A Bedfordshire Lace Bookmark

This little bookmark is a Bedfordshire lace one. It started as something to take to my lace meeting. I had ( and still do) a handkerchief edge on a pillow that I really wanted to do, but the pillow is a little cumbersome and uncomfortable  to use at lace meetings. Something about the height, it is a block pillow, and high at the front. My other pillow is a cookie pillow, and nicer to work on, so I dug out the pricking for this bookmark and thought I would make another one. The pattern came from an Australian Lace magazine, summer 2005, and is by Olwyn Scott and Robyn Hueppauff..

I had made this bookmark before, about three years ago, and thought there would not be an issue. So I quickly gathered my supplies and off I went to lace. As I started to set up my pricking and sort out bobbins, I thought I had bobbins with thread left from a previous project, and thought I would use them. The thread in the container with the bobbins was a cotton one, so I assumed all the bobbins in with the thread would have that thread wound on them. As I started to set them up and begin to work the lace, I could see that there were two different threads. One was a linen, complete with slubs, and the other was a cotton. Would it matter if the bookmark was worked in two different threads? One way to find out!

So I continued on my merry way. It got started, worked a bit, then left for some time while life got in the way. Next time I picked it up I snapped a thread. Mmm........ I could cope with that. Just add in another one and knot later. Famous last words! If I snapped one thread, I snapped a hundred! I know that linen thread has problems in dry air, and I have been told to lay a damp cloth over my work to create humidity. So that's what I did. Most of this bookmark was worked in high summer in air-conditioning, so every afternoon when I packed it away for the day, I would lay a cover cloth, a damp tea towel, then another cover cloth, so creating a layer of humidity.

Although I had made this bookmark before, I still had to remember lots of things. It's been good practice for my tallies, and I had to remember how to make picots, ( thank goodness for reference books!) . Then there were issues with colours of thread to colours on the pricking, as well as issues with pins. I have also learnt how unforgiving half stitch is. Never mind, it is finished now, and the only person I have to please is myself.

Now watch this space for my handkerchief edge that will be coming soon, sometime hopefully this year.