Jaali

One of the things I love best about Ravelry is browsing other people's favorites. There are knitters who have the same taste as I do, and some of them have thousands of favorites. My meagre list only has about 200 entries, because when I see something I like, I spend a lot of time admiring it and then forget to click the little heart.

One morning, while perusing one such glorious Favorites list, I stumbled across Jaali--a shawl similar to Percy--both use the elegant Frost Flowers pattern as the main motif.

Jaali was especially lovely to knit, because it starts at the bottom by casting on a zillion stitches and decreasing to the top edge. By the time the honeymoon period is over, the rows are short and getting shorter; I found it difficult to put down because I wanted just One More Decrease.

The yarn was handspun by me from an EverImprovingMe batt--merino, firestar, and angelina--using a Tibetan spindle. I added a few beads (6/0) on the border, and, in a miracle of pre-planning, I actually did not run out of them before finishing that section.

There's not much else to say about this piece--it's a relatively quick knit, especially if you choose the small or medium size. I went with the large size, because it required 680 yards and my skein of handspun was 700 yards. I had exactly 18 inches left over and knit the last five rows holding my breath.