One Project Down, and Four to Go

I finally finished the shawl for my grandmother. It's out-of-season now, but I hope she'll wear it around the house until next Spring.

It is modeled here by the lovely Esmeralda (Esme for short), a mannequin I purchased from a tiny discount clothes store that was going out-of-business a couple of years ago. Underneath the shawl Esme is wearing a delicate light blue vintage nightgown that doesn't fit me but I can't bring myself to sell quite yet because I love it so.

It took a lot longer than I thought it would to finish, no doubt because I was distracted by sewing class and there were a couple of minor setbacks along the way. It was my fault, really, because I didn't store the project safely away in a covered plastic bin, but left it in a soft-sided collapsible cube in my closet without closing the closet door. My mistake tempted a certain little dog named Teddy beyond the limits of his control. You would think he was a cat he loves to play with yarn so much. He "helped out" by playing with my last full skein of Cotton Ease as I was crocheting the border:

The culprit:

I wanted to finish it quickly after that, so I decided to find more yarn rather than spend several hours untangling the mess.  It seems that my local big-box stores have very little Cotton Ease on hand, because I had to go to three stores to find more.  As it turns out, Lion Brand has discontinued this yarn.  I'm disappointed because I really enjoyed using it and would have bought more for future projects. 

I think the shawl pattern was very easy and recommend it.  I didn't like the look of the border after row two, so I eliminated the second row of the pattern and just kept rows one and three.  The border is now just a simple shell stitch pattern.

I've also begun work on my holiday gifts, but I'm not going to say too much about them just in case the intended recipient read my posts.  I have almost completed the One Skein Scarf out of Debbie Stoller's Stitch 'n Bitch Crochet, which is really very easy and quick to make:

 
This is one of the few times that I've actually used the suggested yarn when crocheting, because I wanted to see if I could really use just one skein.  However, I should have checked the gauge before I started, because I've just started on my second skein of Paton's Classic Wool in Paprika. If you would like to make this scarf, JoAnn's has also posted a free PDF of the scarf and a matching beret.

I've also started a bookmark and a pair of earrings.  More later!