Forty Minutes

That's how long it took me to bind off the 455 stitches my wedding shawl had grown to by the time I was finished with the edging rows. But I did indeed finish the shawl yesterday morning, and it looked something like this when I left it before heading out to run errands:

Last night, after dinner, I put the shawl in the sink for a soak, got out the blocking wires and the pins, cleared a big floor space in the loft, and got to work blocking. And it's done:

Pattern: Flower Basket Shawl by Evelyn A. Clark for Fiber Trends
Yarn: Misti Alpaca Lace (100% baby alpaca), color 7120, approximately 69 grams/603 yards
Needles: US 5 (3.75 mm) 32" Addi Turbo circs
Started/Completed: August 3/August 18
Dimensions: 73" across, 41" deep at center point

In the end, I was concerned about running out of yarn, so I did a total of 16 repeats of the main body chart in addition to the edging charts. I then blocked this shawl severely, restretching it several times. For the first time, I used blocking wires to hold all the points along the side, and I'm quite pleased with the results.

So, my wedding knitting is now done -- and for the record, the shawl was finished two weeks before the wedding, and I didn't stop knitting socks in the interim.

I'll leave you with some other shots of the shawl, with my apologies for the lack of natural light. We had a perfect day yesterday, but today it's overcast and rainy, so I was forced to take only indoor shots. Enjoy!