Stillness Shawl - Halfway There

 

I finished up my test knit last week, so I’m back to focusing on my Stillness Shawl.  I’ve done the last increase, so I now have 577 stitches on my needles.  The rows are simple, but long.  This has been a very easy shawl to modify into a cape.  At this point in the pattern, and since row 100, the extra stitch I have is worked as a k1 for the first pattern repeat.  This makes the pattern symmetrical overall.  I used leftovers from two of my other trio sets (Granny Smith, from an Autumn Trio set and Thyme, from the English Garden Trio) for the Color D stripes.  I am almost out of the the Thyme and searched yesterday for a replacement.  I didn’t really have anything that would work in my leftovers bag, so I checked all of the Kiri in my stash for a suitable color.  I ended up going to my Yule Ombré set.  It turns out that the second skein of that set matches the Thyme exactly so I caked it up yesterday.  If I need more of Color D, I will have to decide if I want to go darker (the third skein) or lighter (the first skein).  I can go either way.  The Granny Smith is darker than the Thyme, so I already have a darker to lighter thing going with Color D.

Pattern:  Stillness Shawl by Helen Stewart

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Kiri

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Goblin Kalari - Finished!

 

I finally bound off my Goblin Kalari.  It has been sitting in my project bag for a while now.  I was going to do a knit on edging instead of binding off, but could not get a good color or a good border that seemed to go, so I gave up trying and just bound off.  I had to tink back one row to get enough yarn to bind off with, and I almost made it.

Fortunately I had some yarn in my Kiri leftovers that was a pretty close match.  I did not do a lace bindoff, just a regular bindoff done a bit looser.  I blocked pretty aggressively.  I love how it came out.  I may do more of these.  It is a great way to use up leftovers, and I like the shape.

Pattern:  Kalari Shawl by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Kiri - Goblin Ombré 

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Pardalote Shawl - Finished!

 

I blocked my Pardalote Shawl yesterday morning and this morning it was dry, so I unpinned it and blocked my Goblin Kalari.  Once it got light I grabbed a quick picture on the deck.

A blocking picture in the early afternoon winter sun.  It is hard to do justice to the colors, but here are a couple more shots that get close.

Here you can see the contrast bind off.  I worked the last couple of rows in C1.  And I think this photo helps show the lovely subtle colors of the Haunted colorway.

Both of the colors are Dream in Color Loopy Ewe exclusive colors - Exploration Station and Haunted.

Here they are in the skein - Haunted is the one on top.

Pattern:  Pardalote Shawl by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere 

Needle: US 5 (3.75 mm)

Stillness Shawl - Cast On!

 

Yesterday I bound off both my Pardalote Shawl and my Goblin Kalari Shawl.  While I was straightening my project bags I came across the three skeins above.  They are the Valentine Trio from The Unique Sheep and they have been in my stash for a while now waiting for the right project.  I looked through my pattern library last night and finally settled on Helen Stewart’s Stillness Shawl.  I thought about doing another Snowmelt but I felt like doing something that I hadn’t knit before.  The Stillness Shawl is a circular shawl, but I’m working it as a circular cape, my standard modification for circular shawls.  For the B color I am not using mohair (can’t stand the stuff), or lace weight.  Instead I am using up some leftovers in the same yarn base.

Pattern:  Stillness Shawl by Helen Stewart

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Kiri

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Jimmy Beans Craftvent 2020 - Tidings to Yew

 

I purchased a Craftvent set from Jimmy Beans Wool again this year.  This is the fifth year I have done this,  although I have only knit three of the projects.  I went a little Advent kit crazy this year.  Along with the past kits that I’ve bought that I haven’t knit up yet I think I can do a year of Advent, which is what I may do in 2021.  I haven’t even opened all of the Advent kits that I bought this year.  For some reason I decided to open this one, but obviously I did not abide by the open one a day rule.  I started this on December 3 and finished it on December 12.  I don’t feel bad about spoiling the mystery, as Jimmy Bean posts pictures of the finished project on their product page.  I think they learned one year that not everyone likes surprises.  This was an interesting knit.  The texture is a bit different because you have lace sections that are separated by slip stitch and fisherman’s rib.  I wasn’t sure how it was going to block out when I was working it, but am pleased with the result.  I couldn’t stretch the lace out as much as I normally would, but it still looks good.

