The Story Behind the Pattern:
The old me started designing this crescent shaped lace shawl in the Fall of 2014. She was 32 years old, and a newlywed. She created the charts, wrote out instructions, and began knitting the sample. Then she found out she was pregnant, and the shawl was set aside temporarily so she could spend more time knitting things for the daughter she was so excited to meet. A few months later, however, while still pregnant, she found a lump in her breast and was unexpectedly diagnosed with an aggressive form of breast cancer.

That’s when the old me ceased to exist. I was now a cancer fighter and a mother, and it was hard for me to pick that lace shawl back up to finish the sample and publish the pattern. At first, I was too depressed, sick, and exhausted to knit. But then, after I was finished with the chemo and surgeries, and I had made it out of the fog of new motherhood, I still couldn’t bring myself to work on it because I felt like it wasn’t mine.

It belonged to the old me, a woman who didn’t know what it was like to go into surgery with a baby still in her womb, or to try to comfort a newborn while crippled by the side-effects of chemotherapy. Every time I looked at that nearly finished shawl, I was reminded of that woman who took things for granted, who just assumed she would get to see her child grow up and have the opportunity to grow old, and I just couldn’t bring myself to work on her shawl.

Then recently, nearly 5 years after starting the shawl, and almost three and a half years after my cancer diagnosis, I finally felt like I could bring myself to finish knitting the shawl and writing the pattern.

I’ll never be the old me again, but now I have finally come to terms with what that means. I appreciate my life and my loved ones so much more than she ever did because I no longer take them for granted. I’ve faced obstacles greater than anything she could have ever imagined, and I’ve overcome them. Finally, I felt like I could pick up that shawl, and rather than a reminder of the young carefree woman who began it, I saw a reminder of the strong woman who has taken her place.

The Pattern Details:

Measurements

• Finished Measurements: Width – 85”; Depth – 16”.
• Gauge: 10 sts and 16 rows per 2 inches of stockinette, blocked.

Yarn:

• Fingering Weight.
• 700 yards.
• The pictured sample was knit with 2 skeins of Araucania Huasco Multy Botany Lace in the colorway Forest.

Tools

• Size 5 Needles (or size required to achieve gauge).
• Stitch Markers – Optional .
• Needle for weaving in ends.