Knot Knecessarily Known Knitting

I did have one "Hmmm, I wonder. . . " moment in Galina's Orenburg lace class. She showed us a Russian book of lace patterns. The patterns were charted on a grid, much like other lace patterns. The difference was the decreases were not shown on the chart. And the yarn-overs were shown in different colors, to indicate groupings. This got me thinking. It implies the Orenburg lace knitters understand their patterns. They work the patterns from memory. They know where the holes go. They know where the decreases go because they know where the holes go. How do they know? First off, Orenburg lace does not worry about direction of slant on the decreases. If you need to decrease one stitch, the answer is to knit two together. A slip-slip-knit decrease is not used. If you need to decrease two stitches, the answer is to knit three together. A centered double decrease is not used. Most of the time, the lace knitter is only asking: Do I need to decrease one stitch or two? Do I p...

Once again, I am experimenting with doing lace absolutely not the way the Russians would do it. This sawtooth border is a common border in Orenburg lace. The Russian way of turning the corner, while clever, left me unsatisfied. Traditional Orenburg corner After a few weeks of experiments, here's where I ended up. I used a basic sawtooth border pattern. You can find the chart in Galina Khmeleva The Gossamer Webs Design Collection , (Loveland CO: Interweave Press 2000) page 5. This particular sawtooth pattern starts with 8 stitches, widens to 12 stitches, and then narrows back to 8 stitches. When increasing, each yarn over causes the border to widen and the line of yarn overs to grow outward toward the right. When decreasing, it becomes trickier. You still need the yarn over to keep the pattern, but it needs a knit-2-together to prevent the fabric from widening and, since you want the overall border to narrow, it needs a second knit-2-together. Without those, the line of hol...

Since I now have some time on my hands, I'm getting back to unfinished objects, half-designed projects, notes for new classes, and the like. I have a backlog of things in the "when I have time" category. There were several items in the basket on the living room table. Among them were handouts, yarn, and a strip of Russian lace pattern samples from when I took Galina Khmeleva's "The Fundamentals of Orenburg Knitted Lace" at Georgia FiberFest in September 2017. What I what to concentrate on today is attaching a lace border. I pulled out the acrylic practice yarn and started swatching. Swatch worked in the Orenburg tradition, with simultaneous edging. In the Orenburg tradition, the edging is worked in a long strip from left to right across the bottom. It essentially becomes the cast-on. The central pattern stitches are picked up from the side of the edging. And the Russians have a clever method for turning the corners and working the edging at both s...