Licorice Allsorts Shawl

No Pattern

Yarn: Yarn Bee First Love, Too Cute 

In the skein, I absolutely loved this color combination. The more I knit the more I started to question it...then I decided that it reminded me of that pink and black candy. I don't know if I've ever eaten licorice allsorts, but that somehow doesn't stop them from being a childhood memory.

I used three skein of Yarn Bee First Love (from the Hobby Lobby incident) and did my own thing. I knew that I wanted to experiment with a center cable and slightly wider than usual borders. That part worked out and I'll definitely play with it again.

Where I ran into trouble was with the bottom edge. I knew going in that I was going to be playing yarn chicken and didn't start the garter stitch row as soon as I should have. It curls far too much and because the yarn is acrylic I'm probably going to have to live with it.

The yarn itself is very fluffy and fragile. Think Lion Brand Homespun but it's smoother and not as forgiving. Every little fingernail snag shows in the finished shawl. I also learned a valuable lesson about self striping yarns and triangular shawls. The longer the rows get, the less the stripes work. At one edge I wasn't getting any black it all.

I have three more skeins of First Love in a different colorway and I think I'll use those for a rectangular shawl.