Happy Friday, people! In a rare moment of planetary alignment, this Friday actually comes with a FO!

Behold my Leafy Green shawl. This represents the last of the stash yarn I acquired in Seattle three years ago, and the first time ever I have knitted through all the stash from a particular location. The pattern is Annis: I had seen it in Knitty when it came out (four years ago!) and, it being knitted in green, decided I had to have it.

I believe we’ve discussed my thing for green before. See e.g. Greenies, Spring Romper, and Lace Leaf Pullover.

Somewhere along the line, the desire to have this shawl parted ways with the vim to actually get it out of my queue, so here we are four years later. I will not beat about the bush: I really didn’t like making it. I love wearing it, and it has already proven useful in my works-well-with-green wardrobe, but the knitting. Meh.

The shawl begins with a long, long, long strip of lace, which is then capped with nupps, followed by a short-row body. I was truly distressed when I found myself thinking that all that lace baaaaack and fooooooorth really stunk, because for me, a shawl is the ultimate process knit. But there I was, really unhappy with all that lace. Then the nupps. I was working with a blunt-tipped needle, and the nupps were punishment for all the bad things I have ever done, and will ever do (and yes, I did attempt to avoid this fate but purchased the wrong size of replacement needle. Thank you, fate). The short rows were ok, but as the name implies, they were short.

And then the blocking. I’ve blocked before, and have blocked shawls before. I followed the directions, pinning the edges into place and then moving inward, but it was beastly. The fabric is very loose, and shifts as you work, and with the crescent shape, there is no good point of reference to keep things in place. Long story short, I had to block it twice to get it right-ish. There were a few places the stockinette got pulled and the stitches are still all wonky (see above), but after the second time, I said to heck with it. The real killer, though, is that the points, the delicious lacy points, are not all that pointy. I tried so hard, squishing things around and trying to make those points sharp, but success eluded me. It was the last turn of the knife, looking forward to knitting this shawl for so long, only to dislike the process, and then, finally, at the last moment for redemption, have blocking turn out to be such a mess.

But it is a finished object, and this is Friday, so I’m going to try to be content with that.

P.S. Thanks to Querido for his photos. He made a point particularly to get that nice detail shot, and did a lovely job of it.