Swallowtail Shawl and Mother's Day Flowers

Whew! I'm finally getting around to blocking my Swallowtail Shawl. I know, I know....it's about time!

Here's what the shawl looks like "unblocked", just laying out on the towels on my blocking board. As promised, I've shown the measurements. It's hard to believe that it's currently about 36" across the top and about 24" down each side. It's "barely" a neckerchief! The second shot shows the "center point" of the shawl....and a closeup of where the points along the edges will be - all the way down each of the 24" sides. They don't look very "pointy" at this point....just a bit "messy".










Next comes soaking the shawl and finally pinning it out. Hopefully I'll be able to add that picture later on today. Of course I'll include measurements with that one as well.

UPDATE: Busy day. I did manage to soak the Swallowtail and pin it out. It's amazing how much larger it grew! Now, it's 61" across the top and 38" down each side. Wahoo! This is the first shawl that I've actually blocked. Other than Feather and Fan projects, it's the first REAL lace project I've completed as well. I guess this is just a "day of firsts" for me! My only worry with this shawl is that it's made of Baby Alpaca and Silk - which means it basically has "no memory" - and so I'm not sure how well the blocking will "take". I guess I'll just have to wait and see! ( I've made a triangle shawl shawl before, but it wasn't lace and since it was all acrylic, there was no blocking required. I did make a rectangular Feather and Fan shawl from black Louet linen....looks down at the ground in embarassment....I....uh.....finished it around January 2006.....and still haven't blocked it.)






(These pictures are of the same shawl....it's just when I take a closeup with my camera directly over the item instead of off to the side, the flash really washes out the colors. The first picture is closer to the actual color of the shawl - a rather deep lilac color.)

Oh! I've fallen "in love" with some yarn and a shawl - keep in mind that I usually don't care for "rainbow colored yarn", but in this case, I'd definitely make an exception. Check out Jeanie's post on May 16th at this link: Just Me, Jeanie. The yarn is absolutely gorgeous! I love the effect! It's called Kauni (it's from Denmark) and available from Astrid's Dutch Obsessions. (I was VERY tempted, but to make it worth the international postage, I'd need to place a nice large order. Since I spent quite a bit at Maryland Sheep and Wool Festival earlier this month, I decided to "pass" on this.....at least for now!)

Finally, here's a few shots of the lovely flowers I received from my daughter for Mother's Day. She also sent a lovely jewelry box with a mother and daughter sculpted on it. She made me feel sooooo special! I should have only received one bouquet of flowers, but the order got messed up, two florists ended up getting involved, and the net result of it all was that I received a total of 3 bouquets (There were actually 4 deliveries, but the first was taken back up by the original florist! Long story.) The entire saga is a bit too long to go into here , so I've simply posted pictures of the three bouquets (Two shots of the pink and purple bouquet and one each of the other two!) Click on the picture of the tulips in the white container to get a better look - the photo came out a bit dark, but provided a more accurate color. (The tulips on the left got a bit washed out by the flash.)