I blocked the Heaven Scent shawl last weekend, and the lace opened up beautifully!
I still have to sew in the ends, but it was a good day for pictures.
It blocked out to a really nice size. It’s about 20″ deep at the middle back, and that long curved edge is about 84″ long.
And one last detail shot. 🙂
There are three more shawls in this pattern bundle. One is rectangular, so less interesting to me, but I’ll have a hunt through my stash for candidates to knit the other two crescent shawls.
I told you last week that I’d cast on this shawl, Heaven Scent by BooKnits in Freia Handpaints Ombré Shawl Ball. (That post is right here.) It turned out to be a compulsive knit and I charged right through the charts. I knew it would be a close call to make it out of the one ball, and ended up playing yarn chicken.
Could I finish with the one ball of yarn? As with many crescent shawls, you increase the needle size at increments in this pattern, which opens up the lace even before blocking. Keeping an eye on my diminishing ball of yarn, I didn’t change needles for the border, but kept on with the ones I’d used for the body.
I made it to the final row and chose not to do the picot edge, hoping I’d still make it.
Nope.
The cast-off is on a wrong side row, so I made it all the way from the left edge to where you see the last 8″ of my yarn. It’s maybe 3/4 of the way around. I lost yarn chicken.
I also played bead chicken at the same time, but I won that. I added more beads to the border then realized I might run out. I have five beads left in the vial. Phew!
I went through all my stash, and my bits and ends, but couldn’t find anything to match that shade of red in a single ply wool. I couldn’t even match the colour. (The colours of this yarn have photographed to look more vivid than they are in real life. They’re bright, but not this bright.) So, I picked back the cast-off row and cast off again. I thought I’d cast off in purple, a contrasting edge that matched the centre of the shawl, and couldn’t get the shade of purple right either. So, I used two strands for the cast-off, one in Sugar Bush Drizzle in Monsoon Mauve (which is a bit light) and one of Rowan Kidsilk Haze in Black.
And here’s the result.
It’s funny that in this picture, the cast-off edge looks too dark. The purple in the middle of ths shawl appears to be the same shade as Monsoon Mauve. You’ll have to trust me that in real life, the colours are matchy-matchy.
Next up, a good soak and a blocking. I’ll show you the finished shawl when it’s done.
I’m kind of amazed that I knit this shawl in less than three weeks. I guess that’s what happens when I concentrate on one project, instead of working on a dozen things at once. (Actually, I had two on the go at the same time and finished the other one, too – it was the mittens and scarf of Patons Rumor. I’ll show you that tomorrow.) There’s a lesson there that I should take on board. 🙂
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.
You might remember that I was knitting a lace shawl. The pattern is called Snow Angel and it’s by BooKnits – here’s the Ravelry link for the pattern. I knit it in a gradient dyed yarn called Freia Ombré Lace in the colourway Autumn Rose. I actually ran out of yarn, so used some Elann Silken Kydd from my stash. I think the colourway is Baked Apple, and I worried it might be a bit dark, but I like it. I also used green glass beads with copper linings, in the positions specified in the pattern.
Here’s the finished and blocked shawl on the back of the couch. I’m not sure why I’m so surprised by the size of it but I am. I had in mind that it was going to be a scarfy little thing, but it’s a shawl. The colour is the most true to life in this first picture.
Here’s the whole thing spread on a rug so you can see the crescent shape of it, and the gradation in the colour. And yes, it’s too big for this rug! And here’s a detail of the middle of the shawl, though it’s a bit blurry. It’s always amazing to see how the lace opens up when it’s blocked. It was hard to discern the pattern in those photographs taken while the shawl was on the needles, but not it’s obvious.
I’m very happy with this one. What do you think?
Last fall, I came across a wonderful lace yarn in my LYS. It was dyed to change colours once over the length of the yarn. The yarn is Knitwhits Freia Handpaints Freia Ombré Lace, and the colourway I chose – Grapevine – changes from purple through brown and green to chartreuse. I thought it would look great in a semi-circular shawl – crescents of colour – and was inspired by the Kleks Shawl. This is the Ravelry link for the Kleks.
I really like the look of this shawl, with its alternating bands of stockinette stitch and bramble stitch, but wanted a shawl that was a wedge out of a circle with a rounded neck – like the letter C. It’s clear from the projects shown on Ravelry that the Kleks doesn’t have that shape. I also was confused by the increase instructions in the shawl pattern (it’s easy to confuse me about such things) and noticed that many Ravellers had issues with the stitch counts.
