One of my shawls, a famous actress and a New York stage.

Earlier this month I got a surprise sale of one of my higher priced shawls and when I saw the address that I was sending it to I got quite excited and was intrigued to find out what it was going to be used for.  The address was the Costume Department at A Theatre For A New Audience in Brooklyn, New York.  I looked them up online, of course, and discovered that they have a Facebook Page, which I started following in the hopes of finding out what happens to the shawl that I made and they purchased.

Suddenly a set of photos appeared on their page, amazing photos featuring my shawl being worn by Kecia Lewis, who has previously starred in Law & Order, Crossing Jordan and Blue Bloods to name a few, and she is currently in The Skin of our Teeth, a production at Theatre for a New Audience which also stars David Rasche, who has previously starred in Sledge Hammer, Blue Bloods, Ugly Betty and many others.  I quickly messaged them and gained permission to use their photographs to show off and promote my shawls.  That is so kind of them because these photos are amazing.

(c) Gerry Goodstein

(c) Gerry Goodstein

(c) Gerry Goodstein

(c) Gerry Goodstein

(c) Gerry Goodstein

The New York Times wrote an article about the play and you find that here

I certainly feel very privileged to have supplied them with an accessory for their Costume Department and supplying theatres and such like is something I had not even considered before.  It has certainly made my year to date.

If you like the shawl, you can find it available in other colours in my Etsy store, in colours such as Lilac, Royal Blue, Bright Green, and Turquoise with other colours planned to be made later in the year.

Working out colour placement of motifs

I've made quite a few 1970's design shawls using Twilley's Goldfingering now but I have so many leftovers in a whole range of colours that would look great as a multi-coloured version of this design.

I could make them colour coordinated i.e. various shades of blue, various shades of red/pink or I could make them truly multi-coloured.  Working things out I have decided that I want to make two new versions, one for 5 different colour flowers and one for 9 different colour flowers as these numbers fit with the number of motifs required overall.

I want to make them so that the same colour flower is not next to itself in any direction but I don't want to have to use little pieces of paper to help me sort that one out, its too busy in our house for that, the bits of paper would get wafted about and messed up.

Light bulb moment! I have some Cross Stitch software, Jane Greenoff's Cross Stitch Gold, that I've not used in a while that I could utilise to help me sort it out.  I am also a fan of Suduko and using methods employed in those I have managed to figure out the placement without too much stressing and cursing.

Because I do a lot of Cross Stitching as well as running a business and being a busy mom I have been able to match all the different colours of Twilley's Goldfingering to the nearest colour of DMC embroidery thread and so can use those colour numbers in the software to see how a shawl may look when finished.  Clever eh!

I've saved these as working files so that when I want to see how a shawl would look I can just go in and change the colour of the flowers in the colour palette at the bottom, one at a time, which changes all instances of that colour in the design.

This is a screen shot of the layout for the 5 colour of flower version.

This is a screen shot of the layout for the 9 flower colour version.

Keep a look out for multi-coloured versions of the shawl in the future.

Ultramarine Wool Shawl - Design S122

Following on the tail of the black and magenta shawl that I just made I am straight into the next one of the same design but using an ultramarine blue yarn that I spun back in 2014 from a Hampshire Down x Dorset Horn cross breed.

I started knitting on 7th February and finished on 10th February 2017, taking a little longer this time as I had hospital appointments to attend.

I got to play yarn chicken with this one but luckily there was enough after all with just a few grams of yarn left over.  I wasn't panicking at all, honest!

Black & Magenta Shetland Shawl - Design S122

I found another simple lace shawl pattern with a plain back and lace edging.  Whereas the last one, Design S207, is knitted in one piece and worked from the bottom up, this one has the lace worked and then you cast off all but one stitch and then pick up the stitches along the straight edge of the lace.  This means that the lace edge is knitted on sideways to the main body of the shawl.

I picked another skein of the Shetland wool from when I made three, each having a different coloured third ply.  This one is 86% Shetland wool, 14% Cotton.

I started this on 31st January and finished it on 6th February 2017.  I kept it simple and without beads.

It is really nice and soft too and looks so much better in real life than what it does in my photographs.

Grey Jacob Shawl - Design S207

After making four shawls in Twilley's Goldfingering I need a break and work with something else.  I picked some nice, soft and squishy Jacob wool that I blended and spun myself back in 2014.

Revisiting a design that I made twice last year, first in Shetland wool and then in Alpaca, I stared knitting this on 26th January and was done and dusted by 31st January 2017.

It does have a tendency to roll but is smoothed out with a soak and block.