I am so excited, I started to design my own pattern shawl!
I did some stash-busting - with yarn I had lying around for 20+ years, because I like the colour so much (royal blue), and couldn't bear chucking it. I finished the shawl and now I know why I could never before bring myself to knit with this 100% Dralon yarn showing an obscure brand name: Lady Joy. Sounds dodgy, doesn't it!
It's not actually that bad, - if you like acrylic. For the longest time I thought that I don't mind it. It's cheap, serviceable, washes well and what more do you want? Ah... lots more.
Acrylic (or dralon by another name!) does not wear terribly well. I'm particularly sensitive around my neck and feel that the yarn sticks to my skin like glue. Not very pleasant at all. It's even a bit suffocating to be honest.
So anyway. Did some stash-busting (I want and need another shawl/kerchief style neckwarmer, in another colour than the pink one I wear all the time) and was going to do a garter stitch interior with something 'lacey' around that as an edging. Or just an edging, wasn't sure.
Then I remembered that I hate garter stitch: knitting Continental style means that the right needle keeps slipping past the purl bump in the row below when I try to pick up the stitches on the left needle. I don't know if English knitters have the same problem. It drives me nuts! I very quickly decided that I wasn't going to get stressed by my knitting: it is meant to be an enjoyable, relaxing past time! So I changed the stitch that fills the inner triangle to something very manageable, comforting to knit and still with a bit of interest too. You'll see if you can wait to look at the pattern (once available).
The pattern still needs to be written up - once that's done I would like to upload it to Ravelry, as a free pattern. It is such a simple shawl, besides being my first own design, that I wouldn't want to go big-headed. A free pattern will be very nice for dipping a toe in on this designing things malarkey, thanks very much...
The nicest element of the shawl is the lace edge. I may change this a little bit for my second version. Having realised that I won't enjoy wearing the Dralon shawl, I am now re-knitting this in a silk/merino mix yarn which is wonderfully soft to the touch and lovely to look at. Can't wait to finish it and blog about it!
Here's a picture of my trial version:
PS: I already picked a name for this design and researched it to make sure it isn't being used for someone else's design. That would be seriously embarrassing, so I'm glad I thought of it!
Wow, congrats on your first steps into designing! The shawl looks lovely!
ReplyDeleteHey, I'm impressed! It looks like a lovely little shawl. Looking forward to seeing the "real" one. I've designed quite a few things and think it's much more fun than following someone else's pattern, although there are times when it's pleasant not to think much!
ReplyDeleteWatch out! The more you design, the more addictive it becomes.
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