This is part of the Instagram KAL led by Stephen West.

The most difficult part about this shawl, at least so far, is the cast-on. I referred to the photos in odette-ds’ project, Dream of Finland and to the YouTube video Stephen made illustrating the cast-on (it’s actually labeled as a cast-on for another one of his shawls but it begins in the same way).

I ended up doing my cast-on slightly differently. I used JMCO, then followed the i-cord/picking up stitches steps, and it seemed to work out just fine - my reverse i-icord stitches were all ready to go. (That, or it didn’t work out fine, but no one can really tell any difference because I’m using black yarn!)

Besides the cast-on, the shawl is quite easy, mostly knit stitches, and once you catch onto the way the shawl is shaped, you’ll find you just use the pattern as a reference to ensure stitch counts are right and that things are continuing to move along correctly. The fun part is in choosing the colors to be used and in determining their placement.

My shawl will be mostly grey, with black i-cord and black YO rows outlining the piece, and with pops of pink color wherever I feel it “works.”

Update 10/4/17 - possible error
My stitch counts matched just prior to starting row 27. Everything matched prior to that point (263 stitches at the conclusion of the row 26 steps). At the end of row 28 I had an extra stitch at the end of row (283 stitches instead of 282 stitches). I have counted and recounted everything, and my holes line up as they should and the stitches are all proportionally increasing correctly when compared to previous rows. Others have reported stitch count errors at approximately the same location, so I’m thinking it isn’t just me. So, I shall forge ahead without changing anything, and will just count as I go to ensure everything is continuing to increase in proportion correctly.

Update 7/12/18 - more errors
As I’ve continued to work I’ve noticed more errors in stitch counts and even in the actual “knit x stitches” part of the pattern. However, now that I’ve done more on the pattern it’s pretty easy to just carry on, knitting everything proportionally (where you had 15 stitches at this location, it’ll be 16 on the next similar one, etc.). So, after you get to the point where you’re past about 280 stitches per row, don’t rely on the instructions for stitch counts anymore and just go with what you know is correct based on the overall pattern already presented. You’ll be fine, it’s not too difficult (don’t let this stop you from making this!).

Update November 2018
I ran out of pink yarn. I guess three unicorn tail minis don’t go nearly as far as they do in the earlier smaller segments (the big rows towards the end of this shawl really are LONG!). I bought another skein of yarn (full size this time) and it’ll probably be more than I need, but that’s fine. I’m considering myself lucky to find the yarn considering I bought the original stuff over two years ago.

Update - FINISHED!
When I bought this yarn, the lady at the yarn shop laughed at me because I was making something so large out of yarn so thin. She said “that will take ages to finish!” and my answer was,“well, yes, but if you’re gonna bother to do something, do it right.” I’m proud to announce that after 2.5 years of working on this shawl, it’s finally DONE! I’m not sure what I’m going to do with my knitting time now that it’s done as I haven’t worked on much else save for a few dishcloths and hats here and there.

My changes: once it became evident that there were a couple of math errors in the pattern, I quit looking at it except just to be sure I could keep increasing the pattern properly. Each wedge was just stepped up incrementally larger than the last and that was much easier than counting and recounting rows and wondering if I was right. Instead I just counted segments and as long as things were increasing ok and lining up fine, I kept pressing forward.

I added an extra wedge beyond what the pattern called for. I color-blocked the wedges and it would have looked off-balance to end where the pattern stated, plus I like a long scarf and wanted to be sure it was exactly so.

And, I omitted the last row of holes as both my border and my dividing (holey) rows were in black and I didn’t want the border to appear to be uneven (thicker on one side) from a distance. This was a good call.

OVERALL Super excited to wear this and I truly enjoyed this knit! Westknits truly are the best knits!