Hollyhocks Shawl

My finished Hollyhocks Shawl.

Pattern: Shoalwater shawl from Fibertrends.
Yarn: Sophie's Toes color Hollyhocks. 2 1/4 skeins (225 grams, for you scientists)
Changes: I did the shawl in stockinette lace instead of garter lace (see below).

I started this shawl on the plane to Mexico. (I know, I haven't even blogged about Mexico. Ask me sometime over a beer.) Six hours of plane time (sans kids!) , plus a four hour layover, I was prepared with a LOT of knitting!

What you see in the photo below is the start of the shawl. The line at the bottom left where my finger is, is the center of the shawl, so you are looking at one half of the shawl. As per the pattern, you do the lace pattern across the right side, and knit the wrong side row, making garter ridges with a lace pattern. (Or "garter lace"). I'm not sure if that is a real term, but it's what I'm calling it for explanation purposes, bear with me.
I wasn't crazy about the look of the garter ridges, because I felt they were obscuring the colors and turning the color to mush. After several inches, I tried about an inch of "stockinette lace", where I did exactly as the pattern for the right side rows, and instead of knitting the wrong side rows, I purled them. I thought it brought out the colors much better, so I ripped the whole thing and started over.
I was a little worried pre-blocking, because the shawl came off the needles in almost a diamond shape instead of a triangle. (Was this due to my changes? It's a mystery.)

But a good blocking turned it into a fine triangle. A friend asked me about using superwash wool for a shawl--does it block nicely and keep the shape?
Pre-blocking:
Post blocking:
My favorite thing about this shawl was the picot bind off. Just beautiful. Almost every little picot is a different color!!!! Love that!!!!

I am so crazy about lace right now. I have lace on the brain! Lace, lace, lace! I'm looking at: this, this, this, and all of these.