I haven’t knit a shawl in a while, lace or otherwise – well, I’m still plugging along on my Water shawl, but it’s not a very fun knit at this point. I don’t think it counts anymore. 🙂

A LYS had Freia Handpaints yarns on sale, and I simply can’t resist gradient dyed yarns. I ordered some and cast on.

I chose a pattern by BooKnits. I wanted to knit a lace shawl with some beads and I had The Close to You Collection of patterns already. (That’s a Ravelry link.) I had knit Snow Angel from this pattern collection, also in Freia Handpaints yarn, but in their Wool/Nylon Lace which is discontinued. The colourway was Autumn Rose.

Here’s my Ravelry project page for the project.

And here’s that Snow Angel shawl:

There’s a blog post for it, which is right here.

This time, I’ve chosen the pattern Heaven Scent, which is in that same collection but also available on its own. (That’s a Ravelry link.) I’m knitting the smallest size, with the stockinette stitch top.

This yarn is Freia Handpaints Ombré Shawl Ball Merino. The colourway is Vamp. Here’s the Ravelry yarn page.

Here’s my progress so far:

The camera is really emphasizing that hot pink. The colourway ends in a bright red.

Of course, it’s curled on the circular needle in the opposite direction of its shape – the shawl will be a crescent curved the other way when it’s off the needles and blocked. (Much like Snow Angel, shown above.)

The yarn is a loose single ply. It’s very soft but tougher than expected – there is the usual thick-and-thin of single ply yarns but it hasn’t been splitty to knit and it hasn’t broken.

And here’s a detail view. I’m using 6/0 purple Czech glass beads in dark purple, which match the beginning of the gradient pretty well.

I did make a slight change to the pattern. The shawl grows quickly in width because you add four stitches on every right side row and two on every wrong side row. The additions are at the beginning and the end of each row, and the pattern uses make-one (slanting left or right). I found that two M1s with just a knit stitch between them, then another M1 on the purl side pretty close by made for a tight edge. I switched out the two M1s on the purl side for YO’s, then the outer M1 on the right side rows to YO’s as well. I’m curious to see how this blocks out. It feels better to me.

I’m almost halfway through the second repeat of the main chart, then have the border chart to knit. I’m thinking I might run out of yarn (the pattern notes that 400m is close) so if I do, I’ll have to find something matchy to finish.