We had tasty dish of peas from our own doorstep with lunch yesterday, All is well out there – the first courgette has formed, carrots and beetroot progressing well, lettuce in production, nasturtiums in bloom. This is fun. Even the wounded courgette – the one that had its first true leaves pecked out – seems to be recovering, although it remains much smaller than its fellows. I moved it into a bigger pot yesterday.

And I got Rames and Yowes out and surveyed the scene. Here it is (Ravelry link), if you've forgotten.

The centre is knit as a tube. I'm about 2/3rds of the way through, beginning the final panel of upside down sheep heads. Then comes that innocent-looking border.

The idea is to pick up nearly 800 stitches and knit 36 rounds, 4 in each of the 9 colours, increasing at the corners – ironically enough, in garter stitch, purling every other round. Then insert a hem line and repeat the process, decreasing at the corners, and finally fold on the hem line and join it to the body of the blankie to cover up the ends where the steek was cut. Some applied i-cord figures somewhere.

The pattern has you pick up the same number of stitches on each of the four sides, but I have a distinct memory of Kate D. herself saying that that didn't entirely work for the side edges, and it was better to do a two-for-three (or something) there. Does anyone remember?

I thought about this during Mass yesterday. I don't see why I can't do the border single-thickness and finish it off with a few rounds of ribbing. I've just been reading Kate's own how-to-finish-your-steek tutorial. There are several possibilities there. This would have a number of advantages – starting with the fact that I never succeed when I try knitting live stitches onto a previously-established hemline. It always comes out slant.

The blankie would be a bit lighter without a double-thickness border– it's going to be awfully warm for a DC toddler, as it is. The yarn is very “sticky” – I have no anxiety about the behaviour of the cut stitches. And I would get back to lace knitting a bit sooner.

Monday is a good day for starting things (re-starting, in this case). That sixth ball of lace yarn still isn't finished, but I think I'll take the plunge.

Here's how the shawl looks at the moment.

And here are some pics from Strathardle last week, not very good except to demonstrate our marvellous weather.

James and his daughters trimming and pruning the yew tree:

James starting a bonfire:

Helen phoned from there yesterday evening. They are successfully installed