Like wearing a fluffy blanket: my shawl-poncho

Last year at one of the regular craft days I attend, we had a swap day where we brought craft supplies from our stash that we no longer wanted. It was a fantastic idea and I got rid of a lot of paper crafting supplies and some fabric. Dangerously, I was the only person who wanted to take yarn. So I perhaps took a little more than I should have.

Most was one or at most two balls of the same yarn, but there was a lot of one slubby blue yarn (an acrylic/mohair blend). I thought there were 6 balls (turned out there were actually 8!)

Uneven size, fluffy texture... but that colour is perfect for me!
This is all that is now left of those 8 balls

Now usually with a textured yarn that does that slubby look where it is thin in places and large and fluffy in others, all I'd make is a scarf. Maybe. But unless I was planning on making the longest scarf ever, that would only take one or two balls and I certainly didn't want three matching scarves. I knew with that much to work with, I wanted to make a garment. I wasn't going to use such a textured yarn for a cardigan though. I pondered a shawl, but I've never managed to get a shawl to be of any use except when curled up on a couch reading. I kept pondering and worked on other projects, but I knew I had to do something with it because I adore that colour.

One day two months ago, doing a colour exercise where I was looking through all my pattern books looking at yarn colours, I came across this interesting pattern in my copy of Rustic Modern Crochet and immediately realised that it was the inspiration I'd been looking for.  

Sand and Shells pattern by Yukimo Alexander.
(I took this photo from my book copy because that seemed less dodgy than adding one from elsewhere;
 for better pics see the ravelry link above)

While this is made up in a totally different style and weight of yarn, the overall schematic of the garment was what I wanted - effectively a poncho. Crochet an arrangement of rectangles and sew together in two places to form armholes. And shawl-poncho is born. 

So cozy

I didn't use the stitch patterns given because the detail would have been wasted on such fluffy yarn. I did keep the contrast in density, making the upper side in a more open mesh, and I worked my dimensions from the detailed diagram for the project. 

You can see the division into the three areas more clearly in this photo.
Actually, this fluffy yarn disguises a lot of details. 

As I said, the construction is very simple, and once you've finished the actual crochet, all that is needed is to join 6-8cm at a point on each side to create the arm holes.

Rear view.

I get all the comfort and warmth of a fluffy shawl without having to worry about keeping it wrapped around me. It is the perfect garment for those days when I'm a bit chilly but don't want a full warm sweater (and in Sydney, we get more of those days than you'd think). I intended this to be an 'only around the house' piece, but I've now worn it out a few times on those intermediate weather days. So happy to have used some swap day yarn for a snuggly addition to my wardrobe.