Wrong Border?

I am conflicted.  Do not know whether to continue or start a new edging for the jacket.  It cannot go on the very end as it looks too dainty, so I tried it halfway onto the end:

On the edge:

Then I tried it upside down.

What do I do?  

Do I try another pattern like the wonderful 
Mary Konior Leaf Braid edging 

that I saw on Sharren's blog?

Do I sew it halfway on?

Help!

Going Boldly...

#5-100 Motif Challenge

Celtic tatting design by Ruth Perry.  

Tatted in Tabatha's Lizbeth #20

Followed by this really pretty design by Sharon Briggs:

#6- 100 Motif Chalenge

_____________________________

 A Brainwave Followed

I have a cotton jacket - very cute, but the sleeves were so long I had to have them rolled all the time, and they always looked sloppy.

After a year of aggravation, last night I cut off the ends of the sleeves, hemmed them (very difficult to do on a jersey-like heavy cotton  - I do not sew, remember) and crocheted two rows of #20 Lizbeth thread around the edge.

I am going to attach this vintage edging to the sleeves!  I had to order a ball of#10 (ugh), Cebelia in black to tat this, because it needs to be really heavy. After trying out the pattern, I think it will be good.  

Not being one to wear embellishments of any kind, especially tatting, this is a very bold move pour moi!

Today I will pick up the Cebelia.  Then I will throw the rest of this impossible black Lizbeth in the garbage, where it belongs.  Then I do not have to complain anymore!

What do you think?  Cute, eh?

Now - THIS is cute:

First-Aid For Fox!

Ingenious Gift From Tabatha!

I appreciate the thought that went into this. Disinfectant!  I REALLY hope that it will NOT be necessary to make use of  those scary looking tweezers! But, if I need them again to remove, thread, beads, who knows what - there they are.  Perfect. Love the plastic container. Very cute.

Here is what came in the mail came in the mail from Tatbatha, 

as I won her birthday giveaway: 

Thanks, again Tabatha!  Love the colour of the Lizbeth.  Of course, I had to begin 

something to take my mind off the disaster Jon's Almas snowflake pictured after.  

I messed up again at the end -  AGAIN. I cannot figure out why I CANNOT get through this pattern without... yes... TEARS! I cannot get it right.

This poor thing is cleverly cobbled together, but the idea is to tat it, not fake it with ingenious mistake-hiding techniques.  Type A personalities are not fun to be!

I had to cut out chunks of it, and I cannot tell you how many times I un-tatted with Finca #12! 

Pathetic! 

Really, I should put it away for a while - a long while - but just guess what I shall tat when I am finished with the Lizbeth motif...  : 0

Naughty Pumpkin

Here it is! 

 Not exactly beautiful, but the knot is now doable!
Next time, I will tat a longer chain as this one was just too short.

#4, 100 Motif Challenge

I had to borrow Gian's cord to practice the knot. 

 I was so deep in concentration that I was not aware 

that he was sitting about a foot away from me... glaring!

Suddenly, I felt his steely gaze; 

I was forced to go and cut a length of my own cord...

Till I Get It Right...

#3 - 100 Motif Challenge

This orange and green, Finca #16 motif, and the one underneath I did get right!  The green/orange is a vintage pattern from somewhere -  I don't remember where. I finished it and just stuck it on top of the lilac tat, and I am enjoying the old-fashioned look of these as they sit temporarily on my table. There is something so appealing about this arrangement to me.  Funny, what pleases...

Then, feeling more confidence, I took my markers in hand and attacked Jon's 'Almas' diagram.  I am determined to get this right!

So, I started it.

The Finca #16 is still right up there on my favourite list. It does have a whitish undertone - maybe the dye is not that consistent?  Anyone know what I mean?

I don't mind this quirky colour-thing.  It gives the stitches a texture that is interesting.

I picked the Delica beads out at night, and thought they were blue, but they are actually green with bluish highlights.  Pretty. You can't really see them here.

As of this morning:

Tatting Gone Bad

I can't seem to get anything right these days.  I am very disgruntled.

This is "Almas," from Jon's Snowflake book.  All was going swimmingly, till, of course, right on cue, the last repeat.  I went the wrong way or something and it did not finish well.  Grrr.  

