Ever since the pattern arrived in the LYS where I used to work I have wanted a reason to knit this stunning lace baby blanket. When my dear friend Sue Medlycott told me in 2009 that her elder daughter Lisa and husband Craig were expecting ab baby in early 2010 I knew immediately that a baby blanket would be made by me and I would finally get to use the Estonian Lullaby Baby Blanket pattern at last.

When I resigned from the LYS in early 2008 I made a decision with myself not to buy any yarn until I could see the tops of the window seats.. Shopping in that stash I found 8 balls of Sirdar Snuggly Babycare DK yarn. The pattern wanted 1050 yards and with the 8 balls at 147 yards I had 1176 yards. This yarn is a combination of acrylic and cotton in a white/cream colour and the label describes it as being machine washable.  I am hoping that it will be an easy care yarn for Lisa to take care of.

I started the project in October using #8 addi turbo needles and got gauge straight away. As we don’t know the sex of the baby I chose the design with the garter stitch border rather than the more lacy border. The pattern is extremely well written and the graphs are very accurate and easy to read.

Like most lace projects I have made once I start they become an obsession as I have to do a pattern repeat each time I pick the knitting up during the day. This with DK weight yarn and #8 needles seemed to fly along and I found myself doing a repeat quickly. I did complete the blanket  in November but as I had eye surgery the finishing had to wait until I could see comfortably to do that.

There was some yarn left over so I made a little toddler hat using Ann Norling pattern #55 that needed 140 yards of DK weight yarn. Now I am not sure if that will be too small or too large for the baby, but it was one way of using the left over yarn.

Because of the yarn mixture the blanket and the hat are very soft but also extremely light in weight. I knew that an all cotton blanket would weigh quite heavily on a new baby so am delighted with the choice I made as it really does look and feel both light and airy.

The pattern is by Evelyn A Clark and it is Fiber Trends S-2011. The pattern is great because you can use anything from a fine lace weight yarn up to a worcested weight yarn. The yarn requirements and suggested needle sizes are all on the pattern too. I knit the shawl on Addi Turbo needles and started with size US 7 but decided to use US8 after doing a little swatch.

I was given some yarn  called Kauni by a dear friend and had to immediately make something from this gorgeous gift. The shoalwater shawl had been on my list of have to knits for quite a while so once I had the yarn there was no question as to what it was going to be used for.

Shoalwater Shawl made in Kauni yarn

The pattern called for a knitted on i-cord edge but I knew I was going to run out of yarn. I completed the picot edge and then just finished the shawl at that point.  I will get it blocked as soon as I have set up my blocking board again.

slightly closer photo of the feather and fan pattern

This will not be the only Shoalwater Shawl I make and already have one on the needles in a very fine lace weight yarn. I was also given four or five more skeins of the Kauni so there will be more shawls in the future.