This is my first shawl made form home made hand-spun. The yarn is natrally coloured blue faced leicester - and it changes colour 2/3 the way down as I ran out and the new top must have come from a slightly differently coloured sheep.
The shawl is 5/8ths of an Octagon (ie halfway round plus an extra 8th). I designed it this way so it would drape over my shoulders and stay put. Its a good heavy snuggly warm shawl.
The next project I have pictures for was knitted for an open University buddy's baby. This is knit using comercial 4 ply baby yarn - as the family has a lot of allergies.
Then back to handspun to make a much finer shawl. This shawl is made from a yarn which aproximates 2-3 ply and is the finest I have spun. One ply is a merino silk blend with streaks of deep pink, the other is plain merino.
I seem to have a habit of making octagons for shawls (or parts of octagons) so maybe next time I should try to make a different shape. This shawl is supposed to be a regular octagon it was calculated so that the base square in the centre had sides of the right legth to yeild and octagon which would have s sufficient wingspan for a shawl. I think the maths took longer than the shawl.
4 comments:
I love your fine spun lace shawl---the bottom pics. It's just lovely. You design your own? Do you write out your patterns for sale? I've made all of my shawl from patterns. I'm wondering how do I become a designer? Did you take classes or use certain books to help you learn?
I'm intrigued by the concept of the octagonal shape. I've only done squares.
Sorry so many questions, but I find the fact that you design your own fascinating.
DeAnn
mississippipioneers@bak.rr.com
I used the book Traditional knitten and lace shawls by Martha waterman and various lace pattern books. I design my own. I learn best from books - and there are rarely any decent classes for handicraft things available where I live.
The fine pink one I basically started with 8 stitches and saw where it lead me - only refining things like design as I went and choosing stitches or altering them to suit where I wanted to be.
I rarely follow patterns even when I buy them I usually find I change them soon after.
it's really beautiful!
well, you didn't exaggerate. You are an excellent knitter.
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