The Lace Issue The Lace Issue is the 50th issue of our newsletter! We Love Lace! Anna: Lace always looked like this magical, unattainable level of knitting. Then I took Franklin Habit’s lace class at the store last year and was empowered and inspired to try it. And I found out that it is magical, this ability to create elegant pictures with your knitting, but that it can also be easy and fun. Moreover, a shawl (unlike a sweater or other garment) will always fit and always be in style. David: I love the structure and rhythm of making lace. While I work lace, I am always counting the stitches within a repeat (to keep my counts correct and to know where I am in a repeat); that counting is very relaxing to me, especially after a particularly annoying day at work. Also, the structure of lace constantly fascinates me; I never cease to be amazed by how the careful placement of yarn-overs and decreases can result in some very beautiful and intricate patterns. I recently finished the Traveling Woman shawl and really liked making that in the Blue Sky Alpaca Silk. The pattern is simple enough for any beginner to try but not so simple that an experienced lace knitter would lose interest. Monica: The reason I enjoy lace is because it's always interesting to see how a pattern or chart translates into your yarn. Depending on what you use, the same pattern can turn out to be beautiful in completely different ways. And making holes in your knitting on purpose is fun. Nora: Lace is feminine and classic. Yet it can have a twist or quirk. These are the qualities that I like in clothing, especially handknits. Flower Basket Shawl Lace is why I have about 20 lace shawls and have knit a dozen for others. Lace shawls work year-round…at work in the air conditioning or in snow as a scarf or hat or both. Lace shawls dress up for evening wear and dress down for jeans. Lace is almost perfect. It also works in shrugs, cardigans and other projects. My photo is Evelyn A. Clark’s Flower Basket shawl (Interweave Knits, Summer 2004; also available as a Fiber Trends pattern at the store). It is a tencel & wool blend that works even in summer with a tank and shorts. Right now I am knitting on a couple of mini shawls: at home is Haruni in a golden bamboo-wool blend (because I saw David’s finished Haruni in blue and loved it), and my travel or knitting with friends project is Multnomah in an eggplant solid sock yarn. Last month I finished Traveling Woman in a black shot with silver to match a cool shawl stick in black/silver/turquoise. All three patterns are free on Ravelry and are really terrific patterns if you want gratification sooner than later. Yvonne: Oh, lace. Never did I think that yarn overs and decreases would make my heart go pitter-patter, but oh, how it does. The way that stitches can be combined into a multitude of patterns, and then you can combine those patterns to make more complex patterns and wind up with astounding shawls, scarves, sweaters. The way a simple lace pattern can look elegant in the the finest or bulkiest yarn. Oh, the joy it brings me! I was once frightened of lace. As a matter of fact, my first lace project reduced me to tears and made me vow to never knit lace again. I wound up ripping it out and shoving the yarn to the back of my stash. I don't think it helped that my yarn choice was ridiculed (I believe the exact words were "who'd want to knit leaves made with purple yarn?"). I was seduced back to the lace game by a post that Stephanie Pearl-McPhee wrote about a shawl (Sivia Harding's Diamond Fantasy pattern) she had knit with sock yarn. Before I knew it, I was clicking the Paypal button and waiting for the email to arrive with my PDF pattern. I had some sock yarn, and I started knitting. Unfortunately, this was no better for me -- I had gotten off track stitch wise, I couldn't figure out where I needed to be, and the yarn wasn't working for me. I complained bitterly about my lack of skill and the lack of enthusiasm in the project. I then received a very lovely note from Sivia herself, that said "if you don't love it, why bother continuing?" It was the simplest thing, but it changed my world. Much later, I was lucky enough to be able to attend Franklin Habit's lace class, held here at Natural Stitches. Franklin really opened my eyes to reading my lace, to working with charts, to understanding how to fix those mixed yarn overs. It's all his fault that I now own Folk Shawls, Victorian Lace Today, Knitted Lace of Estonia, and many other books on lace, not to mention have an entire looseleaf binder of patterns, and a Ravelry queue that includes 25 lace projects. And we won't discuss the miles of lace yarn I own. And the amount of sock yarn that can be used for lace, because I've got a lot of that, too. A detailed shot of David’s Haruni Shawl, the shawl that inspired us all Annette’s enormous Haruni, knitted with Alpaca with a Twist Kelli, a fairly new lace knitter, gets started on her Haruni in Madelinetosh Sock

What’s New We received a special shipment of Madelinetosh Sock, in several new colors. One of our favorite semi-solids, Dream in Color, is fully restocked in worsted-weight Classy and fingering-weight Smooshy. Just in time to make summer tank tops, we have a ton of Universal Yarn Cotton Supreme in a wide variety of colors. More! Wonderful, beautiful Manos Wool Clasica, that amazing worsted weight yarn dyed by a women’s collective in Uruguay. Do you read our blog? Yvonne shows some completed Stora Dimuns from our KAL, and we discuss our favorite methods for making socks. Want even more Natural Stitches on the web? Find us in our Ravelry group, on Facebook, and on Twitter.

