When Doilies Go Bad

The doily in serious need of fixing.

So a crocheted doily was given to one of my lace friends to pass on to one of our other friends who is embarking on a major project requiring a lot of handmade lace doilies. This particular doily came with a note from the sending explaining that it was a rushed job and that it didn't come out very well.

Five treble crochet stitches on the same crochet chain. I think she stitched four too many stitches here.

We all agreed that the doily was indeed stitched in a rush. The maker complained about the fact that she did not like the crochet hook that she used. Our complaint was that the piece was made with obvious missing/dropped stitches which made it look wonky and caused the piece to overlap on itself in some places.

Here is an entire extra set of stitches that don't belong. That explains the bunching up and overlapping here.

Speaking from experience, I knew there was not enough starch this side of the Mississippi to correct the mistakes. There were really only two options- toss the doily or unravel it and restitch the rows where things obviously went horribly wrong.

And another set of stitches that need to be removed. I'll blame this on bad counting.

I volunteered to save the doily. Luckily it is a fairly small doily and to be honest, I really do love a good challenge. It will take unraveling several rows to correct the mistake and get the doily looking presentable.

And here is the row where things took a turn for the worst. But don't worry. We can rebuild you. We can make you better!

I just can't bear to see a doily get trashed. I know the maker meant well and anyone who has made lace long enough knows that sometimes good lace does go bad. 

Renulek Revisited

Every year Renulek puts out a new doily for us tatters to drool over and attempt to create. You can follow along week by week or you can purchase the entire PDF file on Etsy to work on at your leisure. Each year I try to work on one of her doilies and each year I end in a epic fail. Somehow I screw up a row and my hopeful 15 row doily turns into a mere 4 row coaster.

Working on this in the car while waiting to pick up the princess from school

This year I decided to try once again. I am currently working on her 2018 Spring doily, which is just stunning. Instead of tatting it in the usual size #40 thread I decided to tat in size #10 crochet cotton. These means that if I succeed in finishing the piece, it will be a massive size doily. So far I've made it to row 6 without any major hiccups, (knock on wood).

So far looking goood

I'm really studying each row before I start, memorizing the stitch counts of every section. I also have a picture of each row downloaded to my phone so I can keep looking back and making sure I'm not screwing up anything.

Our cat Cupcake, always tries to photo bomb my pictures

Have you ever tried any of Renulek's doily patterns before? Which ones? How did it turn out? I would love to see your work. Please share a pic or link to your finished piece in the comments below.

Not too shabby!