Most laces I work with just a picture or a basic diagram. The straight laces and simple tape laces have consistent structures.
With the more intricate laces, I use a diagram extensively -- having used either pins or sticky arrows on various projects. However, with one project that was a reconstructed old lace, I got frustrated. The pricking was mainly a series of dots with just a few lines. The diagram had all the thread paths marked. It was really hard to keep track of where I was on the pricking and relate those dots to the lines on the diagram. I knew I'd never finish the project if I worked that slowly through the whole thing. I copied the diagram to the same size as the pricking, and moved the lace on top of the diagram. That way I could follow the thread paths directly. Maybe I'm just spoiled with all our modern patterns, but this made this particular pattern so much easier to follow. It's now half done and I know I'll keep working on it until it's all done. It's still interesting and fun. The one thing I learned is that some diagrams do not distinguish a difference in stitch. Just the thread paths are shown. I'm slowly learning to mark/color my pattern in some way to separate half stitch areas from cloth stitch. And hopefully to do it before I put a clear plastic coating on the pattern. Alice in Oregon - To unsubscribe send email to majord...@arachne.com containing the line: unsubscribe lace y...@address.here. For help, write to arachne.modera...@gmail.com. Photo site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacemaker/sets/
