Herb Garden Shawl

I had some skeins of Garthenor Organic number 3 in my stash, including 10 mini skeins. I could make a fairly big project with this. Lots of different natural colours require a simple and pure pattern, I think, and so I searched for something with a lot of garter stitch (which I love!). I chose the Herb Garden Shawl pattern (very easy and free pattern on Ravelry). I could already see myself strolling around in the garden, warmed by this shawl and a cup op tea...

It was lot of knitting, but with this DK yarn things went on fairly quickly and all the different colours made the project interesting.

Garthenor is a small Welsh company that has been producing breed specific organic yarn for over 20 years. Their customer service is great and there is such a positive energetic vibe around them!  I found the yarn great to work with, it is sturdy and soft at the same time. The natural colours are lovely and work well together.

I ran out of yarn and still wanted the shawl to be a bit bigger, but instead of ordering more yarn, I decided to look through my stash (However much I love to support Garthenor and other sustainable businesses, I also try to use up my stash where possible, which also contributes to sustainability) and found this skein of Bleetingbecka Derbyshire Lopi, a very rustic wool from Derbyshire Gritstone (they don't have their own website, but you can find them on Facebook). This is the white top edge of the shawl.

It turned out to be the lovely warm big shawl I imagined, so let's go for a walk!

me, cosy and warm

the shawl, almost finished:

the lovely (and interesting!) card I got with my order from Garthenor:

the Bleetingbecka yarn: