I have been wanting to knit something lacy in a while, so when our team lead at work was getting married, I knew I had to knit a lacy shawl for her. I wasn’t expecting her to actually wear it during the wedding (those decisions are so personal), but I knew I wanted it to be white anyway, more as a symbol. I had thin white yarn that I thought might work, but I was worried that I wouldn’t have enough of it and that it would be too warm for lace. I knitted a swatch and decided to try it. I didn’t have the schedule to try it, but I couldn’t find a better yarn, so I bought clear beads, found a pattern, made a schedule of milestones (I only had a month), and went for it.
This was in the early summer, when J was playing soccer and going to karate, so I was knitting a lot while waiting. I took this project with me everywhere and knit whenever I could. The hardest part was knitting with thin yarn when it was windy, in the sun, while trying to hold the umbrella (for the sun), but I enjoyed how much I was getting done. The beads were also a nightmare; I strung them onto the yarn ahead of time, so I had to keep moving them down the line constantly, and while it got easier as I used up more and more of them, it was a major hassle in the first three quarters of the project. But the alternative was to carry beads with me and use a tiny crochet hook to add them at the needed locations. That required buying a tiny hook and potentially dropping the beads as I tried to add them while sitting on a bench and holding my knitting bag on my arm, which I then perceived as more of a hassle. I am still not sure what would have been the better way to do it, but I thought at least not having to deal with loose beads on the go was a major plus.
I liked the pattern – it was easy to remember intuitively and not just memorizing numbers of knits and yarn overs, and it was turning out to be very pretty. The beads were sparkling in the sun and the yarn was soft. It was wonderful.
I was starting to fall behind just knitting during my kid’s sports, so in the last two weeks, I had to start knitting in the evenings. I caught up with my schedule and was able to finish a bit early, which came in handy since I realized that I needed a steamer for blocking the shawl. I did some reading on how to block since I have never done it before and learned that acrylic yarn is only blocked by steaming the fibers to loosen them. I got some foam padding and T pins, borrowed my mom’s iron, and pinned the shawl. I was nervous about the process, but I think it turned out ok.
I think I could have pulled the points out more to make them more dramatic or steamed them more because they seemed to spring back a bit, but hey, it was my first time blocking yarn, so there are still a lot of things I am learning.
In the end, I learned a few new things during this project and the recipient liked it, so I would call this a success. Maybe someday I will make a similar shawl for myself, just not for a wedding and in a different color.
Here are links to this project on Ravelry and Pinterest.
