My first ring shawl

I have been knitting several lace shawls this year, but I had not yet tried to knit a Shetland pattern. All my previous shawls have been Estonian patterns. I love them very much, but I wanted to knit a ring-shawl (that is a shawl you may thread through a ring ).

I had already bought a book about Shetland lace knitting on Amazon.com by Sharon Miller, called "Heirloom Knitting". It is a nice book, with a good description of the lace traditions on Shetland and many beautiful patterns. But there were no patterns in the book that I just had to knit right now.

So I searched the net for patterns, and found a web-site run by Sharon Miller, also named Heirloom Knitting. This sight is absolutely fantastic, with many beautiful patterns, yarns, hints and useful links, in addition to the books she has written. It contains everything you need to make a beautiful Shetland shawl.

I bought several patterns, and decided to start with a shawl called "1Ply Rosebud Shawl". It was not too big, so that I would be able to finish in a reasonable amount of time. I was also able to use the wooden frame I had already made to block the shawl out after I had finished knitting.

It took me about 150 hours to complete the shawl. Most of the center piece was knitted in a hotel room in Turkey this summer, escaping the hot afternoon sun with my daughter. I used a very fine light grey merino wool yarn called "Fine merino", which I bought at the web shop "Purl soho". It was a challenge to knit with such a fine yarn on 3,5 mm needles in the heat. My daughter and I had many nice afternoons, where she played GoSupermodel and listened to Justin Bieber while I was knitting.

It has been a while since I finished knitting the shawl, but I didn't have time to block it out until recently. The shawl is 155x155 cm and weighs 58 gram when finished. I was a bit unsure whether I would be able to thread the shawl through one of my rings, but I needn’t worry. It came through easily. I had made my first ring shawl!