Just Sit Back & Knit: Cozy Shoulder Shawl

Okay, so I am no better at naming knitted items than I am at thinking up titles for posts...

Here I give you what I believe to be my single greatest knitted item ever. Notice I said "my." I think this is probably the prettiest, most perfect item I have ever knitted. And I think a large part of that has to do with the fact that it seems so well suited to the recepient. This shawl is a gift (given just a few short hours ago) for a friend who has been battling health problems for several months now. I've often seen her with a small wrap tied around her neck or shoulders, and decided that I wanted to make one for her. I knew that she would appreciate it all the more because she began to knit just before her health problems began. She is twice my age but I had the pleasure of teaching her to knit, which included helping her pick out her first yarn (Cascade Eco-Wool) and first set of needles (Crystal Palace Circular Needles) and giving her a lesson that began with, "Knitting is just two stitches, knit and purl...."

The facts:
Cozy Shoulder Shawl
Four skeins of Claudia Handpainted Yarn: Sport Weight, "Donna's Favorite" (color)
Needles: #6 Clover Circulars
Pattern: adopted from the "Feather and Fan Triangle Shawl" in Cheryl Oberle's Folk Shawls

I purchased Folk Shawls specifically for this project. I changed the pattern slightly to suit my purposes. I used a completely different yarn and needle size, and made the shawl significantly smaller than the one pictured. I love the beautiful colors of the yarn and wanted to show them off, so I made the main portion of the shawl in stockinette with a thin, five stitch garter stitch border. Then I only did four or five repeats of the feather and fan and followed that up with a few rows of garter stitch. I am really proud of the way it turned out. This was my first project using a chart (besides little teeny charts for simple cables) and am glad I tried it. Not nearly as scary as I thought!

Finally, I blocked it on the guest bed (a bit unevenly, I must admit) and purchased a shawl pin, the Nickel Silver Fibula from Patternworks.

Before giving it away I had one of my sisters take pictures while I modeled it. And, while the colors are not done justice, I do have an excuse to slip another belly picture in...