sat down to go through Ravelry and pick my pattern for this month’s review, I knew it had to be a pocket shawl, to avenge my previous attempt and finally see what all the hype is about!

This pattern, the Harvest Moon Pocket Shawl, stood out for a couple of reasons. One–it’s a free pattern! Obviously that gave it major points. Two–it was a very interesting texture, and you guys know how I feel about texture. So the moment I saw the designer’s pattern pics I was in love, and started planning my yarn choice. She made hers in a gorgeous rust/brownish orange sort of shade, the sort of color that embodies fall, but I wanted to do something a little different. Before I entered the yarn aisle I was planning on something like an emerald green or maybe a gold, but once I saw this bright aqua shade, I knew what I had to do. It’s not a fall shade and I kind of like that! It’ll stand out all winter long for sure.

Materials I Used:

• About 2.5 skeins of Red Heart With Love in “Iced Aqua” (I chose to omit fringe, so I might have used closer to 3 if I had included that)
• J/6mm hook (Clover Amour)
• Yarn needle
• The free “Harvest Moon Pocket Shawl” pattern from Crochet With Carrie.

Material Notes:

Red Heart With Love is slightly on the thicker side for worsted, which I thought would be a great choice because the designer mentions using Vanna’s Choice, which is also a thicker worsted. I got close in my gauge, but my ribbing must have stretched more, as I reached the correct length at fewer rows than she suggested. This isn’t a problem at all, the pattern is very simple to customize sizing and she walks you through doing so.

Her yardage suggestion is 1020 yards of the Vanna’s Choice, and I used approximately 925-950. This makes sense considering I altered my stitch and row counts a little, and left off the fringe. 3 skeins of the RH With Love should be plenty for most people unless you’re increasing the size.

As far as the finished result with this yarn, it was a wonderful choice. It’s thick and cozy without being too heavy. The wrap feels comfortable on my shoulders and hangs nicely, but isn’t stifling. I have yet to wear this on a seriously cold day, but it was nice to wear in the chilly fall weather for pictures.

The pockets are written to be nice and deep, I could fit my whole hand inside easily and if I was just throwing this on for a quick errand I could see it being great to hold my phone and a smaller wallet. And I just love the extra touch in the pocket having the fun slanted ribbing — she could have easily done a basic straight pocket, but this adds such a casual and comfy look!

Time Spent:

About 12 hours, most of that being the ribbing. Once you’re through that part it’s pretty smooth sailing.

Measurements:

The designer lists hers as being 56″ x 16″, although I was slightly confused by her description because that was what she wrote in the beginning and mentioned in the video tutorial, but then the pattern mentions to continue the texture section until it’s 18 inches wide.

I chose to interpret this as customizable dimensions, so I used those as a guideline and tried it on throughout the process until I felt it was the right size for me!

My finished shawl, unstretched and unblocked (I’m not sure if I will be blocking this as it doesn’t seem necessary) is about 58″ long and 15″ wide. I did modify some stitch/row counts:

• Pattern lists 193 rows of ribbing to start, I hit 56(ish) inches at 175 rows and stopped there, using this as my stitch count for the remainder.
• She suggests 10 total rows of the HDC edging (or even more if desired) at the end, and I only did 6 rows as that was already plenty.
• My pockets are only 18 rows of the HDC, instead of the listed 20, because that fit with the size of my shawl itself.

For size context, I am 5’4″ and usually wear a size Small in most brands.

Gauge Info:

The pattern does not list gauge, but if you’d like to compare to my results, in the main texture (the post-stitches that look like V’s), 4 inches wide is 2 of those V-repeats and the chain stitch following, and 4 inches high is 5 rows of that same section.

Pattern Notes:

My biggest struggle with this pattern was the first few rows of the main shawl. The ribbing is simple and that’s how you decide the finished size, so that part didn’t cause me any problems aside from boredom (I get impatient with ribbing!). Once you get into the actual texture, however, it does get a bit overwhelming.

What helped me most was looking at the pictures the designer includes, showing you where your stitches should fall and how they fit together. And trust me, once you get through the first repeat of the textured post stitch row, the rest is mindless. It’s all just repeating the same two rows from there, and once you’ve done it a couple of times, you don’t even need to look at the pattern anymore (or at least I didn’t). And again, the size is very easy to customize, you just keep repeating those rows until you’re satisfied with the width!

I would consider this pattern difficulty to be suitable for someone leaning towards intermediate skill level. You need to be quite comfortable with not only post stitches, but “decreasing” using post stitches (I say it that way because you’re not actually decreasing stitch count but it is the same technique). It would be a little scary for a beginner. However, if you’re a beginner who wants a challenging project to force you to get comfy with post stitches, this might be a good fit!

All in all, this was a very rewarding project and I am glad I chose it. It took some time, but a large portion of that time was the ribbing at the beginning! Once the main texture started, I could zone out with some coffee and a good movie and just let the shawl emerge.

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