The Beachcomber Shawl

I haven't been doing much knitting, to be honest.  I finished the Chilly Podsters and kind of lost interest in doing anything else.  My Nutkins are still not finished.  I started some Carousel socks, but lost interest in that.  Something about the new job had me not knitting very much.

That is, until I decided to check out what Knit Picks had to offer.  I have no idea why, but I started combing through their pattern kits.  I was hoping to find a shawl, as I've knit up a couple of the shawl kits they've put out before, but I was really up for just about anything.

When I first saw the Beachcomber Shawl, I was in love.  I was a little saddened by the fact that they didn't have any kits in the original color scheme, so I picked the only one they had available.  I wasn't thrilled with the colors, but I figured I could always give it away if I didn't like it.  But I wanted to take a chance on it.  The colors might not actually be that bad.  I don't tend to go for yellow, but I do a like my gray tones.

The start of the shawl went well.  It's an easy enough, basic garter stitch with some increases thrown in on one side, decreasing on the other.  It worked up fairly quick in the beginning, the short rows and simple color changes making it pretty easy to work through.  I have to be honest, when it was just gray I wasn't loving it so much.  I thought I would give it a chance, but I wasn't expecting much.  My daughter loved the way it was working up, so maybe I would give it to her.  That wouldn't be a half bad idea.  It was a little disheartening that I didn't like the way it was knitting up, but I figured I enjoyed knitting it, so I may as well stick it out to finish it.

When the yellow first came in I was even less thrilled with the look.  It was such a shocking departure from the subtle gray tones.  I really didn't like it.  I had built up in my mind that no one could possibly like these colors together.  They just didn't flow well.  I was starting to think this shawl would end up sitting around somewhere, unused and ignored.

Much to my surprise, my daughter came in and said how much she loved it.  She thought it looked cool and the colors looked really good together.  Then Chesh came in and said he thought it looked awesome.  I felt a lot better knowing this project would be loved and used by someone, even if it wasn't used by me.  I was knitting with a purpose again, and made good progress too, until I had to go to work and put it down for the better part of two days.  Even so, with new determination, I worked my way through this shawl like it was the best thing I'd ever knit.  I was excited to see the finished project and I was looking forward to having it go to a good home.  I knew people were excited to see it done, which made it that much easier to knit.  It flew off my needles (all considering) and was done in no time.  The lace sections were simple and pretty, which made it that much nicer to knit.  The only thing that was kind of a pain was the cast off, which was more time consuming than anything.

That's when something happened.  As I was working through the cast off I started to reconsider my thoughts on this shawl.  After I was finished my opinion became that much more firm.  I was not going to give this shawl away, not unless my daughter asked really, really nicely.  I mean, I've got a few shawls, so it's not like I would be lacking any to give this one away, but I did like it enough that, without being begged, I'm not going to part with it.

I still have my thoughts on this shawl.  Perhaps I would have liked the original colors better.  They may have even been more wearable in my mind, but this shawl suited me.  The yellow is bright and cheery, and the gray makes it something I can wear with just about anything I own.  It's not nearly as summery as the original colors, but I think summery isn't really a look I tend to do.  I tend to stick with my very neutral tones, and this yellow would really break up my wardrobe, which tends to have a lot of black, perhaps too much if you ask some.  I really love the way it turned out and I can't wait to get some good wear out of it, something that will undoubtedly happen when they days get a little less brutally hot and muggy.  It's perfect and light and I'm going to love wearing it!