The Price of Progress

I've been avoiding my blog for a week now, irritated by the enormous changes I didn't know I was making. Oh I knew I was making some changes, but just a few changes...not turning the entire fruit basket upside down. I have discovered a few things in the process. In the "new and improved" version of Blogger I can no longer have a list on my sidebar that contains both text only and text with links components. Pick which one you want...you can't have both. I spent tonight reconstructing my WIP and FO lists...now without clickable links to photos. Sorry. I tried to restore my Flickr box that I had previously...the one that was a collage of photos. Nope, that's out too. Gotta use Blogger's slideshow feature and pick which photosource you want...Flickr or Picasa...not both. And speaking of not both, remember that nice list of buttons with photo logos of my KALs that click through to the KAL homepage. That's gone too I guess. I can add one photo...with a header, but not a series of photos; or I can add a series of links...without photos/buttons. Can't do both at the same time. This really s*cks. I am not happy.

In all fairness I have one more option left to explore...the one where I can paste in a block of html coding. I hope this will allow me to get my FiberArts & Lace Knitting Blogring links/banners restored, but I'm too tired to try tonight. One of the rings has has changed away from ringsurf, so I have to redo it from scratch anyway. SIGH!


I have a bunch of garden things to share, but they got top billing last time so I'll talk knitting this time. I'll start with the small stuff first--doilies. Now that I've knit a bunch of lace shawls and scarves, my interests in lace knitting(LK) are starting to diversify. Lately I've been quite taken with knitted doilies and what I've chosen to call "table laces". I figure table laces include everything from the smallest doily to a large tablecloth and everything in between. In LK circles, the hot topic is table laces designed by a German gentleman by the name of Hebert Niebling. His designs are distinctive and include intricate flowing compositions of leaves and flowers that have remarkable dimensionality. Now deceased, Niebling's works are held in highest esteem by lace knitting experts and the most popular designs in OOP pattern magazines are fetching outrageous prices on the secondary market, ie. EBay, etc.

I decided to venture into knitting simple doilies, which caused me to join the DoilieHeads Forum (DHF) on Ravelry. The DHF has both knitters and crocheters, so to encourage folks to crossover and try their less dominant technique they offered a simple KAL. Two patterns similar in size and appearance, one knit (Flacon)& one crochet (Antlia), both free online were chosen for the KAL. I made both doilies out of some yellow Cebelia 20 in my stash and the photos shows the completed doilies side by side. Flacon is pinned out, but neither has been properly blocked. The difference is quite striking. The crochet doily is clearly more dense and weighs more than twice as much as the knit one, yet the finished diameter is the same for both doilies. Fascinating!


Over the last 6 months or so I've looked at the vintage lace knitting patterns on Ebay hoping to pick up some of those German Anna magazines that have Niebling patterns in them. I keep my bids very modest as I can't afford to drop $50 on a craft magazine, but I've had a little success. Then one day I was thumbing through some old Workbasket magazines I had picked up for their tatting patterns. To my great surprise one issue had a lovely knit doily on the cover that looked every bit as beautiful as the ones I'd seen in the German magazines. That was my challenge. I decided to look for American magazines with knitted table laces. So this month I picked up about 6-7 years worth of Workbasket magazines from the late 40s-early 60s. What a goldmine of great stuff! I've had a blast carefully thumbing through the yellowed pages and finding all this great lace--crocheted, tatted, and yes-knitted! Yeehaw!


In my Ebay surfing, I picked up a couple of German magazines too, including a 2006 Lea special issue containing 27 doily designs. The aqua doily is #20 in the magazine and a nice, simple knit. I chose a simple doily for my 1st venture as I didn't have an English translation for the instructions or the charts and I was winging it. I goofed up one symbol and fudged the stitch in my doily, but you can't tell at all so I'm happy. Now I just need to buy a bottle of liquid starch so I can properly block all 3 doilies and give them just a bit of stiffening to help them maintain that blocked look. I am addicted!


Also a couple of weeks ago now I finish knitting the sample shawl for our Summer Lace KAL at The Yarn Haven. Before I let this yummy blue Flower Basket Shawl go I just had to do an artsy photo shoot. I hauled the shawl across the street and everywhere taking photos with blooming dogwood and weeping cherry trees and among the spring flowers. Just before going in the house I decided to take a couple of shots by the bleeding hearts even though it was terribly dark. so guess which location yielded the best photos? Yup, the bleeding hearts :-) You just never know when you are taking photos....