170 g yarn used

Day 2 (A)- Filtered Day Dreams

Day 3 (B) - Eleven Dark

Day 5 (C) - Tiny House

Day 6 (D) - Saffron

Day 8 (E) - Donkey Ote

Day 9 (F) - Coffee Grounds

Day 11 (G) - Liquid Gold

Day 12 (H) - Ristretto

Day 14 (I) - Mars Rover

Day 16 (J) - Blood Runs Cold

Day 17 (K) - Glazed Pecan

Day 19 (L) - Oscuro

Day 20 (M) - Pink Clay

Day 22 (F) - Coffee Grounds

Day 23 (G) - Liquid Gold

Pattern:  Tidings to Yew by Amy Gunderson

Yarn:  Madeline Tosh Merino Light

Needle:  US 4 (3.5 mm)

Woodsman Shawll II - Finished!

 

This week is my last week of work for the rest of the year, and it was a bit of a hell week packed with meetings.  Fortunately that gave me plenty of time to work on the lace edging on my shawl and I finished it up this past Wednesday.  For this shawl I bought some Cascade Yarns Heritage Solids in black.  We had a little bit of snow last night and I thought it would go well with the shawl.  This is just one of my simple garter stitch boomerang shawls.  Mindless knitting that is great for when I’m reviewing documents.  I made one for my sister Virginia, but she only wanted the lace edging on the cast off edge.  I loved the colors so much I bought a second skein to make one for myself.

Pattern:  Improvised (Boomerang shawl)

Yarn:  SpaceCadet Yarns Oriana in Woodsman

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

A Perfect Loaf

 

The last weekend of November my bread machine broke.  It was a Zojirushi, and was seventeen years old.   It was my second bread machine.  My first was also a Zojirushi.  That one was cool, it had a vertical pan, so it made a tall loaf, and it had a finish pan that I could swap out with the mixing pan so there would be no hole in the bottom of my loaf.  The top of the loaf was a wonderful pillow top that I would cut off while the loaf was still warm and spread with butter and eat.  I used that one regularly and it didn’t last too many years.  My second bread machine did not see such regular use, but lately I had been using it weekly, and it finally broke.  I had put my ingredients in as usual on the 29th of November, but when I went to check on my bread it hadn’t mixed.  I quickly scooped everything into my Kitchen Aide mixer and finished mixing, then put it into two loaf pans to rise and then baked it in the oven.  The bread came out great.

I immediately went online and started searching for a new bread machine.  Things have changed some since the last time I shopped for one.  I ended up with a Cuisinart CBK-200 Convection Bread Maker.  The picture above is the third loaf I made in it.  The pan is not as long as the one in my Zojirushi, so the bread comes out taller.  The first loaf I made was a 1.5 pound loaf and it was too tall.  The second loaf I made was a 1 pound loaf and it was too short, so I tweaked the recipe to make a 1.25 pound loaf and used the 1 pound cycle.  It came out just right.  I had seen some complaints about the Cuisinart browning the bread too much, and I agree that it does tend to brown a little more than I prefer, but this one came out perfectly. And the bread is the best bread I have ever eaten.  The texture is perfect, soft without being mushy, and it keeps well.  I cut the loaf in half right down the middle and store it in the fridge in plastic bags (it is too big to fit into a single bag).  Even after a week, the bread is not stale or dry.  I cannot say the same about the bread from my Zojirushi.

I think the secret is that this bread machine does a better job of mixing.  It only has a single paddle, but the paddle has a nice design and it beats with a solid mechanical sound and action.  I always supervise the initial mix to make sure that there is enough moisture in the dough and that everything is getting picked up.  Once it makes a nice ball I walk away until the machine beeps to let me know it is time to take out the paddle.  On my Zojirushi I had to listen for the second stir down and then go take out the paddles, then once the bread was finished baking I would let the whole pan sit on a cooling rack for twenty minutes before taking the bread out or else there would still be big holes where the bread stuck to the paddle posts.  With my new machine I can pop the loaf out right away and there is barely a hole where the post was.

