Addison Embroidery
at the
Vicarage

Lace edge cardigan (from Debbie Bliss’ s book Simply Baby, Quadrille, 2006)

My second knitting of this charming Debbie Bliss pattern in baby cashmerino (Lace edge cardigan (from Debbie Bliss’ s book Simply Baby, Quadrille, 2006; the first one I made can be seen here), though this time it’s in the next size up. A lovely simple pattern is transformed into something quite beautiful by the lace edging. The lace knitting on the pattern stops at the bottom of the front edges but I think it’s so much nicer continuing it all round the bottom edge of the jacket as well – a length of almost 4 feet, but with both this and the one I made previously there was sufficient wool left to do this. (My garter stitch needs this distraction as it’s not as even as it once was. Curious, I’ve always thought garter stitch was the easy option. I am, however much happier back with stocking stitch which I seem to manage to do with more finesse!)

Lace edge cardigan (from Debbie Bliss’ s book Simply Baby, Quadrille, 2006)

Lace edge cardigan (from Debbie Bliss’ s book Simply Baby, Quadrille, 2006)

Just photos today as we’re expecting family for lunch who are camping in Herefordshire. The nights have been horribly wet recently (and the days more showery than sunny) and whereas I quite like rain at night tucked up in a warm house, I can’t believe it will have been particularly wonderful under a tent. We shall try to persuade them to camp under our roof for the next few days but they’re a tough lot these inhabitants of Aberdeen and we may not be successful.

Lace edge cardigan (from Debbie Bliss’ s book Simply Baby, Quadrille, 2006)

Lace: knitted (top); tatted (bottom)

Family commitments and snatches of unpacking have taken their toll on embroidery and knitting. I did reach the point of completing all the component parts of a baby coat but then I decided I didn’t like it at all and undid the whole thing! Its replacement, a simple lace edged cardigan, is nearly finished, but finding the time to make it up is something else again. The lace edging was, however, a joy and just the right sort of knitting to take on recent train journeys – the pulsating forward movement of the train helped sustain the simple pattern repeat increasing from 5 stitches to 10 and back again over 10 rows. A journey to London and then on to Kent and back was just the right amount of time to produce an edging for the whole jacket – extraordinarily for a garment for such a small child, this amounted to a bit more than 4 feet!

Knitted lace (from a Debbie Bliss pattern for a lace edged cardigan)

I did once take up a different sort of lacemaking and strangely enough this made an appearance recently, tumbling out of a box  where I’d never have thought to have looked should I actually have wanted to find it. When I made my Elizabethan jacket (blogged about here) I originally thought it should be edged with hand made lace as seen in some, though by no means all, of the original jackets. Tatting seemed the easiest way of making lace for the sort of look I wanted and once I got going and mastered that knack of the thing I just kept going until this lace was the length I wanted. With great excitement I tacked the lace to the jacket and stood back to take stock. It was quite wrong – the lace was too fussy for the jacket and the jacket told its own story much better without the lace. I put the lace to one side and for all the work involved it packed up into a very small bundle. Tucked away, I forgot about it.  Now many years later I would love to find a use for it. It would work well on a christening dress like the one I made here (for my niece 40 years ago and yet to get another outing) and I’m tempted to add it to this (except now I see it already has a lace edging!!). Perhaps I’ll just wait to see if something else suggests itself?

Tatted lace (from ‘Tatting ‘ published by Coates Sewing Group, 1970)

‘Tatting’ a Coates Sewing Group Book,1970