I fell in love with the Scale Quilting stitch a dozen years ago when I was working on a Learn-to-Knit Afghan from Barbara Walker’s book of the same name. Now, 12 years, many afghans, shawls, and sweaters later, I’ve gone back to it to make a feminine, 2-color shawl. As soon as I thought of adding beads, I knew what the name of the design needed to be!

Techniques: decreasing, horizontal braid, slipped stitches, beading. None of them are difficult, but some are a bit fiddly and any counting errors will show up, so it is not mindless knitting!

Instructions are included for a small swatch that uses all the stitch patterns so that you can familiarize yourself with the techniques and try out your color choices. You need a certain amount of contrast for the overlay to show up. Please swatch!!! You really don’t want to decide you aren’t happy with your colors or their placement after knitting the ruffle and the first braid!

This shawl is knit from the bottom up, so you get the slow part (the ruffle) over with while you’re still excited about knitting it. The overlay section is surprisingly quick, even with the beads, because you slip so many stitches without working them.

For more from Laura visit tossingthestash.blogspot.com

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