Thin Mint and Orange Crush

I've been trying out different shawl shapes in an effort to find my favorite. I'm also trying to solidify my own pattern design idea. This is a boomerang shape before blocking. This was the first yarn I dyed using food coloring. It was more a test of my process than anything else. Only 150 grams of fingering.

The pattern is Lina by Annett Cordes, available on Ravelry. I really like this shape and I can see how it lends itself to lace stitches and edge patterns. I found the 1884 Knitted Lace Sample Book blog and am so glad I did. Great knitted edging. I will have to design a shawl that uses some of the great edging. I'm calling this one Thin Mint because the black is more of a dark chocolate.

Then, I went back to the Dotted Rays by Stephen West. Partly because I love this pattern, partly because I have pretty much memorized it (it isn't hard to memorize), and because this hand dyed yarn needed to be a Dotted Rays shawl. Those stripes needed to be this shawl.

This is the yarn I dyed because I was no longer in love with the color.  After dyeing I love this yarn. So bright and vibrant! This was the first Dotted Rays that I blocked without points along the outer edge. I haven't decided if I like this as much as the points, but I had to try it at least once. A friend of mine said it looks like the rings of Saturn.

I really like how this design blocks differently based on the yarn This one seems much deeper at the bottom of the arc than the others I've made.

I'm calling this one Orange Crush because I do sort of have a crush on it.