mem_somerville, 26 days ago

#WIPWednesday is attempting to recover from transporting this Tønder lace. I took a workshop with Bobbi Donnelly and ended up trying 2 pieces, without enough bobbins. So I had to unwind my first set. Trying to re-wind them now. So far, only one thread broke.

First time I used 140/2 cotton thread. It scares me. So thin. But it is lovely and delicate in the completed pieces. I can see the appeal.

#BobbinLace #TønderLace

Close up of the mat project. You can really only see the tops of a lot of steel pins. You can kind of see the edge work on the right. It alternates between cloth stitch sections that appear fully covered, and the Copenhagen hole stitches that leave a gap in the center of the oval and all the stitches are smushed up against the edge. The pattern notes solid | hole | solid | hole, so I can remember which one to do at each section. The unworked part has the thread outline and the pin holes for the next sections. Various threads hang off the incomplete part.
I didn't think I'd get to a second project so I didn't bring more bobbins. I hastily set up for this second one. But I was able to try another new-to-me stitch, the gimp fingers. They are tricky to do with threads winding back and forth in really short order. The advice was to make sure you deal with the tension of them constantly so they don't slip around. Anyway, my little practice piece is a mess, sitting on red felt next to the pattern printouts. My honeycombs are a mess but I just wanted to get to the fingers to be sure I tried them a couple of times during the workshop with the instructor there.