Granite Stitch Men's Scarf

I'm always on the lookout for good crochet patterns for men's scarves.  Almost any basic plain pattern will work for men, but often they are a little too plain for me.  This one is very simple but has a nice result and makes a good manly scarf.  I found the pattern on The Caped Crocheter blog:

http://capedcrocheter.wordpress.com/2012/08/01/granite-stitch-mens-scarf/

For this scarf I picked up 2 skeins of Cascade Eco Duo.  This yarn is 70% undyed alpaca and 30% undyed merino wool, an unimaginably soft and snuggly yarn.  When I say soft I mean SOFT, you fall in love with it the minute you touch it.  It has nice marled colors which lead to nicely graduated colorways.

I used the Cascade Eco Duo Chicory with an H hook.  This scarf took almost all of 2 skeins ( 197 yards each).  The end result was a 6"x76" scarf.  Because this scarf is worked width-wise you can produce a shorter scarf than I did if you like by just stopping when you get to your preferred length; I made mine for someone who is 6'2" and so the length is adjusted accordingly.

This is a straightforward and repetitive pattern, just continual repeats of 2 rows.  You'll be working in ch-1 spaces, and it ends up being an alternating pattern.  Because it was a little monotonous I found I actually did need to pay attention, a couple of missed stitches in both the middle and at the end caused my scarf to start shrinking and meant I had to rip out a lot of rows to get back to my mistake.  To prevent it from happening I just counted my stitches on my odd rows every now and again to make sure I was still on track as I continued through the scarf.  I would make this pattern again, plain as it is it has a very nice result.