25-04-2020

I opted to use a US5 needle - prob should have used a 6. Also - added one extra row of lace in the final lace repeat and still had about 18g of yarn. Even though my ball is only 425 yards, I got 9 extra rows of garter after the final lace repeat (it’s only supposed to be one garter ridge or 2 rows). Not sure if this will mess with the proportions of lace to garter, and leave it looking a bit less delicate than desired, but the shawl is too small at anything less than 425 yards and I wanted to use up all of the yarn.

25-04-2020

This is harder on the hands than the Drops of Joy and less fun to knit. Given that the Drops is more interesting (IMO) and includes less of the fish-eye lace. I likely won’t knit this shawl again - even though I’m optimistic, once it blocks, I will like it very much. Whereas it was prudent for me to use a US5 for Drops of Joy (because of the amount of yarn I had and in light of the fact that I am not a tight knitter), this pattern calls for the same yardage and I had lots of yarn left over once completing the final fish eye segment. So, for me, this shawl could use the larger needle size (even if I am a loose knitter working with 1 425y skein).

If I hadn’t knitted 10 extra rows, this thing would have been really small - too small, IMO, to have adequate impact (and to do the job of keeping one warm).

Was able to block to 20 x 70, which is fine.

26-04-2020

In retrospect, to use up all the yarn while maximizing the proportions of lace in the shawl I would have distributed those rows in the fish eye sections - perhaps adding 5 to the first fish eye section. 3 to the second and 2 to the 3rd (to maintain the ratios of lace). I could also have got another 2 rows of garter with my 2g of yarn remaining, esp. if I added them into the original garter section (in that section the 2g would likely have got me 4 rows more). At this point, the finished Drops of Joy seems like a larger finished object but, perhaps when blocking is finished (and given that I actually used 3 more grams of yarn in this project), they will seem equal in size.

One final thought: If you’re not prepared to wet block and then use pins and blocking wires agressively, this shawl will not look like the designer’s photos. It will be wonky, the centre tab will likely bubble and it will seem very small and insubstantial. And that’s even if you wet block, but don’t then use wires and pins.