I have been in love with lace since I was a child. I began making lace when I was a little girl. One of my grandmother’s friends taught me how to make holes (on purpose!) in your knitting, and that was it for me….. addicted!

I’ve been making lace ever since. I started crocheting lace when I was a teenager, then learned how to tat in my 20’s. And, I’ve been knitting lace ever since I learned to put those holes where I wanted them!

But, that was lace making in the 20th C, and the title of this posting is about the 19th C!

When I was trying to find an article about a lacemaker in the 19th C, I was disappointed to see that the link I had bookmarked had disappeared. So, I did a little googling, and found some fascinating stuff…..

Emily Clare, lacemaker

I was enchanted by the liveliness and animation in Emily Clare’s face…. I bet she was a charmer!

Being a lacemaker in the 19th C was not an easy life. I’m glad that the internet can help us to remember those lacemakers of long ago! Bless ‘em!

Amy and Donna over at Crochetville have started a fun challenge.

It’s the 2008 Crochet Games of Ancient Greece Challenge.  It’s an invitation to challenge yourself to create a work of crochet that will be a challenge for you to complete from the opening to closing of the Olympic games in Bejing.

At first, I thought…. there is NO way on earth that I can do this… I am working to deadline on my new book, AND have projects to complete for SEVEN workshops that I am teaching in September at the Knit and Crochet Show in Portland OR.

Then… it hit me…. oho! I have a concept for a new butterfly shawl that has been stuck on my design wall for months! I want to get this done for Portland, so maybe this is the time to do it….

What the heck…. I think I’ll sign up for the challenge! Wish me luck!

I’ll let you know how it goes!

:o)

Image Source: Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright 

Synchronicity is amazing.

I was just reading about the common root of two opposing words:

Hospitality vs Hostility

and then the link for this amazing and beautiful piece of work was sent to a list that I belong to:

Lace Fence 

I am awestruck by the lace fence. As a lacemaker, I KNOW how incredibly difficult creating the lace fence had to have been. The technical virtuosity is stunning.  It took a great deal of power to manipulate the wire to create the lace on that scale.

But, the metaphor behind it is  equally, or perhaps even more powerful.  It’s a potent reminder that we really can approach our environments in more mindful ways and create more beauty.  Functional DOES NOT have to equal ugly.