I was about to post my own tip QUESTION, so I hope I’m not out of line placing it here. If so, send me a message and I’ll start a new topic. Any good idea to keep in pattern in lace with, K2tog, YO, SSK, etc. stitches when you need to decrease? Pretty hard to tell the stitches apart on the back, PLUS you have to almost rewrite the stitch pattern. ??
Do you have a pattern youre working on? It might help to see a picture of the type of lace you’re making. Some kace patterns lend themselves quite well to having stitch markers in position at the repeats so its easier to know where to work up to but others are more tricky and cross over the ‘boundry’ of the repeat in which case if it’s really fiddly you might need move markers each row before you work the row which sounds like extra work and a bit of a faff but if it prevents the pattern going off track then it’s worth the extra effort.
Think of the increases (yarn overs) and decreases (ssk or k2tog) as occurring in pairs. If you need to decrease and use one part of the pair then don’t work the second part of the pair. For example, if you have a k2tog, yo at the point of the decrease, work the k2tog as your decrease but don’t work the yo. You can work in stockinette or whatever your background stitch pattern is.
Scroll down for Patty Lyons’ consideration of lacework decreases.