I started making bread again when I noticed that store bought bread, even the high end stuff, was bothering my stomach and just making me feel off.  I got worried that maybe I was developing a gluten allergy.  So I decided to start making my own bread again, and the problems disappeared.  I figured it was probably the other stuff they add to the bread.  Now we rarely buy bread products.

Pardalote Shawl - Cast On

Once I had finished up my Kentia Wrap I cast on my Pardalote Shawl.  This shawl was just recently published by Ambah and I had already picked out my colors from some recent acquisitions from The Loopy Ewe.  The pattern is easy and repetitive (most of her patterns are), but they really showcase the yarn, and they let you play with color.

Both of these skeins are Loopy Ewe exclusive colors from Dream in Color.  I love their yarns and their colors.  The top one is Haunted, and came out last month.  The bottom one is Exploration Station and came out this past summer during Camp Loopy, which was science themed this year.  Both are Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere.  I keep an eye on that page and tend to buy at least one skein of the color on Smooshy because I know that I can use it in a shawl.  Sometimes I will buy a couple of skeins on City as well.

Pattern:  Pardalote Shawl by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Dream in Color Smooshy with Cashmere

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

 

Kentia Wrap - Finished!

 

I finished up my Kentia Wrap this past Friday evening and blocked it Saturday morning.  I used a Paintbox set, plus one skein from a Paintcan set so I begin and end on a Mosaic section.  I enjoyed knitting this.  The colors are fun and it makes a nice squishy fabric.

Pattern:  Kentia Wrap by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Koigu KPM and KPPPM

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Kentia Wrap - Eight Contrast Colors Done (almost)

 

I have also been making progress on my Kentia Shawl in bursts.  I’m almost done with the eighth contrast color and I have the ninth caked up and ready to go.  I really like the texture and the color play.

Here is a close up of the top.

Pattern:  Kentia Wrap by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Koigu KPM and KPPPM

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Woodsman Shawl II - Body Done!

 

I’ve been working on this one lately and managed to finish up the body last night while watching the latest season of The Last Kingdom.  I ordered a skein of basic black sock yarn for the border.  Now I need another mindless project.

Pattern:  Improvised (Boomerang shawl)

Yarn:  SpaceCadet Yarns Oriana in Woodsman

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Crochet Basket

I’ve been trying to use up some of my deeper stash, especially the heavier weight yarns.  I tend to prefer knitting with lighter weight yarns.  These yarns are from clubs and they have been in my stash for a while.  I’ve been wanting to make a simple crochet basket for a while now, and I finally got started the last weekend in October.  I’ll keep working the increases in the bottom until it gets to a size I like and then I’ll work the sides until I run out of yarn.

Pattern:  based on Stash Basket by Emily Bolduan

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Back to Basics

Hook:  4 mm (G)

Claude the Octopus

 

When I first started knitting, way back at the turn of this millennium I became obsessed with Adrienne Vittadini patterns.  I loved the sophistication of their style and I bought pattern books and yarn.  Back then I always bought yarn for patterns that I wanted to knit right away, on the theory that the yarn could be discontinued later when I finally got around to knitting the pattern.  It is a habit that has contributed to my rather large stash, but it has paid off.  One of the Adrienne Vittadini yarns that I have in my stash is Dianna.  This yarn is 51% cotton, 49% acrylic, and comes in 50 gram/87 yard balls, and I have 27 balls in my stash in 5 colors.  I did knit a top out of it, and didn’t really like how it knit up, so I left it in deep stash and moved on.

Lately I’ve been going through my deep stash and deciding what to do with it.  I’ve given some away to friends and I almost gave this away to a friend of mine that crochets and can’t work with wool, but then I saw Claude the Octopus on Ravelry and I fell in love.  I looked at the colors in my stash of Dianna and realized that I had colors that would work in the quantities that I need.  This baby is taking 13 skeins, almost half of what I have in my stash.  So last weekend I grabbed a hook and started crocheting, and I am loving it.  I’ve been eyeing Amigurumi for awhile now, but this is the first one I’ve attempted, and I am hooked - pun intended.  The picture above is the head/body (upside down).  I’ve almost finished the top side of the tentacles.

This is the very start.

