Doily Construction and Reconstruction

I grew up in a waste not want not family. If you ask me, my family is one of those midwest families that you could call "the salt of the earth". We like to save and preserve things. These projects are definitely a testament to my roots and thank you mom and dad I do :).

Last year my parents came and visited us here in Virginia from Iowa bringing me a half done doily (among some other goodies :)). While the lady managed to make some headway on the doily, she had since passed. My mom must have some faith in my crochet skills to pass this baby to me. I'm not sure if she thought I'd finish it since the pattern & doily were wrapped around the thread spool so it would seem I have all I need. However, another project is probably the last thing I need ;). Right? LOL There are not enough hours in the day to do all that I want to do... who's with me? :) Life is exciting when you have something to look forward to and a vision in mind of a completed project so I suppose I shouldn't complain huh? ;)

Having caught up on my recent custom orders I pulled out the doilies I had laying around that need some TLC and a good starching ;). I undid the rubber band that had been cleverly placed about the thread spool holding the doily and pattern to it. I sized up the work that was done to see how much thread I would need to pull out to make the circle look complete and asked my sister if she liked the half that had an additional row or the other. At first I was annoyed that she liked the additional row look because this meant I would have to work and finalize the row (who wants to work, when you can just tear it out and call it done ;)) but as I looked at the work that'd already been done on this row and knew what stitches were needed my attitude changed a bit. I was finishing a doily. Look at me! Not just a snowflake, (though those are beautiful!) I'm working on a substantially sized doily... ^-^. At some point I bothered to look at the pattern and as I unfolded this baby I realized this doily would be friggin huge! What an undertaking! ...So... I'm going to finish it. Yup. This may take a while as I'll likely be working on it between projects but that's okay... through the workings of life this ended up in my possession and I can finish it... and seriously it has an endearing quality knowing someone else wanted to finish it. This is what lostsentiments is about too - reclaiming things, ideas, notions and bringing them back to life again! :) This, is exciting. :)

Here she is in all her glory so far ;) 

The doily that came without a pattern - just needs to be starched!

I also acquired a big box from a lady on freecycle, scoring many antique items, some I passed on and others I held onto. One of the items I kept was a doily with what looks like a pineapple pattern (this was before my mom has brought me any from Iowa :)). One of the pineapples was frayed but I still used it as a prop in my shop many times over to give a bit of a cozy feel to the items, doing well to omit the torn corner from the photos. :) I finally pieced together this lovely tonight and made her about as good as new as she'll get :).

The corner to the right is the one I patched back together :)

Salt of the earth baby. Salt.. of the earth :) These will decorate my house for years to come. :) Oh yeah...