Secret of the Stole iii: Finished!

IMG_1911.JPGHere it is! I finally finished the Secret of the Stole iii shawl! Shown here on me, in front of the Lajitas Mesa, near Big Bend National Park and Terlingua, Texas.

We arrived yesterday from San Antonio, and took today to go scout Big Bend. The park is gorgeous, if you go for big, sweeping views of colorful buttes and mesas.

It is, however, the rainy season here. Last night we watched as a lightning storm rolled in and played merry havoc with our plans to sleep.

See, at first it was really cool. We went for a moonlit walk, watching the distant lightning silently terrorize south of the Mexico border. It was windy, but hot.

But about an hour later, the storm reached us, and we suddenly realized that the big awning needed to come down, like now. We went out there in our pajamas and wrestled with the awning in the wind. Awnings are one of the most common breakages on an RV. They flap in the wind and very powerful winds can gust the awning to the point where the frame holding it in place breaks. Awnings have little clasps on the sides to help keep them from flapping too much. Ironically, these clasps invariably come loose in the wind.

Anyway, the storm rolled in, and I heard what sounded vaguely like water dripping. Figuring this was just water hitting the ground outside, I ignored it. John got up eventually and said “Um, we have a problem!”

There is a vent in our bathroom ceiling. It’s about the size of a small box fan and it has, in it, a small box fan. It’s to help vent out damp air and steam from the bathroom as needed. When not needed, it has a motorized plastic cover that flips up or down to cover the fan.

The plastic cover… well, we had no idea where it was. We’d heard it rattling on the road yesterday, but fixing it was a very low priority when we pulled in.

Not at 11:30 PM when rainwater was pouring in through the ceiling! And with lightning striking less than a mile away, it would have been suicidal to climb onto the roof to try and fix it! We put a basin under the vent and hoped it would catch most of the water.

Needless to say, we slept poorly last night. We talked about what would happen if the RV was struck by lightning– would we be safe inside? Should we hightail it to a nearby shelter? I was counting on the nearby mesa being tall enough to draw the lightning, but the fact is, this park is very open and exposed.

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In the morning, we both felt wretched, but we survived the night. The RV survived. The ground was damp. The bathroom was a wreck– thank goodness we’re in the desert! It dried quickly. And I got up and had coffee and got dressed in time to snap a few photos of the shawl before we headed into the park.

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Note the pretty glittery beads? Those are light pink– they really show up well on the shawl, but they don’t show up well in photographs.

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The yarn is Malabrigo laceweight, and it’s one of my favorite yarns. Wonderfully soft and very easy to knit with– it’s a heavier laceweight than most people are used to, which is probably why I like it so much!

Although the pattern’s name hasn’t been revealed yet, it seems to have some relation to the state of Colorado, and another famous national park therein.

7 thoughts on “Secret of the Stole iii: Finished!

  1. Big Bend looks neat! I’ve heard about it, but never seen it. Love the shawl! Gotta try that thing with the beads! 🙂 First thing we did when we got our RV was put those shield things over the vent covers–been there/done that before! 🙁 Glad you survived!

  2. way to cute Stephanie…. Well, I’m off to read my email from you!! Chat you soon!!

    Evie

  3. Love the shawl! Absolutely gorgeous colour. I followed the link here from the yahoo group mail 🙂

    And in theory, you shouldn’t get struck by lightning in a vehicle, as the rubber tyres insulate you from the ground.

  4. Hi, gave up on the shawl because I didn’t like the pastels, but I love it in the colour you’ve chosen. Thanks for bucking the trend.

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