Some Knitting, Some Lace and the Dolls' House

Knitting - found a bargain on my last trip to Spotlight ... Patons' Bluebell at $2 a ball! There was a nice dark tealish green and my grandson lurvs green so I grabbed enough (plus a bit) to make a vest for him. A vintage styled vest. In the 30s & 40s textured stitches were very popular for masculine knits, lots of twisted stitches, some cables and lots of patterns in simple knit & purl.

I had a lovely time trawling though my vintage patterns and eventually selected this knit/purl stitch pattern - the original is called "Lance" or perhaps that was the name of the dog. I'm using a more modern pattern for the maths but will adapt as it has 80's armhole shaping.

Lace - lots of lace news :-) At Epping Lace group on Thurs I only managed to do 1 tiny exercise - The Footside from Jennifer Fisher's book "Torchon Lace for Today" but that night I had the bright idea of making that exercise - in much finer thread - to put on the ends of the towels I'm making for my dolls' house. Only problem was that I'd had the book on loan and had returned it. So next day I had to try to remember how it went - luckily it is very simple. Not sure I got it quite right but in 1 strand of embroidery floss it does make quite a good, very fringe like trim for a miniature towel. Cheap Emb floss does not wash well though - I think this will benefit from a bit of ironing.

I must say that it felt wonderful to make my first pieces of Lace for a Purpose - not just a sample or exercise - even though the purpose is rather a silly one, being trim for miniature dolls' house towels! Here are some of those towels in situ - with new "perfume bottles" and new "plant" - it is a new species, the African Sage Violet.

The bathroom is almost done now - solved another little problem too. As the dolls' house is a cupboard all the rooms are quite deep - which means that the small rooms are awkward to arrange - with one bit of furniture hiding others and those at the front dominating. The ceramic wear was a cheap set (which I then painted) and I've always been unhappy with the base of the hand basin, it's clumpy, but how to disguise it? plants? a little rubbish bin? Had another bright idea looking at my sewing thimbles ... I had one that is too large and has a flat tip ... paint it up and voila!


But back to Lace - also went to the Lace Guild day at Linnwood on Sunday, spent lots of credit card and now I have my own lace-making equipment YEA! pretty pearwood bobbins :-)

Celebrated last night by making that sample (it is not an amoeba!) lace-makers will recognise it from Rosemary Shephard's book (I hope!)