on the needles: robins' feathers shawl

It's the holiday season and I have lots of gift-knitting to do.

So naturally I decided to cast on a non-gift charted lace shawl!

Here's the yarn I'm using-- it's soft and fluffy superwash merino wool, which I spun from this Lorna's Laces roving.  I have 900 yards of a heavy laceweight to light fingering weight, so my shawl should be big and cozy!  

Here's my progress so far.  I'm using the Gwendolyn pattern, by Stefanie Bold.

Since it's lace, the full effect of the patterning won't be visible until the shawl is finished and blocked, but I am so, so pleased with how it's turning out.  The lace looks like feathers, and the yarn is the most beautiful robin's egg blue, so I'm naming this shawl my Robins' Feathers Shawl.

As I keep working on this shawl (along with the four or five other projects on the needles-- how did that happen?  I almost never have more than one knitting project going at once!), I'll include a few little tips and tricks that are making my first charted lace project a bit easier.  The first thing I've discovered?  I can only work on this shawl if I'm listening to a podcast.  If I'm trying to watch a movie at the same time, I'm too visually distracted, and if I'm not listening to anything, my brain gets bored and my mind wanders from my place in the charts.  Podcasts seem to be a happy medium for me.

I hope you're having a wonderful week!

♥