MG: Lelah & lace-mania

swatch washing report: my Jaeger Cadiz grew a bit wider from washing; the top part of Lelah will have to be recalculated.

i was nervous about casting on for Lelah--never knitted lace before--so i started a swatch to be sure i understood the lace pattern. another swatch? yes, they are great coping tools for anxiety-ridden me. i get to knit while still unsure of myself. here are the odd row instructions:

row 1: p k yo k k slanted-double-decrease k k yo k p
row 3: p k k yo k slanted-double-decrease k yo k k p
row 5: p k k k yo slanted-double-decrease yo k k k p
oh the pattern progressions! {k1, k2, k3} yo! oh the symmetry! sigh... knitting the swatch promptly induced lace-mania. thank you, Christine, for creating such a beautiful pattern to lure me into lace. i won't show you the swatch because look:


that's Lelah at about 5 inches along. i can't believe how much i enjoy knitting it. actually, that photo is from a couple of days ago, and i'm now ready to start on the eyelets.

oh, as Kitty Kitty mentioned, i googled to find cast-ons who play well with lace stitches. the knitted cast-on (knitted-on) seemed beloved by many experienced lace knitters, so i followed according to their wisdom. here is a closeup of the cast-on edge:


i like the simple, inconspicuous edge, which conforms to the contours of the lace nicely. though the first round was a terrible tug-a-war since knitted cast-ons are worked pretty tightly, i think it was worth it. links for the knitted cast-on:

• StitchGuide (video and illustration)
• wonderful-things (illustrated instructions for knitted and cabled cast-ons)