Yarnologue

Color Affection is a shawl pattern designed by Veera Välimäki. It is a striped, asymmetrical, garter stitch shawl that employs short rows to create its unique shape.

On Ravelry there are 5,477 projects and 7,539 queues listed.

I feel like I keep seeing it everywhere, and each one seems more beautiful than the next! I could no longer resist jumping on the bandwagon.

Yarn Tree Studio use Elsebeth Lavold Sikly Wool.

This version was made by Yarn Tree Studio, a local yarn store in North Carolina. They used Elsebeth Lavold Silky Wool for their version. This 45%Wool, 35%Silk, 20% Nylon blend is available in a wide range of solid colors. The slight tweedy texture of the yarn adds extra interest.

Island Yarn Company made one using Noro Taiyo Sock Yarn

Island Yarn Company, a local yarn store in Massachusetts,  used Noro Taiyo Sock Yarn for their shawl. The long color changes of this 50% Cotton, 17% Wool, 17% Nylon, 16% Silk blend add an interesting dimension to the look of the finished shawl.

Sedona Knit Wits made one using 4 color of Lace Merino

Sedona Knit Wits, a local yarn store in Arizona, made theirs larger by adding a fourth color. They used Ella Rae Lace Merino for their shawl, which is the same yarn I selected.

Lace Merino is a fingering weight, 100% Superwash Merino Wool with approximately 460 yards per hank. Plenty of yardage to meet the pattern requirements. This yarn is available in a wide range of both semi-solid and variegated colors, which can make it a little tough to decide just which colors to use!

#32 - Crimson, #139-Turq, Green, #34-Med. blue

Since blue is one of my favorite colors, I decided to use that as my starting point and selected #34-Medium Blue to start narrowing my options.

I thought it would be interesting to include one of the variegated colors both to see how it behaved in the pattern and to tie the three colors together, so I selected #139-Turqoise, Green because some of it’s blues echoed #34.

Then it was  matter of selecting a third shade. First I picked #32-Crimson because I thought it matched some of the pink bits in #139.

#32 - Crimson, #139-Turq, Green, #3-Grass Green

My friend suggested picking up the greens in the multi colored skein and selected #3-Grass Green.

Although the blue was my starting skein, I thought I do my due diligence and try a pink, multi, green combination first. It was nice, but wasn’t speaking to me.

#34-Med. Blue, #139-Turq, Green, #3-Grass Green

Then I did the blue, multi, green combination and knew I had a winner. The colors were pleasing to my eyes and the pink in #139 would add extra instance.

With my colors selected, I dove in. My right arm got a bit of a work out winding all three skeins consecutively, but it was worth it to do it now so I won’t be stalled when I reach the color changes in the pattern.

12 rows in!

It seems most people work from light to dark as the sample shawls in the pattern show. Following the trend, I cast on with the green yarn.

I’m already 12 rows in, whoo-hoo! I might have confused my M1L and M1R a few times and I might have grabbed an incorrect strand here and there when working them, but I don’t think anyone will notice when I wearing it.

At least, no one besides my husband should be close enough to me to notice and he doesn’t knit. (haha!)

I can already tell the Ella Rae Lace Merino was a great choice for this shawl pattern. In addition to being soft, it has a lot of spring and life as I’m knitting. This makes it easy to manipulate the knit fabric as I’m twisting and turning it to work all those increases.

The green will be my companion for a while longer before I reach the first set of stripes. Then the real fun will begin!

Have you made the Color Affection shawl? Was it easy for you to select colors?