Valdani, for Fox

These two pictures are to show Fox how pretty Valdani can look when it is used for bobbin lace. This was an easy pattern, and in all took me around five hours. I now need to get it off the pillow, and do it again, as I made quite a few mistakes, but I hate unpicking! It was always intended as a bobbin thread, it is only two ply, (I think...) and although it can be tatted, as you can see if you wander back through my blog (yawn, no don't!) I think it works better on a pillow.

Late night, after wine...

This is probably an unwise moment to decide to update...

And so let me start with this. My daughter thinks it looks like a relic from the 70s, when we all had rainbow fabrics everywhere, *sigh* she's right. So I will go no further with this one, design from "Be-stitched". Also she warns us that the SLT doesn't work so well, and I am inclined to agree. This is a pretty crap piece of tatting, and my only excuse is that I was trapped in a car, traversing the Czech Republic. :(

So, I decided to draw on my rather faulty memory and do ... this. It is a Mary Konior design, and I love it, although just right now I can not remember the name. :( 

I do need to do another square to finish it, but due to rather faulty progress  and many distractionsI am not holding my breath!

What is this? Yet another WIP, this is from the Tina Frauberger book from the Georgia Seitz pages. Yes I made a mistake, but WTH, I pretty much never unpick, I choose to live with my mistakes...or else I abandon the whole boiling lot... BTW this is part of a six motif ring...hmm just another five to go.

Oh oh...

I have a new scanner and so I apologise for this poor quality scan. I will eventually get the hang of it, by which time it will break and I will be faced with learning yet another set of controls. This rather sad pic shows my somewhat pitiful start at the German peacock. It's not an easy pattern to follow, especially if are trying to do two other things at the same time, one of which is to study Byron's Pilgrimage of Childe Harold, canto III. I didn't follow what she meant us to do for the beak at all!
(The charge of columns paused not,
Nor ceased the storm of shell and shot;
For all that war could do
Of skill and force was proved that day,
And turned not yet the doubtful fray
On bloody Waterloo.)

Frustration and slow progress.

I have at last finished this edging, however it is just too small for a standard hanky. Here it is laid over a plain white handkerchief.

This shows just how much too small it is.

I also made a square of Frivole's working of Pomegranate with corner. The thread is from Tatskool, and is Coral Reef. This was just an exercise, I haven't thought what I could put in the centre, a doll's handkerchief perhaps!

This snowflake is made in Tatilicious' thread called "Grackle mess". The name fascinated me, and I thought Jess had made up the word Grackle, except that she mentioned plumage, so I googled it, and sure enough a grackle is a bird, somewhat similar to an European starling. In real life this thread captures that mixture of blues, greens and a touch of purple, but sadly neither she nor I can find a way to reproduce it on the computer. :( The pattern is from the site Be-stitched, and is called Jan 2007 snowflake.

I recently went to Amazon.de and bought this book. I am fascinated by the peacock, but probably need my life to be a little more settled before I try something so complicated. (We are trying to sell the property where we live, anyone fancy buying a gite complex in France?) I am forced to spend most of my time trying to declutter and clean, this in tandem with my studies for a university degree, a full time job and all the responsibilities that being wife and mother bring! Grumpy, me, no! However I am a bit frustrated that lace-making is being relegated for the moment. Well back to the pattern above, it is a classic, and this is the author's personal working of it. I was just doodling along with it to use up thread on the shuttles, but then I made a mistake, so I will probably cut it off there. I had pretty much run out of the green anyway.

This is another shuttle emptying exercise from the same book.

And to finish the beginning of a Schneeberg butterfly, that may be stuck on my carreau for a while, the way things are going here. Oh well, back to work....

Birthday!

 Last week I was 53, and I received a lovely card and some HDT from Fox. The thread was dyed by Tat-ilicious and was called "Young Hearts". It's a pretty mixture of greens, pale blue, brown and magenta, to which my scanner does not do justice.
My first tat was this Celtic picot motif from Jennifer Williams. I had seen Fox do it and wanted to try the new technique myself. It is more fiddly than exactly difficult.

Then I decided that Young Hearts should be made into Heart's Desire...however this is not a pattern to be made while watching television. This one is so full of errors I am ashamed to show it, except that sometimes it's fun for other tatters to enlarge and spot the mistakes. I am no longer sure how many there are, at the time it seemed to look awful, and now it looks ok. Bizarre!

