How Do I Love Thee, Wedding Shawl?

I promised I'd put up pictures of the finished, blocked "Girl's Best Friend" shawl as soon as I could, so here you go! Just to sum it up, since I hope to not be posting about this every day from now on:

Pattern: A Girl's Best Friend, from Jade Sapphire (hard to find in stores, and no longer on their website)
Yarn: Australian merino roving in natural and tan from Outback Fibers, blended by a friend of Jody's. Spun to 2-ply laceweight, by Jody in the Netherlands, who used to be Jody in Austin.
Needles: Size 6 circular, KnitPicks Harmony.
Beads: Clear size 6 seed beads lined with gold, 1570 or so (most of 5 vials of beads) from Legendary Beads in Austin. Attached using crochet hook method (size 11 hook).
Size: Wingspan was about 60" after blocking, but seems to have shrunk up a bit.

The shawl took me only two weeks to knit, which surprised me, but then, I was not working, and the shawl was so much fun to work on that it was hard to stop. Between the lovely yarn and the fun of the beads, it was endlessly fascinating. It has a nice weight and feel, with the beads on the edges doing a good job of making it drape. And the beads look stunning in person, but hide in photos--I hope you can see them a bit!

My son, Beccano, and I blocked it yesterday using Jody's blocking wires (good thing I know Jody, or this would be a nonexistent shawl) and t-pins that we went out and bought, since my other ones are misplaced somewhere. He was very patient and helpful, which added to how special the shawl is to me. Heck, I had refused to sew him disco pants in some shiny, sheer rainbow fabric he spotted at the fabric shop (he swore he'd wear them to school!), and I made him look at wedding dress patterns, too, but he still helped me! What a guy. He got meatloaf for dinner as a reward.

Today Beccano patiently photographed me in the shawl, twice, since the first set of photos featured me wearing the shawl inside out. The beads are hard enough to see in photos without that extra challenge! He paused a couple of times to photograph lizards and such. The photos you see here are the ones he took.

On my Flickr pages are lots of shawl photos that you can blow up pretty large, if you want to try to see the beads better. Thanks to all who helped me make this or supported me during the process. Now I have to plan the REST of the wedding (November 28, if jobs and availability go right).