You Knew I Would!

When I mentioned a little while ago that I wanted to cast on for a shawl, I had a couple in mind. One of them, I even had the suggested yarn and had been YEARNING for the perfect pattern to do it justice. It was just what I was looking for in my next shawl--a large motif that is repeated, instead of a main panel and edging, or a repeating small motif.

But let's back up a little and take a look at that beautiful yarn!

Purchased at the Kitchener-Waterloo Knitter's Fair, September 2007, when I went with Cindy. I really wanted to try HandMaiden SeaSilk and thought, at that time, that I could make a delightful nightie to wear on our cruise. For which we were leaving in under a month. LOL. I had some bikini top patterns and tried repeatedly to crochet a bikini top, while at the same time, search for a matching fabric to provide some body coverage. Nothing was working, there was too much else to do...

Then along came the Montego Bay scarf. Once I realized that I had the suggested yarn for that, I decided to go ahead with it, even though I was not enamored with the pattern, knew it would drive me crazy, and that I probably wouldn't wear a 'scarf'.

That's how far I got. I put in the life line and tried to morph it into another scarf pattern that goes the other direction and has 'medallions'. Didn't work. It sat for awhile...that picture was taken July 28 2008. So, about a year. I ripped it out awhile ago.

And here is the new shawl in its early stages. Shortly after this, I made an error by forgetting to start another repeat in the center. I didn't notice it till much later and had to rip out quite a bit!

This is the shawl, all done, getting ready to have a soak. There is seven repeats of the motif, and for the edging, I think I did one repeat plus one row or so. There is a mistake in the edging chart, and it is NOT the lack of a double YO at the center. On row 3 (I think) there are YOs missing; it's pretty obvious how every right side row has yarn overs at the edges where the edge pattern meets the tip of the last leaf, but this row was missing the YOs. The next row won't work without the stitch created by the YO. You can see the small ball of yarn I had left. I could have done a few more edging rows, but I didn't want too much edging.

This picture should have been rotated! It's the center column, showing how the leaves branch off from a double YO.

There she is, being blocked on my floor. Of course, I'd like her a little bigger, it's more scarf than shawl (although at these times, being short helps). But man, what a stunner for under 500 yards and, get this....July 18 to August 1!!!!! That's like, two weeks?! Once I got those charts drawn up, and understood how it all worked, it actually became quite intuitive, despite being a large motif. Of course, it helped that we've had a lot of driving time lately, LOL. When I made the Heartland Shawl last year, I thought I might make it again, and I haven't, but this one, I think I will, only even bigger!!