Tuesday frustration

I haven't been able to tat for a few days, I did a Fox! I was cutting up onions and sliced into my left index finger. David appeared just after saying "Did you notice that I sharpened the knives?" I held up my bandaged finger with a wry smile..."I did."
So I started some blackwork, oh and some untangling, because Guinevere loves to steal thread and tangle it for me, and this is Tatskools HDT choco-raspberry which I was planning to use for another try at the pomegranate edging, this time using Frivole's version.

Fox's rayon thread, Frivole's edging

.I tatted this motif with the shiny rayon thread. It tats up quite well, even if it's a a little bit fiddly sometimes, however I just gave up when I tried to sew in the ends. I couldn't get them to go where I wanted...I expect I will just have to try again, perhaps a finer needle would help. Fox, did you ever try sewing in the ends?

Now this is an edging I saw on Frivole's blog. I don't follow all that many tatting blogs any more. Once upon a time in 2006 when I was just discovering the online tatting world, via Sharon's 25 motif challenge, I would check every blog on her list! Now I just watch a handful, although I do sometimes wander around reading all sorts of blogs through the list on the side bar. I don't comment much...I don't know what to say, but I do find a lot of inspiration that way. Well, so I was reading way back on Frivole's blog and this edging caught my eye. I found a copy of Anne Orr's book, and decided to have a go. I wanted a Pomegranate coloured thread, but I am not sure who dyed this thread or what it was called. I am pretty sure it was either Yarnplayer, or Tatskool. I think it's quite a good match, in any case, although I am sure that the fruit didn't figure in the name! :)

 Pomegranates are a frequent symbol on Tudor blackwork, due to Catherine of Aragon, and I think that is what made me want to have a go.

Progress Report

 I can't remember when I started this beaded necklace, but it was over a year ago. I finally picked it up again and jolly well finished it! It had kicked about because I was nine beads short...but I used a slightly different colour for those last few, and I don't even think I am likely to wear it, so no-one will ever see, but it is done, and I can clear the box away.

I did a few more experiments with the doodad. The blue beads look better with the magenta silk, but no way am I going to tat all way round with that silk. It splits and it won't slide up and it twists...no not that. The blue buttonhole thread is a good thread for holding its shape, and in fact I have some silvery blue beads that don't show up so well but the are quite pretty with the blue. I think I will give those a try.

Christmas is a time when food comes in tins. I bought a box of sablés really just for the pretty tin, because I don't like chocolate. Luckily my children were noble enough to consume them. :)

The tin is great for storing thread, especially as I have such a naughty puppy who steals thread and chews it up. Then last week they had some more sablés in a different tin, but we haven't finished those ones yet. I have plenty more supplies to keep in there when it is empty.

 

The snowflake doily creeps on, still three more repeats, and the hanky edging still has eight more to do.

Cadeaux!

 The other day I received a little package in the post from the generous and inspiring Fox. She sent me some of the Sulky rayon thread that you can see in the photo, plus all those buttons, and four metal findings or "doodads". There was also an antique bone shuttle!  You can see it peeping out of my old shuttle case. :)

 I have watched fascinated as others have decorated their doodads, and long wanted to try my hand at making something. I found some pretty beads and some matching thread, however you can see it hasn't really worked. The colours aren't contrasting, so that the beads are invisible, also I should have added some beads to the thread beforehand...So next stage will require me to cut it off and try again with a different thread, or different beads. The little scrap in turquoise is me trying the rayon. It is pretty, but sad that once tatted it looses it's shine to a certain extent. I am still working on that motif...I will show it once I have finished it.

Meantime on the hanky edging I have run out of thread! A whole spool of DMC 80 in a single edging, luckily I can easily get more as I bought it from my friend's shop, and I know she will keep me some till I can get in.

Snowflake doily

Remember this bookmark? I knew I had used this colour combination before! Anyway, round three is finished, and I will try to start round four this evening.

Not as good as Fox's

So, I set off to have a go at the doily from Reneluk, using a similar set of colours as Fox.
I am afraid it has worked out a pale imitation!
I wonder if everyone has the same memory problem as I do...I try to memorise a pattern by the time I have done one or two repeats...so that I can carry some WIPs around with me, and do a few stitches when I have a moment, but I never carry the patterns. Most of the time it's fine, but then I will find I have forgotten the stitch count...or remembered it wrong. Both my edging and this pattern have suffered from poor memory syndrome, so I am wondering now if this round will meet up as it should do after the next few repeats. Oh, well, watch this space.

Finished!

