Competition! Honeymoon Wrap

Well, folks, here it is, the great unveiling of the honeymoon shawl!
For our honeymoon last year J and I spent a few days in each Venice, Florence and Rome and had the most wonderful time. While looking for a particular church near the Ponte Vecchio in Florence we chanced upon Beatrice Galli's great yarn shop. (Sidebar) Amongst other things I bought three balls of Filatura di Crosa Pixel yarn shade 8, thinking I would make a scarf at some stage.
On return from the holiday I put the yarn in the stash (as you do) and thought nothing more of it until this spring I decided to make a shawl starting from three stitches and working up. So I cast on on 3.5mm needles as stated and started making a triangle, working a yarn over round a central stitch on right side rows. Only it didn't turn out as a triangle, it turned out as a diamond and by the time I had 99 stitches it was about ten inches wide, on a good day. India helped me see sense that it would take me about ninety nine years to get it to shawl width at that rate, not to mention about ninety nine balls. So, to plan B, I made some wee straps and turned it into a kerchief. Now, I had never really seen myself as a shawl person, far less a kerchief person, but I didn't want to waste my work and I got LOADS of use out of it on my holidays to keep the sun off my head while walking up hills, my hair out my eyes in the sea breeze and the midges off me 24/7.

Which left me without a shawl. I decided to go up to needle size 6mm and increase one stitch at the beginning of each row. This time it did form a triangle and it made ideal knitting on Stitch and Bitch days because it was plain garter because the yarn was fancy enough, in my view. Of course, having used up a ball for my head thingy left me short of yarn and I had to send to Florence for reinforcements. Every time we had a knitting meet up I would pull this thing out the bag and do another few rows. The only time I touched it was at meetups so it didn't seem to be growing very fast.
Well, it did grow, fast or not, and at one meeting recently I mentioned I was nearly done and was thinking of fringing it and what did everyone think. Well the silence spoke volumes so I thought it through and decided on making a row of eyelets along the top to match the side increases and then make a ruffle all round.

And the results as you see are this completed shawl! I am pleased with it and can see myself wearing it over strappy things at parties or over jeans or black stuff to brighten them up. Trust me, every time you see me in the near future I will be wearing this wrap, shawl person or not!

***So, as you know I made up the pattern as I went along (urbanDK) and started with 3 stitches. But the question is (and remember I increased to make a ruffle) how many stitches did I eventually cast off along the top edge? ***

A prize of either sock yarn or scarf yarn (your preference) to the person who has come closest by 5pm on Thursday 27th October. Oh yes, and if you are not a knitter, eg family, you can have a scarf or socks handknitted for you. NO EXCUSE FAMILY, GET GUESSING!

Have a butcher's at my pix below to get an idea....
xK