Diamonds and Pearls Shawl, or: Adventures in Lace

Voilà! I did it! I finished Shelia January’s Diamonds and Pearls Shawl, the pattern of which I fell in love with the second I saw it in Clara’s book. I used the same yarn as in the book: Art Yarns Silk Rhapsody--such a gorgeous yarn! I had to hunt it down in my LYS; the lovely lady working there was “sort of sure” she had a couple of skeins left but couldn’t find them, and we both searched every shelf and even the large sales bin (no luck there), and just as I settled on a substitute silk yarn, she presented me with four or five skein, in beautiful pinks and in the elegant brown/silver/black that I ended up walking out with. I was skeptical that one skein’s enough, but enough it was! (I actually added six rows, praying to the knitting gods that I wouldn’t run out of yarn for the BO.)

Knitting the pattern was easy. I didn’t have very good needles but cheap metal ones that felt like they had been treated with sandpaper: the mohair didn’t like it one bit, and neither did I. (In the meantime, a shipment from Germany is on its way: my mom is sending me Addi needles for Easter!) I was entirely confused by the stitch markers: the pattern calls for four, one of which is in the middle, leaving two on the right side and just one on the left. It didn’t make any sense to me, and it surely wasn’t helpful in counting stitches; since markers ended up between those two stitches calling for “k2tog” or “ssk,” I had to move them around all the time anyway. I finally gave up and just took them out.

I’m so glad I checked the errata site at KR for the two mistakes in the pattern that Clara detected in the book, although I wonder if in the BO row the very first “K1” isn’t a boo-boo as well: I had to take it out, otherwise the BO didn’t work for me. (I was actually freaking out quite a bit at that point: I started to BO, it looked weird, I ripped, the mohair didn’t appreciate it, I ended up with a knot, I was contemplating scissors, etc. etc.) Blocking was a new experience for me; I didn’t have a blocking board but relied on carpet and several large towels: not the greatest solution, but it worked. I had only a limited number of t-pins and used plenty of regular seamstress needles that left me with bloody finger tips. Funny how on the same day Clara reviewed dressing wires and the art of blocking! In case I knit more lace, I’ll certainly invest in a board and more t-pins, if not dressing wires.
The shawl’s off the floor and ready to be taken for a walk; I’m really, really pleased with it. One month ago I didn’t knit (or blog, for that matter), and now I finished a lace shawl (and am blogging about it). I love my new hobby. :)