Tuesday, September 04, 2012

Sashay Shawl

Startitis.
Oh my weakness, oh my joy.

I feel like they should write poems of such a sweet torment.

In my town, our Michael's is next to Home Depot. I was thinking about building a 25 dollar greenhouse from a tutorial online, only to find that they don't sell ANY seeds after the beginning of Summer. You have to plan that far in advance for a fall/winter garden. Bummer. I was hoping to grow lettuce and such this year. After my disappointment, I headed next door to browse the latest fibers, when I came across Red Heart's Sashay novelty yarn. I couldn't resist the charms of an idiot's shawl, or also known as a "let's see how quick we can whip up a project" type of shawl. What can I say...I saw promise from inches of manufactured lace.

The yarn came with a free pattern for a ruffled scarf. I'm not one for ruffles and fru-fru around my neck, so I was determined to make be more innovative with this yarn. I played around with it at first, and couldn't thinking of anything that would not make the yarn ruffle. I searched Ravelry to see if anyone came up with a unique project using this yarn, and lo-and-behold, I found a spiral shawl, "The Kelp Forest Shawlette."

I attempted this pattern several times in vain, until I realized that she used yarn very similar, but was from a different company. That meant that the lacy holes were probably spread wider, thus throwing my shawl more into a tube than necessary. Sorry, but I don't really need a 150 year-old-like-droopy-nipple thing hanging down the middle of my back. During my attempts, I figured that EZ knew what she was doing when she did round increases in the "Pi Shawl," and I attempted to deruffle as best as I could by skipping more "wide band" holes after every so many stitches bound off (ei. after 26 sts done, then 52 sts done, etc). You'll have to read into the pattern to know exactly what I'm talking about. The designer only tells you to bind off in the same "wide band" hole for the whole spiral.



It still needs to be worked on and blocked before looking in tip-top shape. You can look up my WIP project notes on Ravelry (I'm "knittyknitter." Friend-Me if you haven't already) in the meantime if for some reason you're smitten or intrigued and just HAVE to knit this up like I did. Otherwise, tune in later to my "FO" post of this on my blog to get my complete handy notes of the shawl (if you're using Sashay yarn rather than the recommended yarn).

Peace,
Mrs. Hopelessly Non-Monogamous.

4 comments:

Taci simmons said...

I have been thinking abou what else one can do with that yarn. I made a few scarfs last yer, but I'm already tired of the " to many ruffles" . I'm curious how it looks like when u wear it ... The shawl I mean...

Grace said...

Too bad about the greenhouse, definitely next year! What pretty lace, I love how the pattern is looks with the yarn!

Jennifer said...

Very pretty! Love that color too!

Jennifer @ Fiber Flux

Z said...

I really like that color.

Since you're also on Ravelry, do you know anything about those works in progress bars? If you do, can you help me out?

Thanks.