And this is the head/body before I started really decreasing and had to start stuffing it.

And these are the colors I’m using.  The off white will be the underside, and the rose will be the suckers.  The dark blue is the edging color that you use to join the top and the bottom together.

Pattern:  Claude the Octopus by Kate E. Hancock

Yarn:  Adrienne Vittadini Dianna

Hook:  4 mm (G)

Rose Bolero - Finished!

 

I finished this up last weekend.  I didn’t have enough yarn to work the picot edging, but I did have enough to work a single crochet around the armholes just to give them a neat finish.  I had to undo all of the joining I had done of blocks to the body, but not the joining of blocks to blocks.  When I got the last block attached I had a gap of 12 stitches between the last one and the first one.  Oops.  So I pulled the thread and all the blocks came off.  Then I counted out intervals of 18 stitches, plus two that had 19 stitches, and marked them with locking stitch markers.  I then finished joining all of the blocks to each other in a long strip (per the pattern instructions) and joined them together into a loop, being careful not to twist the loop when I joined.  With the wrong sides facing each other I joined the loop of blocks to the body using the locking stitch markers.  Once that was done I started joining once more.  This time everything worked out.  

Pattern:  DROPS 126-8 Rose Parade by DROPS Design

Yarn:  Fiesta Yarns La Luz Multi in Rose (June Flower of the Month colorway)

Hook:  D (3.25 mm)

Goblin Kalari - Choosing a Color for the Edging

 

I had finished the knitting on the body of my Goblin Kalari some time back and had even started working an edging with one of the skeins from the Santa Rosa trio, but I just wasn’t feeling it, so I set it aside to let my subconscious ponder it.  Today I decided to try a couple of other combinations.

I think I like the orange.  It has a bit of a Halloween feel to it, which is totally appropriate.  I’ll give it a shot and see how it looks.

Pattern:  Kalari by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Kiri in Goblin Ombré 

Needle:  US 6 (4.0 mm)

Woodsman Shawl II - Cast On

 

I needed another mindless knit for work knitting, so I pulled this skein out of my recent stash.  I made a simple boomerang shawl for my sister with this colorway, and I so loved the color that I purchased a second skein to make a shawl for myself.

Pattern:  Improvised (Boomerang shawl)
Yarn:  SpaceCadet Yarns Oriana in Woodsman
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Kentia Wrap - Cast On and Three Contrast Skeins Done

This is a recent release from Ambah O’Brien.  The recommended yarn is by Koigu, and went with a kit, which includes a pencil set of 10 mini skeins plus a main color.

The shawl is composed of mosaic sections alternating with slip stitch sections, which results in a wonderful texture as well as color play.  It is a very addicting pattern to knit.

Pattern:  Kentia Wrap by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Koigu KPM and KPPPM

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Rose Bolero - Attaching the blocks

After sitting sealed up in a plastic project bag for the last eight years, I finally pulled this project back out and am almost done with it.  I had set it aside after making one of the crochet blocks for the edge.  For some reason I just didn’t feel like making seventeen more.  I actually ended up needing nineteen to make it around the edge.  Amazingly enough the other eighteen that I made in this past week matched up size-wise with the one that I made eight years ago.  The pattern calls for joining all of the blocks and then joining to the body of the bolero, but I decided to join the blocks to the bolero individually first, and then joining the blocks.  I am doing a single crochet join for all of my seams, as I like the way it looks and I didn’t feel like doing a lot of sewing.

My last six blocks are drying.  They should be dry later today and I can finish this up this weekend.  In the process of finishing this bolero I have re-discovered that I enjoy crocheting.  I may have to do more, even though I can’t read or really watch TV while doing it.

Here are my last six blocks.

