Adventures of a Desi KnitterKnitting (and now sewing!) keeps an Indian academic sane in the States. Almost.

Leaf Lace Shawl

§ September 21st, 2006 § Filed under Leaf Lace Shawl § 7 Comments

Voila my leaf lace shawl this morning, blocking:

Things I learnt while on this easy, quick (hah!) lace project:

1) Frogging lace sucks, especially if you have to frog the same border rows thrice, the last time when you have only 20 stitches to cast off and you have run out of yarn.

2) I made a good decision after Class X to take Arts instead of Maths and Science, because I am still incapable of elementary arithmetic.

3) It doesn’t matter if you fudge a couple of rows to make it all fit.

4) Simple lace in variegated yarn rocks! Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

5) And finally, when your leftover skein of laceweight/jumperweight wills itself to be something you aren’t sure of, do let it. The results can be quite breathtaking, viz. the photo on the left.

Am so happy with how this turned out! It’s folded into a pretty little triangle right now. After wrapping it around myself this evening, I had the twinge of a second thought, but I think I will send it, as I’d planned, to a sister-in-law of mine, to whom I owe a knitting gift for the longest time.

It is just right as a shoulder wrap to wear with a dressy outfit, and soft as hell.

Specs: Leaf Lace Shawl, designed by Evelyn Clark and available from Fibertrends

Size: 60" wide and 30" deep. I did 13 repeats of the main pattern, on a size 6 needle.

Yarn: handpainted laceweight/jumperweight from Laura. Have no idea how much. Genny gave great advice  last time about how to figure out how much you have and how far you can go with a skein, but alas, she didn’t take into account that I was beyond the help of even a calculator.

In my defence, I did try. I counted the total number of stitches I had to left to do, measured the yarn I had left by wrapping it around an open drawer and then multiplying the length of the drawer by the number of wraps (into 2, duh, cause it goes around twice!), but I mysteriously ended up with only 34 yards and thousands of stitches, when visually it was plain that I had enough for atleast one more repeat. I went with my eyes instead of my brain, and ultimately, I only had to frog the border twice more, that too once because I messed up the pattern. Eventually I cast off on the 15th row instead of the  16th to finish properly, and I have 2 yards left. Sweet, huh?