Monday (Labor Day) we went to the Pow Wow at the Shinnecock Reservation on Long Island. I've only been to a few, but this is the biggest one I've attended so far. So many vendors, and the native dancing was wonderful, the costumes beautiful. It turned out to be a lovely day, too, weatherwise.
Our next outing for the week will be Bally's at Atlantic City. I got another free night voucher, so what the heck. I usually qualify for one of their 2-fer dinners, so that takes some cost out of the deal. And I just love the slots!!! I probably don't spend enough to even cover the room, but they invited me, so what the heck. We're leaving Wednesday night.
Knitting
I'm working on the I-cord edging on my Cutaway Tank top. Finishing is not my favorite thing, so it's slow going, even though it's so easy. I know I'll be finished with it before I have to go back to work, but I don't feel urgent about it.
So what did I do instead? I started another project. This one has been sitting in the wings calling to me, and all I needed was a moment of boredom to answer the call. I'm sure you've seen this one on many blogs: CeCe by Bonne Marie Burns. I have about 4 inces of it done:
I'm using Rowan Calmer (everybody else seemed to be using Calmer) and it's red #469, although I don't exactly remember the name of the shade. You can't see the lace pattern very well in this picture because I took it on my scanner, so there was no way to block it out even a little.
I have to say that I didn't consider this pattern as 'brilliant' as everybody else thought it was. I'm certainly no expert, but I have followed some intricate lace patterns successfully and gotten the expected results from those well-written patterns.
Here is my opinion, and since this is my blog, I feel free to say what I want. I did write to Bonne telling her that I was confused by the pattern, and asked her to explain further. Instead of offering to enlighten me, she chose to berate me in the belief that I must be an inept knitter who has never knit lace before, or I was just too stupid to follow directions. I felt really badly about that, and wasn't even going to bother knitting her pattern because I didn't think a merchant should be so vindictive to a customer. In the end, I put aside my personal feelings and decided to try it anyway; after all, I did pay for it.
These pattern instructions were not very clear at the start. The explanation for the set-up row could have been written better. There was no indication that there would be certain stitches that were outside of the actual lace patterning, and would remain stockinette. And these stitches would increase in number as the piece grew. Once I realized this, I placed additional markers where the patterning ended and the pattern now made more sense to me. With this simple fix, the lace pattern is coming along nicely. The lace part is really a very simple pattern. I still feel a lot of confusion could be avoided with a little more verbiage in the pattern, in compassion for the knitter who has to figure it out.
Blogger Beta
I had more photos to show, but Blogger Beta seems to have a problem with me loading them. The one photo I loaded, loaded faster. But it won't let me load any more. And there seems to be some kind of glitch in the editing mode. In order for me to get some of the effects I want, I need to go back and forth between Compose and Edit Html. This never happened before I went to Beta. Well, I guess there's no going back now, so I have to work around it. Since there was one reader who asked, I would say stay with the regular Blogger until they force you to change.
I may not post again this week, after all I really am on vacation. If not, see you on Sept. 12th, when I return to work.
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