Let’s Talk Lace
July 13th, 2007
It must be the Summer Of Lace around here, because I’ve got a ton of lace on the needles. I’m loving it!
First, on a whim I bought and downloaded a new pattern last night. I had to cast on right away, and it wasn’t an expensive pattern either. I mean, I had the exact yarn for it already (even down to the color, I think)!
This is the [Emelia Lace Choker](http://www.pieknits.com/blog/2006/05/emelia_lace_choker.html) by Jennifer Tallapeneni over at [Pieknits](http://www.pieknits.com/blog/). I’ve been meaning to knit a choker for a while because they’re fun, and Corey loves them. This is a more complicated lace pattern than most I’ve done before, mostly due to a few particular stitches. It’s not hard, I just have to pay attention more. Good thing it’s small!
Ahhh the [beloved socks](http://www.crafty.greenkri.com/spring-cable). It’s not lace, I know! I just had to throw in a few update pictures of their progress, because I’m just lovin’ these. I can’t wait to wear them, I don’t care how hot it is.
I haven’t written about this pattern in a while, but it’s in temporary hibernation for a bit. I realized a week ago that I needed another ball of yarn to finish this. Apparently you have to look at the number of materials for your size. Whoops! I really just wasn’t paying enough attention when I started this. I wish I could show you some more stretched out pictures of the lace, because it looks quite nice. All bunched up like that it looks like a wrinkly ole mess. I suppose it’ll have to wait until they’re done!
I’m slowly plodding along on the Candle Flames shawl too, and I really like the yarn. The pattern somewhere calls for a k1,yo,k1 in the same stitch, which seems to create a bit of a hole. I’d rather not have the hole, but I’ve done too much of the shawl to change it now. I __definitely__ don’t want to even consider restarting now.
Speaking of the Candle Flames shawl: I had asked in the Ravelry forums about blocking alpaca a while back, wondering if the small amount of silk in this yarn would make up for the unblockability of alpaca. The responses I got were “I’ve had no troubles blocking alpaca.” Hmm..perhaps it was the particular yarn I was trying to block. Perhaps they did not know what I meant by block (yeah right!). I don’t have any other alpaca to test this on, and this yarn is on a cone, so there’ll be no finding the other end to knit a swatch. Any others with experience blocking alpaca?
Want more lace? Alright, I’m considering picking back up the shawl I started from A Gathering of Lace. Only, this time I think I want to skip the rest of the pattern altogether. I really like the stitch pattern that’s in the center, and I’m not so fond of the geometric shapes of the rest of it. Perhaps I’ll improvise! Since I can’t find a quick picture of the shawl on my blog, here’s one to remind you:
Your candle flame shawl is looking really good ! May I ask which yarn did you use ?
I recently finished an alpaca shawl. I’m a cruel, hard blocker, and it came out nearly twice as big as in unblocked state. It did spring back quite a bit when I released it, but it has held that shape wuite well through several wearings, a week-long sailing trip, and being shoved into the bottom of my bag numerous times. The points are getting a little soft, but overall it’s held the blocking quite well!
Isn’t Ravelry almost overwhelming? I haven’t even dug through half of it yet, I’m sure! (But I’m there, and I have projects posted!)