As Pat will soon find out, the nicest pricking to work on is one done on card, and then inked in. Without the plastic layer, you can feel where the holes are. With the plastic layer the holes close back up so it is hard to feel them and then hard to push the pin through.
Make sure you use a needle in the pricker that is the same size or slightly smaller than the pins you are to use. Use either waxed paper between the photocopy and the card, or just rub over the back of the pricking with wax of some sort; I use beeswax as DH is a beekeeper so there's always some around, but a candle works just as well. The old way was to dip the pricker into a wax block ever few holes; a gunky waxy lump soon forms against the bottom of the needle. It was a light bulb moment when someone showed me how to rub the wax onto the paper to save all that extra work. But with the thick card it will be hard work pricking without any wax to lubricate it. The very heaviest card is only 'needed' for lace like Honiton or Duchesse where you are going to do a lot of needlepin sewings - so you don't end up scratching a hole right through as you try to achieve them - but it can of course be used for any lace. But you don't need to reverse technology as far as a dip pen, unless you are very comfortable using one. Lots of the fine fibre tip (0.1) pens are waterproof and indelible, and for drawing curves for spiders legs (my preferred method to straight lines radiating from the centre hole) or to be able to do the trails as a fluent continuous zigzag they are much easier to use. Jacquie in Lincolnshire - To unsubscribe send email to majord...@arachne.com containing the line: unsubscribe lace y...@address.here. For help, write to arachne.modera...@gmail.com
