Royal alpaca road trip

A few years back I "earned" this royal alpaca yarn by knitting a sample for a yarn company. This yarn is $40 a skein, so it is nice and, well, needs to be used for something special. I have been thinking for a while that a shawl would be just the thing. Then my DLF Becky gave me an awesome knitting book for Christmas and right there on page 12 was the perfect pattern. I also happened to be looking for something a little more challenging to knit on our 6 hr road trip the day after Christmas.
Then I read the pattern, and read it, and read it. The more I read the less sense it made, I actually lost sleep trying to figure out how it could possibly work. Obsessive anyone? Of course I finally remembered the rule. Just do exactly what it tells you, no matter how little sense it makes. So here was step one titled "beginning the lace". See why I was confused? doesn't look like lace to me!

Then aha! ok, this must be the tip of the triangle, because of course a shawl is a big triangle right? But if so, where is the frilly lace border?? Hm, keep knitting.







Ok, this is the "set up". Still confused about the lace border, but keep knitting.











Finally daylight hits! it is worked from the center neck out. The lace border is the last thing you do. So as I go it will get bigger and bigger and bigger. How many hours of knitting later and it finally made sense. Good thing I decided to start without understanding. If I had waited for understanding I never would have started. I'm sure there could be a parable in that.