Blocking Tales

As I mentioned, on Sunday I blocked the magic striped shawl--which by the way is magic because of the yarn, not the pattern. But I also half-assedly blocked something else this week, so let me show you that, first.

I was working on the second half of the lace shawl, Puncia, at stitch and bitch, and it occurred to me that I could block the first half, to see what a difference blocking was going to make, and it would be kind of fun to have the two halves to compare, instead of just before-and-after photos.

Here it is, just laid out before its soak.

And here, wet and pinned out.

Quite the difference! It opened up nicely, which bodes well for how it will go when the whole thing is done and joined and properly blocked.

One thing that I thought would happen, though, is that some of the uneven spots would smooth out, but there they still are.

It doesn't bother me much, and I don't expect it will be very noticeable when I wear it, but still, hmm.

Now, back to stripey! It's funny how I think I've laid something out straight until I see the pictures.

Before blocking, the bottom edge was not exactly rolling, but kind of folding over itself.

Like this:

 Once wet and pinned out, the edge went much better. It wanted to be flat even before I pinned it.

And the whole thing just pleases me.

The pattern (hardly necessary, really, if you've ever made a triangular shawl like this) is the Simple Yet Effective Shawl, except I did all stockinette instead of alternating with garter. I did a few rows of garter at the bottom, then used the Two-Row Bind Off from the book Cast On, Bind Off by Leslie Ann Bestor.

The magical, magical yarn is MCN Fingering: Shawl (self-striping), from Caterpillargreen yarns, in the Concrete and Tulips colorway, and I used all but a gram of the XL skein.

I'll have to block it again at some point, as I stretched one side out a little longer than the other, but it's nothing too obvious when you see it in person. And it's light and soft and warm and stripey. Ahh, happy knitting.