Sunday, July 15, 2007

Heart-stopping lace moments

Based on my limited experience, I think there are two kinds of heart-stopping lace moments. The *good* kind is when it's blocked and it looks amazing. The bad kind is when you have a Lace Knitting Accident and you nearly pass out from shock.

We're fine now, of course.



I wanted to see how big the thing was getting and how it looks so far, so I devised a complicated plan involving 4 knitpicks cables (only 2 40-inchers, one short one and one middle-length one. note to self: get more 40-inch cables for stretching out lace pieces) to hold all the stitches with enough room to actually lay the thing flat. I am just over the halfway mark if you count by rows (sadly, only about 1/4 the total area) and have started the second (interesting) lace chart.

I have a handy tip for everybody. When using multiple knitpicks cables to hold your stitches and using those plastic caps to make sure they don't fall off, if you have an odd number of caps left over then you probably have an end that is not capped. Each cable has two ends, and so each cable needs two caps. Not one. Check several times.

Fortunately only about 1/2 of a repeat fell off the needle, and few stitches were dropped. The ones that were dropped were only yarnovers and with careful reference to the chart I made sure I had all my stitches where I needed them. But damn, was that scary.



I am hoping this starts to look more interesting soon.

8 comments:

  1. Gosh, Liz...it's beautiful!!!!!

    I learned another lesson. Do not snag the cable on your rings and rip out a whole needle. I've dont that twice now. Thankfully got it back on the needles, too.

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  2. It's really beautiful!

    I hate those heart-stopping moments.

    How's that blazer going?

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  3. ooh, close call. i am afraid of things like that happening, so i generally just let the lace be all smooshed up til i finish it. i figure when i block it i'll have a nice surprise. or a horrible one.

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  4. Hoo Boy! You just made my heart stop for a second! It's looking beautiful (I can't believe how quickly it's progressing!)

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  5. Wow. I have a newfound appreciation for lace after all my sweating and swearing just doing the tiny bit of lace on my shrug. Brava.

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  6. This is going to be gorgeous. You're making so much progress on it. Keep us posted on what that next chart looks like. It's always a thrill to change charts, even when you're not the one doing the knitting.

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  7. Good save! Next time you need to take some before shots to scare the kids with.

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  8. oooh, check carefully twice. Words to live by.

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