There is no more of the silk thread, (variegated from LadyShuttlemaker) so I could not fix it and I have no intention of doing it over at this time.  It is done.  I do like the colours though and the beads... ( old ones I love and did NOT give away!)

I am also not happy tatting with silk - even the thicker stuff.  I find it very difficult; it catches on my cuticles.

I am calling this #1 of my 100 Motif Challenge.  I have been zipping through the 25 Motif Challenge, and it is a pain to keep start the count over, so I am just going to do 100.  I wonder how long it will take!

Looking at it, I think I might just tat this again - I cannot stand not having done it right!

_____________________________

#2 - 100 Motif Challenge

This one I did correctly.  Small, but right!

__________________________

Lastly,

Last But Not Least...

 Lily!

  Lady Countess Lily,

Your joking around must have brought you some good luck!

Please email me with your postal address ASAP, 
so I can get your goodies mailed out.

from

Your Royal Awesomeness

A big Thank You to all the tatters who participated in this give-away.

♥Fox  : )

More M's: Martha, Mrs. Mee and Murderous Mistakes

Oh, yes.  These are Mrs. Mee's pesky pearly picots that I learned to tat in Martha's new book - which is fantastic, by the way.  Lots of fun tatting in there, thanks to the creativity of Ms. Ess.

My attempt at the picots is certainly not stellar, but the overall effect can be clearly seen and I find it rather pleasing!  I was lazy and eye-balled the picots instead of using a gauge, ( which I can rarely spell either!) for I find them frustrating to use.

In this case, I should have.  Also it would have helped to have read the instructions straight through before beginning, as the picots should be a bit shorter; had they been, the end result would have been better.  Next time!

Un-tatting #16 Finca thread is absolutely crazy-making!  I thought I would go mad trying to get a couple of rings un-tatted, but the Tat-Pic was magnifique, and I got through it.  Love the thread though - a bit on the soft side, but  lovely to tat with.

Then I tried the broomstick lace technique.  Love it!  Thanks, Martha.  The next one I tat will be one of the bookmarks that employs this trick.  Very pretty and challenging, yet not a hopelessly difficult skill to achieve.

________A bit of a non sequitur_______  

I thought I had forgotten how to tat a 

single shuttle split ring and PANICKED!  

Yup, I got all shaky and everything! 

 Rushed to YouTube and 

found a video and... 

whew!

_______Then______

The Delica Bead Experiment

A couple of days ago I posted about my new Delica beads.  I received an e-mail from JaneE, who was good enough to caution me to check out the "washability" of my new sparklies, lest I ruin something inadvertently.  She said:

Sorry, but there is a risk with laundering delicas!!  I noticed when I bought some off ebay that there was a warning on the packets so looked it up and lo and behold they're right!!!  Not a great risk, probably but I'd certainly not use them on an item of clothing that has to be washed a lot.  Here's a link http://www.beadage.net/glossary/index.php?term=delica-beads

So, I performed a little experiment:

No damage to the beads, no leaking of colours and no staining on the cotton.  I am very relieved. It may be that certain other colours will bleed, or other types of Delicas might react differently, as there are a variety of other finishes.  I had never realized there was so much variety in Delicas till I ordered some.

One other thing: Delicas seem to be more brittle than other glass beads, due to the way they are manufactured; they are definitely finer, so they may not stand up to machine washing very well.

___________LASTLY_____________

Who Wants Beads?

Hi there, readers of tat-ology,

You have been so good to me this year - lots of lovely gifts, warm wishes and gestures of generosity.  Lots of encouragement, and enthusiastic comments.  Tons of humour. The tatting community is something else.  Would that this type of goodwill existed everywhere on our deeply troubled planet.

This line of thinking occurred to me as I was straightening out my bead box to find a home for the fabulous new beads that arrived from Fire Mountain Gems and Beads;  the gift certificate from Miranda had burned a hole in my pocket! I went bead shopping! Thank you Miranda.  I am excited with my new stock.

I notice my taste in beads has changes significantly in the 21/2 years that I have been tatting.  So, as I will never use all that is in my stash, I decided I would give the ones I could tear myself away from to one of you.  A Bead-Away!