So, I made a plan for some variations. This is how my shawl came out:
The colour is richer than that, but the flash did what it does. The crescent is about 18″ deep, so the full width is roughly 45″. It falls to my elbows and comes together nicely at the front. I love it!
Here’s how I knit this variation. You need a multiple of 4 for the bramble pattern, plus there are 3 stitches on each border. It made sense to me to cast on a multiple of 4 plus 6 stitches, then to always increase stitches in multiples of 4. If I can avoid counting stitches, I will!
(Actually, in order to make the lace pattern come out symmetrically, you need a multiple of 8 stitches plus 4, plus the borders, but I missed that bit. You might want to modify the counts if asymmetry troubles you.)
Here we go!
Collar:
Cast on 86 stitches.
Knit 1 row. Knit 5 more rows, slipping the first stitch on each row. (This gives a neater edge.)
First Stockinette Stitch Band – You’ll add 8 stitch markers in this band.
19 rows in total
Row 1 – Slip 1, K2, K8, M1, place marker, * K9, M1, place marker. Repeat from * six times. K to end. (94 stitches.)
Row 2 – Slip 1, K2, purl to last three stitches, K to end.
Row 3 – Slip 1, knit to end.
Row 4 – as Row 2.
Repeat this four row sequence four times, as follows:
Row 5, 9, 13 and 17 – Slip 1, K2, *K to marker, M1 before marker. Repeat from * seven times. K to end.
After each increase row, your counts will be as follows:
Row 5 (102 stitches)
Row 9 (110 stitches)
Row 13 (118 stitches)
Row 17 (126 stitches)
Remove the stitch markers anytime after Row 17. You’ll need them in different places for the next stockinette stitch band. End after Row 19, with the wrong side facing. (Yes, you knit the pattern stitch on the wrong side.)
First Lace Panel – 15 rows in total. This is one repeat more than the pattern specifies, which is why I have 15 rows instead of 11. Work in trinity stitch (or bramble stitch. Call it whichever) as specified in pattern, keeping three border stitches in garter stitch. There are no increases in this panel.
Second Stockinette Stitch Panel – This time, we’ll put 16 markers in the work.
19 rows in total.
Row 1 – Slip 1, K2, K7, M1, place marker, * Repeat from * fifteen times. K to end. (142 stitches.)
Row 2 – Slip 1, K2, purl to last three stitches, K to end.
Row 3 – Slip 1, knit to end.
Row 4 – as Row 2.
Repeat this four row sequence four times, as follows:
Row 5, 9, 13 and 17 – Slip 1, K2, *K to marker, M1 before marker. Repeat from * fifteen times. K to end.
After each increase row, your counts will be as follows:
Row 5 (158 stitches)
Row 9 (174 stitches)
Row 13 (190 stitches)
Row 17 (206 stitches)
Remove the stitch markers anytime after Row 17. You’ll need them in different places for the next stockinette stitch band. End after Row 19, with the wrong side facing.
Second Lace Band – as first lace band.
15 rows total.
Third Stockinette Band
Following the same increase strategy, add 24 stitches to every increase row. You’ll end with 326 stitches.
Third Lace Band – as first lace band.
15 rows total.
Fourth Stockinette Band
Following the same increase strategy, add 36 stitches per increase row. I forgot to count the stitches after this one.
Fourth Lace Band – as first lace band.
15 rows total.
Border
In an ideal universe, I would have had enough yarn to mirror the 19 rows of stockinette stitch followed by 6 rows of garter stitch at the collar. I was running out of yarn, though, so had to adapt. I worked 3 rows of garter stitch after the last last panel, putting beads on the second row, on every second stitch. I didn’t have enough yarn left to cast off (there’s about a meter of it) so I knit a row with some Kidsilk Haze in BlackCurrant that was in my bits and ends, then cast off with that. For the cast off edge, I used a crochet hook – this is the cast-off from the Fiddlesticks Knitting Peacock Shawl, which I liked on it. *Work 3 stitches together, place bead, chain 5, repeat from * to end, work last chain into last stitch and bind off. (I was short one stitch at the end, but just worked 2 together before the last loop instead of 3.)
And that’s it! What do you think?
Alive & Knitting 