At the sharp end

My knots on a stick have progressed into some curly wurly scribbliness hanging from a stick. If you look closely you can see some sort of order to it, which is a good sign. This is hopefully going to become the curved shoulder shawl from Victorian Lace Today (page 71) if I can keep it together. It is the first lace pattern that I have attempted that doesn't have a plain knit or purl row on the wrong side for me to collect my thoughts along as it is a very open lace pattern - but luckily the stitch repeats seem fairly simple and I'm hoping that they will stick in my brain ok and it should grow quite fast.


And when it does, I shall be ready! I have my brand new Addi Lace Needles!

See the points!

Top to bottom: Addi Lace 3.5mm circ, Pony 3.25mm metal straight, Addi 3mm metal dpn

I have been trying my hand at braid making too. Super Monkey brought me presents (huzzah!) from her holiday in the Peak District and one of them was a lucet. This is a mediaeval way of making cords (basically a two pronged knitting-nancy) and I although was a bit wobbly at it to start with, I think it will be useful for making straps and ties, etc, as an alternative to twisting or i-cord. Super Monkey also gave me one of her cool swirly crocheted bookmarks, which will definitely come in handy the next time I pick up a book (which hasn't happened in a shamefully long time and is something that I really should rectify).

I have been doing a bit of knitting-related reading, having bought the 25th Anniversary edition of Vogue Knitting. It is a bumper thick magazine this Fall, packed with lots of patterns and stuff from the last 25 years. Obviously there's a lot of retro stuff (big jumpers ahoy!) and some updated versions of old patterns, there are also some good articles - in particular the interviews with the knitting elite from way back when, including Kaffe Fassett and Alice Starmore, and from now, with Debbie Stoller and the Yarn Harlot. The one pattern that jumped out at me was Iris Schreier's Mesh Lace Cardigan, which I think is just beautiful. I also think VK should give their patterns slightly more imaginative names...