Pattern:  DROPS 126-8 Rose Parade by DROPS Design

Yarn:  Fiesta Yarns La Luz Multi in Rose (June Flower of the Month colorway)

Hook:  D (3.25 mm)

Reverberation Shawl - Two Colors Done

 

I finished up color 2 yesterday.  I was not able to complete the entire section as written in the pattern.  You can see in the picture the tiny bit of the green that I have left over.  At the end of the first color there are 114 stitches on the needle.  You continue increasing with the second color until you get to 130 stitches.  That is an increase of 16 stitches, and each repeat of the pattern gives you 4 stitches, so that means 4 repeats to get to 130 stitches.  Then the instructions state to repeat the pattern 7 more times - 28 rows total.  I’m two repeats or 8 rows short.  I had seen a comment on one of the project pages on Ravelry about making sure you get gauge and yarn chicken.  I did not do a gauge swatch, but am using the recommended needle size and am knitting pretty tightly (and am not seeing any rowing out on my wrong side, yay!).

For this pattern I’m not concerned with the fact that I had to cut this section short.  It is easy to shorten a section to adjust to yarn usage, so I’m not sweating it.

Pattern:  Reverberation Shawl by Debbie O’Neill

Yarn:  Sweet Georgia Yarns Tough Love Sock

Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Reverberation Shawl - Cast On and One Color Done

 

Having finished up a couple of projects I obviously needed to cast on something new, despite the fact that I currently have twenty WIPs on my Ravelry project page.  This one is The Loopy Ewe Advent Kit from 2019.  It was a bit of an odd one in that the bags had no numbers on them, you could open them in any order you wanted to, or all at once.  I can’t remember for certain what I did, but I probably opened them all at once.  It came with a pattern, the Reverberation Shawl by Debbie O’Neill.  Here are the mini skeins, which did not come with any labels at all, no yarn type, no color names.  I deduced from other clues that the yarn is Sweet Georgia Yarns Tough Love Sock, and I think the order in the picture is the order that I’m going to use them in (going from left to right), although I reserve the right to change my mind.

The Advent set also came with some notions:

Pattern:  Reverberation Shawl by Debbie O’Neill

Yarn:  Sweet Georgia Yarns Tough Love Sock

Needle:  US 3 (3.25 mm)

Bifrost - Finished!

 

I finished up my Bifrost scarf last week, it took me just under a year (I started it November 14, 2019 and finished it October 6, 2020).  It was a fun, mindless knit, and I enjoyed the colors.  The yarn has a nice feel to it, a bit rustic.

Pattern:  Bifrost by Cate Carter-Evans

Yarn:  Infinite Twist Helix Treasure Cakes

Needle: US 5 (3.75 mm)

Adventurous Beach - Finished!

 

I ended up making two shawls, one each out of each half of the Advent set.  This is skeins 1, 14-25.

This is skeins 1-13.

I suppose that I could have mixed the triangles rather than matching them, so that each shawl used all 25 colors but I think I had just gotten so used to working with each half set of colors separately that it didn’t really occur to me until later.  I’m not sure how I would have paired them up if I had done it that way.  By doing it this way I have two fades, and I really like fades.  I did think about putting all four triangles together into one huge shawl, but the thought of trying to block that just made me want to go hide.  Even blocking these took a lot of floor space and most of my blocking mats.

Pattern:  Adventurous Shawl by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Sunshine Yarns Classic Sock in the Beach Tones Advent Set

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Adventurous Beach - Four Triangles Done!

 

I finished up the fourth triangle today.  While knitting this last triangle I pondered what I would do with them when they were all done.  I considered joining them all together to make one shawl, but I realized that shawl would be huge.  Too huge.  So I came up with the idea of two shawl, each using half of the Advent set.  But instead of just joining the two triangles I decided to use up the leftovers from each pair of triangles to add some length between the two triangle with rows of garter stitch worked on the bias to match the bias of the triangle edge.

Pattern:  Adventurous Wrap by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Sunshine Yarns Beach Tones Advent Set

Needle: US 5 (3.75 mm)

Garden Variety MKAL - Finished!

I finished this up this past Monday, although I didn’t block it until Tuesday.  It was a lot of fun.  I enjoyed the construction and the color work and the pattern was extremely well-written.  It is huge, about two feet wide and eight feet long.

Pattern:  Garden Variety MKAL by Lisa K. Ross

Yarn:  Miss Babs Yummy 2-Ply

Needles:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Shimmer & Shine - Finished!

From a temporal perspective, I find knit on borders fascinating.  When you first start them you don’t seem to be making much progress, then suddenly you are halfway done, and then you get to those last 10 or so repeats and everything seems to slow down again.  I finished up the knit on border this past Wednesday and blocked it right away.  It is huge, but so light and floaty.