 Now I can start the Renulek tat-a-long. The hanky edging has stagnated a bit, I have twelve repeats and a corner still to do. :(
Anyway I wound my shuttles last night, with similar colours to Fox, and I will try to get the first two rounds done this weekend.

Tatting..... a long way behind

I am trying to tat-a-long with the Norma Benporath doily, however I am probably the slowest one on the challenge. Last night I finally completed the third round. The hanky edging is only just over halfway, so I won't put a photo as yet. Next time, which will probably a month away!

Tatting along

This is my edging, which grows but slowly, and I did want to have at least two corners done by next Wednesday, as I am teaching tatting in my friends shop, and she sells this thread. I hoped that if my edging looked pretty people might want to buy the thread to try at home... The thread is DMC 80 colour 820, and the pattern is from Tatted Handkerchiefs by Nikolajsen, from Akacia publishing. So here's hoping for a miracle this weekend!

And, this is Jon's Tat-Along pattern, which I do when the edging is making me sleepy! It is so pretty, and I am doing it in Oliver Twists, which is really quite fine thread. My previous doily/motif in the turquoise thread is waiting for it's third row, however my very naughty puppy climbed up and grabbed my tatting bag off the printer while I was out and chewed the turquoise thread, I now have a pile of short lengths but will I be able to find some longer bits for the final round?

Naughty puppy

Chewed up thread.

My "Go to" pattern

 Sharon asked us what we would choose as our most frequent or favourite pattern that we always return to, and what it is that makes it our choice.

This pattern from the Blomqvist and Persson book Tatting Patterns is the one I would choose. It shows off variegated threads like a dream. This is a machine embroidery thread from Gütermann, very fine. It is a quick pattern, and yet I feel it has a light lacy look that is very satisfying. I often use it to try new threads, as I have lots of old samples to compare them to, like a tension sample in knitting.

 This is Yarnplayer's Tourmaline, size 80.

These were made using Valdani 50

The green is Gütermann Sulky, the navy is Caen lace thrad.

Tatskool's beautiful daffodils, in size 80.

Some tatting

I read a post somewhere about photographing tatting, in an attempt to get better quality in the colours and so on, so these two pieces have photographed rather than scanned. The first piece is from Suzanne Schwenke's book, and isn't a snowflake but appears in the Christmas section. There is an optional third row...I haven't made my mind up on that one for the moment. The thread is Oliver Twists, from the Mediterranean collection...size approx = slightly smaller than DMC 80 

This is a dragon from Anne Bruvold's much loved Minor Norwegian Dragon pattern. The thread is Lizbeth size 20 colour Springtime. I am afraid the photo hasn't come close to the real colour, so disappointing. I am now working on an edging, in DMC 80, but there isn't enough to show yet. I did finish the Beatrice doily, but gave it to a friend before I thought to take a picture...hey ho, one doily looks much like another!

Elderly canine + new technique = ? Youthful canine + shuttle = disaster.

 I haven't been doing much tatting,( my day to day life  has continued on my other blog) but I do occasionally add a motif to my "Yes-u-can" doily. No ends have been sewn in though for a while!

 This is an experiment from my latest book on tatting, where you flip one row and don't the next...I think it looks interesting but I ran out of thread.

 I began a square from Iris's book, but haven't finished it yet. :( Much unfinished work at the moment isn't there?

 This was an experiment to try my new way of tatting, you see I learnt from a book in 1973, and never saw anyone tat until recently. Thanks to the internet I realised that my method was slow and clumsy compared to what other tatters did...thank you Diane, Tattyhead, and Yarnplayer for enabling me to see how I could improve. (Amongst others, who I didn't note down.)
So slowly I picked up that graceful movement and sped up. This motif was done after looking at the pansy motif, it's on the same page of the Saunders Tatting book. The thread was a free sample from Roseground, Elizabeth 40, and I don't like the colour at all, however the thread itself tats beautifully and I will be buying some next order I put in...but not this colour!

 The reason I had put in an order was because a friend asked me to teach tatting in her shop. She was able to find Clover shuttles but not the Elizabeth threads. I thought it might be hard to learn on thread that is too fine so I ordered a couple of colours to help potential students get started. This was one, Springtime, I think it's really pretty.

Then I had sudden urge to try an Iris doily with the hideous thread, so I wound my shuttle and started. I left it on the table overnight, and my naughty puppy, and my naughty kittens played with the contents of my bag. :(

My beautiful dragon shuttle from Shuttle Shop was broken, and I had to rewind another.