Now that the FBS is done I'm back working on the Orkney Pi Shawl. I have 213 rows completed at this point. I took a couple of shots of the last section, which is cat's paw lace and the beginning of more trees. At 1280 sts/round progress is painstakingly slow and hard to see. but I keep checking off the rounds with my pink marker so I know I am getting there. I'm working on a white Swallowtail shawl as my portable project and plan to cast-on more doilies for that quick FO fix. After all, sometimes a knitter just needs to see Finished in lights to know that she's getting somewhere :-)

And so it goes

It's Monday morning, St. Patrick's Day, so I suppose I should say "Top 'o the Morning to You!" But then that would be a terribly Irish thing for a little Dutch/Deutsch girl to do, now wouldn't it? My mother always wore *orange* on St. Patty's Day to make sure folks knew she was Dutch. I thought it was a bit strange then, but I think it's cool now. but enough of that....

The wild, weird weekend is over. Tennessee basketball fans are not happy. they did not get to see their team play in the SEC tourney because of the change of venue required by the tornado that hit downtown Atlanta. Then the team lost in the closing seconds of the semis to Arkansas, which was stunning. Even more stunning was the fact that the worst team in the conference this year, Georgia, won the SEC tournament by overcoming outrageous odds. You have to be happy for them, because it was such an amazing feat! The the NCAA announced the brackets for the "Big Dance" last night and we got a no. 2 seed (not happy, but not surprised) in the East bracket...which has the strongest teams including No. 1 North Carolina. That's like ranking TN 8th, or the lowest among the No. 2 seeds. That a really rotten deal. Placing the Vols in the East sends them first to Birmingham where they should win their 1st two games, then on to Charlotte. Upsets notwithstanding, the Vols will have to get past a tough Louisville team to arrive at the elite 8 with the golden opportunity to play North Carolina...in North Carolina. Good luck guys...you're gonna need it :-) It was pretty interesting watching Bruce Pearl & the guys maintain their composure at the post-announcement press interviews after getting such a raw deal. So much for having the highest RPI and playing the toughest non-conference schedule in the nation...and winning almost all of the games. It didn't pay off as much as it was supposed to.

So enough about the Vols, let's talk knitting :-) Being sick with a nasty virus and lots of basketball tournament games to watch make for productive knitting time. I just finished off the 1st 100g ball of yarn on my Orkney Pi yesterday. I'm up to row 154, which is the latter part of the 4th repeat of the swirling diamonds/640sts section. I should start the 5th and final repeat tonight, which places me a couple of days ahead of schedule and ready for the next clue which I think comes out on Friday. Designing Pi shawls by inserting various lace patterns into the distinct sections of the shawl is not as simple as one would think. Oh, the process of choosing your favorite laces and using them is simple, but getting the right combination to produce an cohesive and esthetically-pleasing look is challenging. i say this because I've seen some less than attractive (to my view) Pi shawls. But trust Liz Lovick to know just how to put classic Shetland Lace patterns together to get that just right look. It's a great shawl!

With the Orkney Pi being so time consuming, and sickness keeping me at home (no need for portable knitting), the Swallowtail Shawl has been neglected for more than a week. I'm using the white Jaggerspun Zephyr I had in the stash left from the Spring Things Shawl which I frogged because I ended up not liking the design. I knew I had an issue with the lace patterns chosen for Spring Things, but I also blamed the yarn for my unhappy experience. I just couldn't see what it was that makes so many knitters go "Zany for Zephyr." I used Zephyr for one of my earliest shawls, a Nancie Wiseman design, and it turned out OK, but not wonderful in my view. But the idea of knitting Lily of the Valley nupps in white lace yarn has been in my head for more than a year now, so the white Zephyr seemed perfect for Swallowtail. To cut to the end of the story, I get it. After knitting the upper body of the Swallowtail with the Zephyr, I now get why people adore this yarn. It is wonderful for lace work!

Success in lace knitting is in the details. Each little detail must be evaluated, then carefully combined to yield success. You have to choose the right fiber(s), the right yarn, the right needles, and the right patterns. When one or more of these is off, then knitting is frustrating and the result less than pleasing. Find the right combination and knitting lace becomes a joy to work and the project a treasure. You don't have to use the most expensive yarn or the most complex or fancy pattern to knit a stunning piece of lace. But when a project is thoughtfully planned then executed with reasonable precision (not perfection), the end result can't help but be something wonderful. My somethings wonderful are starting to accumulate now that I'm a confirmed lace knitting addict, and I'm amazed at the joy these little beauties bring into my everyday life. It's something wonderful indeed!