Beginning Lace Suggestions By Anna and Yvonne Awhile back, one of our customers asked for suggestions for patterns for a first-time lace knitter. We sat down and thought about what qualities made a pattern appropriate for a newbie to lace: A clear, easy to read chart Pattern repeats that are easy to memorize Pattern repeats that make the knitting “readable,” so that the knitter can easily tell where she or he is (and where she or he may have made a mistake) An added bonus: patterns that can be knit in multiple gauges, with any yarn the knitter has in the stash. We believe that the Forest Canopy, Shetland Triangle, and Traveling Woman patterns are all appropriate for a beginning lace knitter. The patterns have both written and charted instructions, and look good worked in any weight of yarn. You can easily read the stitches, so if you make a mistake, it’s very easy to discover where it was you went wrong. The Forest Canopy pattern is a pay pattern, available online; the Shetland Triangle pattern is available in the Wrap Style book, available at Natural Stitches; the Traveling Woman is a free Ravelry download. One final suggestion is that if you are new to lace knitting, stay within the fingering- to DK-weight yarn range. We love our lace weight yarns, but if you’re fighting techniques that are new to you AND a very thin yarn, the results can be disastrous. We’ve found that Malabrigo Sock (440 yards), Smooshy Sock (450 yards) and Tosh Sock (395 yards) are all excellent yarns for lace (even if you’re not a beginner!). Anna’s Traveling Woman, knit in Pagewood Farm’s Alyeska Detail of a Shetland Triangle

Fixing Mistakes in Lace: The Missed Decrease By David Mistakes happen. . . and when knitting lace, mistakes are inevitable. In the March issue, Yvonne explained how to correct one of the most common lace mistakes, the missed yarn-over. In this issue, I explain how to correct the other common lace mistake, the missed decrease. The missed decrease is usually discovered on a subsequent patterned row when you realize that you have too many stitches within a repeat or at the end of a row or round (assuming there were no yarn-overs accidentally introduced). Don’t panic and certainly don’t rip back until you know for sure where the missed decrease should have occurred. You have at least two options to remedy the situation: a simple way and a correct way. The simple way focuses on getting your stitch count back in order while the correct way entails laddering stitches. (If you discover that the missed decrease occurred on the row you just worked, tink back and catch it before going any farther). Since I am not a perfectionist knitter (I hear a collective gasp from those of you who admire my lace projects), I generally prefer to go the simple way. When I discover a missed decrease in the previous row, I compensate for the extra stitch by working in an extra decrease within the current row I am knitting. The extra decrease has to be done within the lace repeat where it was initially missed – the missed decrease should not be compensated for at the end or beginning of a row. Keep in mind that this simple remedy could throw off the symmetry of that particular lace repeat, but in most cases, it is not noticeable in the overall project. The compensating decrease will help keep your stitch count correct and will usually disguise itself as you work subsequent rows. If you like to keep all your lace stitches in order and have your lace motifs appear mistake-free, then you want to explore this other remedy for missed decreases. Work your lace repeat up to the point where the decrease in the previous row should be. If you missed a k2tog or an ssk, you will drop two stitches off your left-hand needle and ladder down to the row where the decrease should have happened (usually no more than two rows). Follow one of the steps below to catch the decrease and ladder back up: For k2tog: With a crochet hook and approaching your stitches from the left, catch the left-most stitch through the front of the loop, then the right stitch through the front of the loop. Catch the ladder (or strand of yarn) of the row above, then pull it though both stitches, forming a single stitch. The left stitch should lie on top of the right stitch and appear to lean right. Ladder up your stitches until you are back to your working row. For ssk: With a crochet hook and approaching your stitches from the right, catch the right-most stitch through the front loop, then the left stitch (it does not matter if you catch the left loop through the front or back). Catch the ladder (or strand of yarn) of the row above, then pull it though both stitches, forming a single stitch. The right stitch should lie on top of the left stitch and appear to lean left. Ladder up your stitches until you are back to your working row. Keep in mind that the resulting stitch will be a little loose, especially if the missed decrease was preceded or followed by a yarn-over. However, the stitch should even out once the lace piece is blocked. Happy Knitting!

Customer Show and Tell The entries are rolling in for our Summer of Socks and Lace contest! We hope this inspires you to join in and show us your own beautiful work.   Emily displays her Pretty as a Peacock Shawl, knit with almost four skeins of Madeline Tosh Sock   Emily’s Prairie Rose Shawl, from The Knitter’s Book of Wool, knit in Buffalo Gold yarn     Sarah let Steven model her Wool Peddler’s Shawl, from Folk Shawls, knit here in Brown Sheep Lamb’s Pride Worsted   Brooke shows off her daughter’s Christening gown, knit in Little Lehigh:

From the entire staff of Natural Stitches, we wish you happy knits, creative crochets and splendid spinnings. And, as always, if there's anything we can do to help, just let us know!

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