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Project Notebook: Maedwe Shawl

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my maedwe shawlRight before Christmas I participated in a really fun, spontaneous act of giving. Using the hashtag #getyouryarnwishesgranted, knitters requested yarns they’d like to play with and went about fulfilling other people’s wishes, too.

One of the yarns I wished for was something from Lorna’s Laces, because I feel like it’s shameful that I’ve never really knit with their yarn before.

I was gifted two skeins of Shepherd Sport Multi, and they arrived just before the holiday. On Christmas I set out to find something to knit with them. I knew I wanted to knit a shawl, but beyond that I wasn’t sure.

I finally settled on making a version of Maedwe, a short-row garter stitch shawl by AnneLena Mattison found in the book Free-Spirit Shawls. It’s actually a pretty easy pattern once you get the rhythm of it, and I finished up mine in five days.

I really like the look of it, even though the original was knit in a much more subdued yarn. I’ve already worn it quite a lot and intend to throughout the season. maedwe and instahat

This is me wearing it on New Year’s Eve along with a quick as lightning hat I’ll tell you about next week.

What’s on (or recently off) your needles? I’d love to hear about it!

 

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Comments

  1. Beautiful shawl. I’m so sorry that I missed #getyouryarnwishgranted. I’ll have to keep an eye out for it next year as I’d love to participate.
    I’m currently working on an infinity scarf for my daughters best friends 30th birthday gift.
    I’m using the bulky Brown sheep co. Lambs pride.
    I purchased this yarn at the New York sheep an wool festival this past October.
    Knitting with this yarn reminds me of the great day that I had with my daughter.
    The Eucalyptus leaf color will look lovely on her.

Have you read?

A Shawlette with a Ton of Design Options

There’s a lot to like about the Eloise Bandana from Katryn Seeburger. This cute little colorwork triangle can be worked as a bandana or kerchief size or a bigger shawlette. 

It’s worked in two colors of fingering weight yarn so you can use whatever yarn you have in your stash and just make it as big as you can (since it is worked from the bottom up). 

You can see the two sizes from the photo, and also two colorwork options: strawberries and lily of the valley. 

But that’s not all the choices you have. In fact, there are 34 different charts you can choose from to knit onto your project. Some of the options include happy faces, a lobster, a pumpkin, a snail and a butterfly. There are cherries, peaches, tomatoes and radishes.

There’s even a blank square you can use to draw your own little design if you want to use something else. Or keep it blank and make it a plain checkerboard design. 

And while both of these shawls use the same icons throughout, you could also use different designs throughout if you want. Say a fall version with a bat, pumpkin, leaf and acorn, or a summer beach theme with sailboat, fish, lobster and a bird? I keep suggesting four different icons because the larger size has four rows of squares, but the smaller has three, so you could do stripes of the same icon or alternate a couple of different ones, whatever you like. 

Look through the finished projects on the Ravelry project page to see lots of different options, from rows to individual icons. There are also some projects that are smaller than the suggested size to make a smaller bandana. You could also keep going a make a bigger shawl working increases in the same way as you have been going. 

Check out all the details and grab a copy of the pattern on Ravelry. 

[Photo: Katryn Seeburger]