“Always practice unfamiliar techniques on a swatch.” 

Sensible advice – and I practiced my nupps (the “bud” stitch
in Estonian lace knitting – rhymes with “soups”) for several days while waiting
for my circular needles (Addi-tubo lace points) to arrive.  And, wow, did I need to practice them!  They are tricksy beasties! 

They are worked as a k1-yo-k1-yo-k1-yo-k1 in a single stitch
(making 7 stitches) on the right side, then purling those 7 stitches together
on the wrong side.  Sounds easy – until
you try to jam-shove-wiggle your working needle into the yarn-overs which are
lassoed tightly around the needle. 
Grrrrrrrrr.  Okay, the directions
say to work the k1-yo’s loosely.  Try
again.  Grrrrr.  And again. 
Grrrr.   I pulled every trick I
could think of, every suggestion I read. 
And some of the nupps looked good and some looked bad and some were just
plain ugly!  Too flat or too bobbly, too
sloppy or just weird (like the ones that look like curled dried-up spiders –
and where did that big hole come from?!).

My goal was to get consistency.  I did not want my shawl to document a gradual
improvement of technique – with sloppy bobbly buds and dried spiders at the top
and lovely textbook nupps at the hem! 

And on the day my needles arrived, I managed to work 3 nupps
in a row that look like first cousins. 
Consistency! Time to cast on the 251 stitches for the top of the shawl –
and get going while I still had the “knack.”

After I cast on, I studied the directions closely and
realized that I would be working 2 rows of garter, an 11-row lace pattern (a
simple pattern with no nupps), 2 more rows of garter, a decrease row, 2 more
rows of garter and then  begin the lace pattern with nupps! That works
out to 18 rows of 251 stitches (roughly 4518
stitches!) before I get to knit nupps. 
Knowing myself as I do (and knowing how our summers go – which is fast
and furious with activities that do not necessarily involve knitting), it could
take weeks before I get to the nupps! 

And the likelihood of my losing the “knack” by then?  Pretty good. 
I could try to get in a little nupp practice now and then, of
course.  Might be a good idea to keep the
nupp-ing muscles toned (I was actually a little sore after one particular
evening of battling nupps!).