When I want to use a pattern, I take my book to our local copy shop.
There, I can choose from a huge range of colours - so I take my thread
along to try against the paper. It's amazing how shades of white can
blend into something like pale blue. Also, you can find a shade that is
going to be kind to your eyes, as well as being agreeable with your
pillow covering.
Once I have a satisfactory copy, (or copies if I'm going to want to keep
joining pieces of pattern for a long piece of edging lace), I cut out
the pieces. Then the kind lady in the shop puts them through her
machine which laminates them.
Although the plastic coating is very thin, it is enough to make the
paper sturdy enough to use, yet still being very easy to prick - even
for my arthritic fingers, and has all the working lines. Also, of
course, it seals in the copier ink. Since it is a photocopy, there are
no mistakes. Coloured paper saves you having to find coloured film, and
there is none of the work of covering the pattern with the film and
sticking it down: with my clumsy fingers, that has always been a challenge.
I have used this method for several different sorts of lace for many
years, including several yards of a narrow edging made on the roller of
a travel pillow. These patterns are quite easy to wrap around even a
roller of narrow diameter and with no distortion. All my patterns are
still as good as new, and ready for further use. Being thin they are
also very easy to store in those double-sided plastic envelope pages
that fit into a ring binder, along with a spare copy of the pattern and
notes of the source, any changes I made, problems, and so on.
With all these benefits, I haven't felt the need to use pricking card
for many years, even though I still have a store of it. There is the
point that I'm lucky in having a helpful copy shop nearby, but these
days I understand that many computer printers will also work as
photocopiers, and that small lamination machines can be bought quite
cheaply in the sales. While I'm not personally 're-purposing' my cereal
boxes, I do send them to the recycling centre so they are re-used.
Hoping this is helpful,
Linda Walton,
in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, U.K.,
where it is cold and gloomy, with rain and a blustery wind - but then it
is the Spring Bank Holiday weekend, so what else could we expect!
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