Gentle

I am working hard on the final stretches of a new shawl pattern.

No photos until after the 21st, when I am meeting Amanda and family for friendship and photo shoot at the botanical gardens.

I had this idea. I love the way triangle shawls look, old-fashioned and comforting, but they tend to not fit curves very well, and pulling them close around your neck means a rumple or two.

So I put on my engineer's hat (my Dad was a mechanical engineer) and proceeded to plan.

And plan. And knit, and plan, and knit some more. By using regularly placed simplified short rows, this triangle shawl curves around your shoulders. I also wanted it to be a great pattern for using hand-dyed yarns. And be something easy to knit in public or in front of the tv. It is mostly garter stitch, with 1 single purled stitch every 10 rows. Not purled row, but a single, solitary purled stitch.

Then I thought 'wouldn't it be nice if this pattern had explicit directions for using many types of yarn weights?'.

So I knit some more.

And I am working on shawl 4 of 6 right now.

I will have yardages, number of pattern repeats and dimensions for shawls in 6 different weights of yarn in this pattern. (fingering, sport/dk, worsted, Aran, bulky and super/bulky fuzzy).

Some of the samples are in hand-dyed yarn, some are in solid.

A lot of work, but worth it, I think.

And I love it. (and yes, I am biased).

It has a touch of lace, but also has a sensible, use-it-every-day feel. The fabric is flowing but solidly warm, and it fits everyone who has tried one on, curving over their shoulders as I had hoped :-} I think I will name it 'Gentle'.

And thank you to the knitters who stepped up to test knit it. They say they enjoyed the process of knitting it, which I have to tell you makes me glow :-}