Tumbling Blocks (my terminology, again), is the first mezza mandolina pattern I was able to fathom and work out. There is one surviving sample that I have seen so far; it's in the gallery. The pattern is very simple,
actually, and a good place to start for the beginner.

First: do a row of normal stitches.

On your second row, decrease first, bringing two stitches of row one together; then increase in that same place. do that across the row.

Second: Do another row of normal stitches, making sure that you catch both the regular stitches and the increases.


Third: repeat steps one and two, over and over again.

VARIATION:

There is one variation that I have seen, which creates the optical illusion of three dimensional blocks. It is done almost identically to the first.

First: do a row of normal stitches. On your second row, decrease first, bringing two stitches of row one together; then increase in that same place. do that across the row.

Second: Do another row of normal stitches, making sure that you catch both the regular stitches and the increases.

Third: take one normal stitch in the first stitch of this row. Then do the decrease/increase across the row. This should leave you with one normal stitch at the far end, and stagger the decreases across the row.


Fourth: do another row of normal stitches.

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