Lilac Alpaca Shawl - Design F307

I've been meaning to re-create some of the shawls I made way back in the early days for some time now, partly because I loved them and partly because until I do I cannot possibly price them correctly.  Back then I never timed how long things took to make nor did I price them to take into consideration labour, time, skill, materials, listing fees, commission fees, transaction fees...

So, the time has come to make another shawl in the same design as the very first one that I sold, way back before I opened my store on Etsy.  This one is an old Danish Pattern called Påfuglehale, which means Peacock's Tail, and was originally made as a doily or table covering but has long since been translated into English and there are patterns freely available in the public domain for full circle, 3/4 circle and semi-circle.  This shawl is made using the 3/4 circle pattern.

My first attempt at making this design was a nightmare.  I made so many mistakes and had to undo large amounts so many times that I almost threw it in the bin but then I decided to push on and get on with it as it was pretty much my first attempt at making anything so big and so lacy.  I am a little nervous in attempting this design again given my problems last time but I have a lot more experience with lace knitting now so I have to bite the bullet, its too pretty not to ever make it again.

I have chosen to make it from a skein of lilac pure baby alpaca that I bought back in 2011 from The Storm Child, an indie dyer and seller of yarns, who seem to have since closed down.  The yarn is lace weight and has approx 800m per 100g and is absolutely beautiful, see the photos below.

I started this project on 13th February, no it wasn't a Friday, it was a Monday.  Two hours of work and I have already completed 32 rows, there are 125sts, I've inserted a lifeline and have my Russian dolly stitch markers in play to help keep track of the lace design and I will know immediately if something is not right.  I did have my moments with this design where I kept making silly mistakes, some swearing went on but I persevered to complete it.  There were so many stitches that I couldn't even get good photos of the pattern or open it out to check to make sure I hadn't gone wrong.  I had to trust in myself and keep knitting.  Despite its size and how many stitches there are it is incredibly lightweight and so warm too.

During the making of this I had school half term to contend with and so no work was done on this for a while but as soon as they were back to school I got back on with it but each row was taking 45 minutes to an hour to complete and it seemed like I would never get to the end as each row had more than 600 stitches on it.

The cast off edge to this shawl is a fancy crochet cast off.  What this means is that you still have the stitches on the knitting needles but you are now using the loop of the first stitch with a crochet hook, making crochet chains and then crocheting the stitches off the knitting needles.  It gives a beautiful scalloped edge to the shawl but it does take a long time to do.  My only wish is that I had timed this cast off row, I didn't, but my guess would be around 3 or 4 hours.  I finished making this the first week of March.

The finished shawl used up just under 700m of the 800m in the skein, weighs about 86g and is so fine that it fits through my K sized wedding ring.

You can read about my first attempts at making this shawl here.

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.

Pearl Capelet - Design SB168 Small

I had a small amount of yarn left over in Pearl from when I made the large version of this capelet in various colours last summer.   There was just enough to make the small version, which I have two of in my shop already in a blue-green colour and the same design as the one bought for a photo-shoot.

Of course it looks ridiculous on me as this small version is made with small petite women in mind, and its been years since I could be classed as small or petite when it comes to my figure.