I started knitting a Super Easy Lap Blanket this week using Maxima and I (*swoon*) am in love! To me, a yarn must meet 4 requirements:
- color
- softness
- easy to knit with
- value
Maxima exceeds those requirements by leaps and bounds.
I am a big fan of kettle or hand dyed yarns. Maxima is kettle dyed and comes in variegated and semi-solid color options. My blanket uses dark chocolate, pewter, stratus and foil. The blanket starts with dark chocolate and the knitted fabric is delicious. It's chocolatey-ness goes from the darkest of cocoas to bits of milk chocolate.
At first touch, while in hank form, I wasn't sold on this yarn's softness. I'd felted softer and scratchier yarns before and Maxima fell in the middle. I test-touched many skeins and in the end relied on the Ravelry reviews boasting it's softness. Well they were right and my 100% garter stitch blanket is uber soft and snuggly.
Maxima is very easy to knit with. I had no trouble winding and there's no splitting (even with KnitPicks interchangeable needles which are really pointy). The yarn flies off the needles.
Some may think that $14 a skein is pricey and there were days I used to think that. But with a yarn like Maxima, you are paying for quality. At 218 yards, this yarn is $.06 per yard. That's not too bad and for kettle dyed softness, I'm willing to pay that.
On scale of 1-10 this yarn is a 10 and it's now on my favorite yarns list.
