And more decorations!

Delicate, dainty and lacy. That is what my tree is. There are no things like it anywhere else in my home. I'm not really into lace. No lace curtains, no lace bed covers, and only a few touches awaiting use in closets and corners. I've strong opinions on lace, and how it is used, and you can have too much, particularly in a house of males such as I have lived with for the past almost 30 years.

My tree though, is touches of lace and I really enjoy its delicacy.

The Snowflakes but for one are from 99 Snowflakes. All the red ball covers come from a book of covers for ornaments that I have had and shared with my mother in law for years. The patterns all use pearl headed pins to hold all the tips in place on the old fashioned satin balls. In fact if anyone knows a source for cheap red satin balls, please tell me. There are none being sold here anymore even after an exhaustive search of dollar stores. The third ornament is one of 3 made for me by my mother in law, almost 25 years ago.

The angels and a few other little snowflakes are tatted.

I learned to tat last fall after having a tatting shuttle in my work bag since 1974. It too was just something I could not quite understand. Once given the basics, I felt like a duck in water, and love the little rings of its dainty nature. My teacher was a master tatter. It was she who told me about Nordic Needles online as a great source for tatting. Its a superior source for all kinds of neat things.

I have some ball cover patterns in tatting on the to do list, but knitting got in the way. I planned for a few more snowflakes, but knitting got in the way. I have dozens of incomplete things that I mean to finish, but, well, knitting seems to have consumed me. There is so much to learn, and I have tons more still to experience, but soon, there will be much work on some of these other things. I love them just as well. Now if I can just stop coming up with interesting things to knit!

I got a good start on the hand warmers this morning. They will have the same lac pattern as the scarf, best displayed here. Annie Modesitt's pattern from her lace class (the black and silver doesn't take good photos).Because the set of scarf and hand warmers are of man made yarns, I've had to think through how I was going to fit these to her tiny hands. Remember my little black lace thing from long ago? My plan there was to use a ribbon to close up the arm part of the wristlet. I saw a pattern on Ravelry that did the same thing up the whole of the warmer, and that will work here. The laces will compensate for the lack of stretchiness in the yarn. Doing it the whole way up the warmer might just solve my long standing problem with the lacy black wristlet. When I realized that yesterday, my hope for the project that was and now once again is the reason I learned to knit, is reborn.

So I'm going to work a bunch over the next two days to get these wristlets knit up, and then I will decide if the over part that Curlerchik uses so well, will look right. I still like the idea, but I'm a little concerned that the lacing will be to much fussiness with the over skirt. The lacing is a feature all on its own, and two big design features on one small hand seems to much.

Beads? Well I can see beads running up the edges, alternating silver and black (I found the right size beads!!!) in a bit of a wave to echo the lace. Or maybe all along the lacy waves. I'm going to knit i-cord with one of those funny little i-cord knitting things, of crochet cotton, to use for lacing. I'll bead the last inch of that too.

You know what? As I write this, I realize how very clearly my direction forward is. What was just a thought from yesterday, an informal start to a plan, is a picture in my head complete and lovely on her hand. I really hope she likes these.