I have been wanting to knit the Liliaceae for quite a while now, but the idea of having to cast on 347 stitches held me back, until this week.  Well I actually cast this on 3 times, the first time I didn’t have enough yarn to finish casting on when i had already cast on 300 stitches the second time I cast on 374 instead of 347 for some reason, then I cast on properly.  But that wasn’t the end of the problems with this project.  After knitting the first row, I realized I had missed a stitch in the first 10 when I was at the end of the row so I had to unknit a whole row ( there was no way that I was going to frog the whole thing and cast on a fourth time).  There were a couple of other rows where I had to go back 50 or 60 stitches.  The lace pattern was so difficult to remember and I had to keep checking the chart.

All this is not the fault of a beautiful pattern which is well written, I was just having a bad knitting week.  I also think I should have gone down a needle size or two.

I am glad I kept going because it really is a beautiful piece.

The lace is gorgeous and the short row shaping makes it curve without being very round. This was the first time I attempted to knit a short row shawl and an applied i-cord bind off. Both were very useful techniques to learn. I love the i-cord bind off, it gives a much cleaner edge than a garter stitch edge. I did a bit of research on short rows and realized they weren’t so scary after all.

As usual the little person who lives here tried to steal claim it.  She helped me block it.

Yes I block on the bed, it is the easiest thing for me. I don’t wet block since I don’t have a blocking board but I do have a steamer so it is much easier and faster to pin on the sheets and steam it away. Yes I know the bed is a mess, but hey I wanted to block this baby so I didn’t pull the sheets properly, as if you never do that kind of thing?

I would definitely love to knit this again sometime in the future, but I think I would make it deeper. I am so happy I kept on knitting this instead of giving up, it really is gorgeous.