Citron is a free pattern for a semi-circular shawlette Hilary Smith Callis. It’s available from Knitty.com and has been around for a while. (Ha. It’s in the Winter 2009 edition, so that is a while!) Here’s a link to the pattern at Knitty.com.

Here’s the Ravelry page for the pattern.

I’ve made a couple of these in the past. First, I made one for my MIL in Noro Kureyon Sock. (This yarn is discontinued, which is a sad truth. Here’s its page on Ravelry.) She wanted something cheerful and bright.

There are a couple of variations in this version from the original pattern. The original has stockinette bands alternating with gathered sections for a ripple effect. I added some eyelets and beads to this version. Here’s the blog post about it (which has now reminded me of the Gaia Shawl, also a nice one skein knit and a free pattern. That’s a Ravelry link. Hmm.)

One of the things that still irks me about this shawl (I have it now, since my MIL passed) is the lack of a second band of pinky-purple. Knots in yarn are frustrating, but in self-striping yarns, a knot may also mean that part of the colourway is missing. This was made from one skein of Noro Kureyon Sock, but it had a knot. Instead of a second repeat of the pink and purple part at the outer edge, I got a third repeat of the green. It looks to me as if the pink and purple part shouldn’t be there at all.

The second version I knit of this shawl was in one colour, a kettle-dyed laceweight yarn from an indie dyer.

I added beads to this one, as well, gradually increasing the number of them toward the hem. It’s edged in black Malabrigo Lace. There’s a blog post about this one here.

And now on to the new version. This is knit of Noro Silk Garden Sock in the colourway 211.

It’s had a gentle block to make it rounder, but not a hard one to stretch it out. I wanted to preserve the ripple (which was lost in the first one for my MIL, because of a very hard block.) I could – and maybe should – have knit it on larger needles. The fabric is quite sturdy on the 4.0mm needles but I do like the colourway. Here’s the yarn on Ravelry, and here it is on the Diamond Yarns website, which is Noro’s distributor in Canada.

The put-up for this yarn is less because it’s thicker – it’s a sport weight (while Kureyon Sock was a fingering weight) and has 300m per skein (while Kureyon Sock had 420m). So, having two balls didn’t make a huge shawl.

I also added some eyelets and beads but not as many as the first one.

For the cast-off edge, I did a simple crochet edging to keep it frilly. A single crochet in each stitch, then chain 2 before repeating. I ran out of yarn when the cast-off was almost done so substituted in a piece of leftover Silk Garden Sock from another colourway (in my stash for sock yarn squares). I picked out the turquoise section so it would match a bit.

The first skein had no knots at all, which made me happy. The second one, however, had three knots in rapid succession. I can see what that did to the colour progression (grr) but still I like this shawl a lot. It’s 22″ deep and 44″ across the long edge, just enough to hang over my shoulders to the elbows.

What do you think?