As they say in Dr. Seuss, the time has come; the time is now. That is, it’s time to reveal the Quiet Bay MKAL shawl…
What do you think?
Quiet Bay is a bottom-up asymmetrical triangle, beginning with a long cast-on and a scalloped lace border. After the lace, the main body of the shawl is worked in bands of different slipped stitch colorwork patterns, shaped with Japanese short rows.
The shawl uses three colors of fingering weight yarn; SweetGeorgia still has kits available, or you can curate your own palette (more on that below!)
The whole MKAL experience reminded me of the way my mom learned to swim—aka falling in the deep end of the pool. Both the design process and the administration of the knitalong itself kept me on my toes the whole way; I’m so thankful for my incredible coworkers at SweetGeorgia Yarns and the School of SweetGeorgia, who walked me through every step with incredible patience and kindness (and a ton of cheerleading!) I’ve learned things I would do differently if I designed another MKAL, and things I wouldn’t stress about.
Now that the full pattern is out there in the world, I’m curious to see how knitters respond. The construction is a bit unusual, and there are lots of different stitch patterns and a few techniques that are out of the ordinary. So we’ll see what everyone thinks! The pattern is available via Ravelry and SweetGeorgia’s website.
I’ve made 2 Quiet Bay shawls so far—the original shawl that I made when I proposed the design to SweetGeorgia (above), and the photographed sample for the final design, which has several small differences with the first shawl. That final sample is at the SweetGeorgia studio in Vancouver (my samples have been to more places than I have…), so I need to make another one for me! My mom gave me a gift card to pick out some yarn, and I’m so excited about these colors!
The first shawl was made in a trio of Stealth Mode, Rose Gold, and Peachy on Tough Love Sock. The final sample used the Charlottetown kit, which is Mulberry on Cashluxe Spark, and Lady Grey and Bubble Wand on Tough Love Sock. For my final trio, I went with Black Plum on Cashluxe Spark, and Mink and London Fog on Cashluxe Fine. These smoky, moody colors sit perfectly in my color happy place, and I can’t wait to knit with them! I’m looking forward to having a Quiet Bay that will fit well in my wardrobe.
So after a busy time of it these last few months, hopefully this is the happy ending with a bit of impetus into the next thing. I can’t wait to hear what you think!
Final Quiet Bay sample photos by Tabetha Hedrick for SweetGeorgia Yarns.