Pattern:  Woollsia by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Sundara Yarns Extra Fine Fingering Merino

Needles:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Shimmer & Shine - Border One-Quarter Done

This has become my meeting knitting when I am on telecons.  I can look at a chart and at my knitting, so I can do simple lace while listening to the telecon.  This week I made some good progress  on it, finishing about one-quarter of the border.  It goes surprisingly quickly.

Pattern:  Woollsia by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  Sundara Yarns Extra Fine Fingering Merino

Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Goblin Kalari - Over 300 Stitches!

I have not forgotten my two Ambah O’Brien projects.  My Goblin Kalari has become my mindless work knitting, and I am down to my last four skeins.  The stitch count is over 300 at this point, so those rows are long, which is actually perfect for when I’m reading technical documents.  I did have to put the project on a longer cable this week.  I’m still contemplating what color to pick for a knit on border.

Pattern:  Kalari by Ambah O’Brien

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Kiri in Goblin Ombré 

Needles:  US 6 (4.0 mm)

Garden Variety MKAL - Clue 3 Done

After spending last weekend finishing up Arabian Nights, I turned my attention back to this shawl and finished up Clue 3 yesterday morning.  The design is a lot of fun, and very inspiring and I like the fact that it kind of looks like a dress.  The fourth clue is out and it uses the first three colors.  I may add some rows in to use up my leftovers, depending on how much of my main color I have.  I like the asymmetry of the design, and I love the colors.

Pattern:  Garden Variety MKAL by Lisa K. Ross
Yarn:  Miss Babs Yummy 2-ply and Yummy 2-ply Toes
Needle:  US 5 (3.75 mm)

Arabian Nights - MKAL Reveal

This past Friday marked the release of the eighth and final clue of the latest Unique Sheep MKAL.  As one of the test knitters (and also the tech editor of the pattern) I no longer can post about these as I knit them, and never think about posting the individual clues later.  For this one I knit half the shawl during the actual test knit, and only finished the shawl this past Sunday.  I started the test knit during my long Fourth of July weekend working two clues each weekend for four weeks in order to make the August 8 start of the MKAL.  During the week I worked on in my Camp Loopy knitting.  After Camp Loopy finished up in August, I started working on this again, working it in between other projects, with the goal of finishing up before the last clue came out.

The yarn is Luxe and the Colorway is Hazy Days.  It is a circle colorway and I just love it.  I got it from Earthfaire back in 2016.  I used two different colors of beads, that I also got from Earthfaire at some point in the past and pulled from my bead stash.  I used Amethyst Lined Crystal AB for the cooler blue-green side and Raspberry Lined Crystal AB for the warmer purple-pink side.  When I blocked it I was really blown away with how beautiful it came out.  I kept wandering in to my blocking room just to admire it.

The Luxe has really great stitch definition, unfortunately it is no longer available from The Unique Sheep.  They were having some quality control issues with the mill and dropped it.  I blocked the edges straight along the grid of my blocking mats, blocking one edge and then the other, starting from the center and working towards the ends.  The ends were a little bit of a challenge.  I tried points, but that didn’t seem right, so I ended up threading a blocking wire, picking up every other stitch, and then flaring out the ends so that the beads would show.  The last four rows are just 1x1 rib and after all of the twisted stitches they naturally open up more so I let them do what they wanted.  I don’t believe in forcing my knitting when I block.  I try to understand what the knitted fabric wants to do naturally and block it that way.  I also don’t block strenuously.  I block firmly, but I don’t over block.  If the knitting is pulling back from the pins when it is drying (making little scallops) I figure I blocked it too hard.  This one did not do that at all.

I worked the first half with the cool colors.

And the second half with the warm colors.  I did not work any transition rows.  I did work a plain knit row when I started the second half, so there are two plain knit rows in the center of the shawl.  If I were working it over again I would still work those two set up rows, but I would work them in a knit/purl pattern that matched the lace pattern.

Pattern:  Arabian Nights by Janine Le Cras

Yarn:  The Unique Sheep Luxe in Hazy Days

Needle:  US 4 (3.5 mm)