I’m a huge admirer of people who knit lace. I’ve seen so many beautiful shawls and wraps and I wish I would ever have anywhere to go in such an item. Unfortunately, were I to make such a thing it would just end up languishing in a cupboard somewhere, because even if I did ever have occassion to wear a shawl, I think I’d look a right turkey in one! So I can’t stand the idea of putting such a huge amount of effort into making something that would never get used. However, after a bit of a disaster with the Great American Aran Afghan which had put me off charts a few months ago, I wanted to overcome my chart-phobia so I decided I needed to find something lacey that I could actually wear. In the process, I discovered that half the battle with charts is understanding which end to start from, and the other half is keeping track of where you are in the pattern… So once I had grasped the concept of starting at the end with the number next to it, and prepared mysef with a little whiteboard and magnetic rulers to cover the row above the one I was on (thus forcing me to remember to move the marker up every row – you can’t carry on without forgetting to mark your place if you can’t see the next row!) I was ready for action.
My mum found a beautiful pattern called the Essential Tank from a great book called Lace Style. Instead of doubling laceweight as the pattern suggested, she tried it with a dk cotton/bamboo blend and it worked out great! Luckily for me, she had 2 balls left over when she was done in the most gorgeous, summery bright pink colour, so I decided to give it a go too as my first proper lace project. I’m pretty thrilled with the result! And even happier that today was warm enough to wear it to work, hoorah!
I made a bit of a modification to it, because I saw a few project photos on Ravelry which had a rather drapey neck and I wanted it to sit flat instead of gaping forwards. I was also not too keen on how it changes to the “small lace pattern” at the top, so I just carried on with the main large petal pattern, and began decreasing sooner than it asked for and just made the straps longer. Seems to have worked rather well! The colour is much brighter than in either of the pictures below – I really must learn how to use my camera properly one of these days so that it can capture the proper colour of things.
Pattern: Essential Tank from Lace Style
Yarn: King Cole Bamboo Cotton – Shade: 63916
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