Monday, March 26, 2007

Post Traumatic Lace Disorder

Lace and I have an uneasy relationship.

This all started during the Summer of Lace. Ambitious me, who'd only made



lace swatches and couple of lace scarves, decided to take on the Kimono Shawl from Folk Shawls.

It's said that knitters should just plunge into projects they feel are too hard for them. Sound advice. If knitters didn't do this, we'd have zillions of knitters who only made garter stitch scarves for their entire lives.

I started Kimono Shawl unable (and refusing) to read charts on Lantern Moon needles. Two big mistakes. I kept breaking the needles and kept getting lost in the word instructions. It was so frustrating that I finally crossed the line where knitting wasn't fun anymore. I wisely cast off and threw the large Kimono swatch into a drawer.



Since then, I've been happy knitting socks, hats and scarves with interesting stitch patterns--but, no lace. Until Victorian Lace Today came out. Each and every shawl in that book is meant to be mine!

Oh, but ----- I don't do lace.

Well, guess who's doing lace. And reading charts.

I'm not tackling Melon or Alpine -- yet. Being that I suffer from PTLD (Post Traumatic Lace Disorder), I needed something that would instruct, be somewhat easy and produce a beautiful and useful item.

Forest Canopy Shawl fits the bill. Yarn being used is Claudia Hand Painted fingering-weight in the Argyle Sock colorway. Stunning yarn! But hard to describe the colors--brown, black, purple, blue all blending into each other.



The shawl so far looks like a pile of blecccch:



Mistakes have been made and mistakes have been figured out and fixed and fudged. But, there's gonna be a lace shawl around here before too long!

And then there'll be more.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good luck. Don't give up!

Mauren Mureaux said...

Ooooh. It's so NOT looking like a pile of "blecccch". I just love the way the colorway is flowing within the lace design. Yummy!

Unknown said...

Congratulations on the lace-chart-thing! I had PTLD for years until I had that AHA moment. I never looked back!

Kristi said...

Keep at it, don't give up. :) I think after it is blocked it'll look awesome.

The DeDe said...

no pile of Blecccch! The yarn colors are pretty. I'm so glad you're doing lace... not one to bring to UWS and work on but one to show off! I hope to see it in person soon.

Anonymous said...

This was my first lace shawl pattern as well. It really turns out pretty after blocking. I made two as Christmas gifts and am inordinately proud that I finally knit lace successfully after being "afraid" to try it for a long time. It is so worth it! Your yarn colorway is very pretty.

Redheadskydiver said...

I just recently finished my first lace, swallowtail! I also just recently got Victorian Lace Today and LOVE it! I happen to be running a little lacey contest over at blog. Feel free to stop by and check it out.