As I started to weed out the ones I would give away, I noticed how difficult it was  to part with the ones I would never use again.  I am such an old crow.  Everything that sparkles has MY name on it!

However, with formidable resolve that I dredged up from who knows where,  I dug into the stash and here you can see what I have come up with for a giveaway.

I am adding a Teri Dusenbury's pattern book of hearts, as heart motifs always cry out for beads and then even more beads!

Send me your comments, those of you who desire my offering, and I will consult the Random Number Generator on Monday October 24th,  for a winner.

If I have never heard of you, I shall not include your name in this draw, as it is for those who read, comment, and lurk around tat-ology!  It is YOU to whom I owe many thanks!
Fox  : )

Knotted Up With Schwenke 'Tsuris'

tsuris - (Yiddish) aggravating trouble; "the frustrating tsuris he subjected himself to"

difficulty, trouble - an effort that is inconvenient; "I went to a lot of trouble"; "he won without any trouble"; "had difficulty walking"; "finished the test only with great difficulty" Oh Yah!

Susanne Schwenke's Design

Pretty but what a challenge! My goal was just to finish it.

The thread is vintage Coats #30; Kelly gave me a two balls of it this past summer.  It  broke twice, but I was pulling worked-over thread. It is great to work with, as it is a 6-cord cordonnet, crisp, firm and easy to tat. No twists or separations.  Very different from my experience with Lizbeth.

I followed all my self-help tatting hints, used the coloured diagrams,

(My camera is so good that I had great difficulty in blurring the photo!)

did not work too late into the wee hours and I still had to un-tat and CUT OUT A LOT!  Whew. I do not think I will be tatting this one again anytime soon.  But, it is pretty.  : )

There were lots of the BAD kind of knots in this tat. Now, I think about knots a lot, and on my daily route realized that I stroll past this one every single day.  It confronts me beside the sidewalk near my apartment, just hanging around, secured over the bough of a sturdy tree:

Then, I remembered a walk I took in New York a year ago, when I spotted this in a window in Soho. It was one of a few old prints showing sailing knots, (notice, it is a ds!) displayed in a very grimy window.

I mean really, who notices these things?  

Tatters!

Last Leaf, A Warrior and New Challenge

A friend of mine saw the last leaf bookmark I tatted and loved it.  REALLY loved it.  In fact, I could tell by her expression that she was hoping I would exchange it for the one I had just given her!

However, as it is probably my favourite tatted piece ever, I said I would make her the same one.  So I did.  It is not quite as nice as mine, the one on the right of the screen, but I think she will like it.  It goes in the mail today.

Pattern by Karey Solomon

hers

mine

Funny, mine has more mistakes and flaws than this one, but I really adore it.

________________

Then, a new project. 

Oh, Susanne Schwenke,
I might just have to spitzen on your Spitzen Kreationen!

____________________

Heartfelt emotions run rampant at my place:

Magical M's

Lots of m's:  Miranda,  gave me the maple shuttle; Mary Konior for the design; Michelle sent me the variegated vintage thread and me for putting it all together.  Magical!

Then there is Martha. 

This new book is terrific -  well-organized, beautiful patterns, 

cleanly designed, easily comprehended: my kind of instructions!  

Thank you Martha!

The final M is for Misha, who
lives on in my memory and in my tatting. ♥ 

I thank my friend Bev for the constant visual.

First-Rate Finca

Trying out the new thread.  I like it.  

The #16 is too teeny pour moi.

Dental Designs

My dentist is a really great guy and NEVER administers pain!  I always get so frozen that it is a miracle that I regain any feeling after those mega-shots!

So, next week, when I get a filling, (ugh) I will give him a book that I enjoyed that I think he might like as well, and I had the thought to tat a simple Rosemary Peel bookmark to put in the book.

I never did hear if the black one I tatted a couple of weeks ago was enjoyed by its male recipient, so this is another gamble.  It has a hefty feel. Masculine enough?

That filling better not hurt...

The burgundy thread is silk from Krystledawne 

and the sparkly - Altin Basak, from Suneeti.

___________________

I was not pleased with this the first time I tatted it and had a lot of trouble finishing the pattern - as usual.  I get so turned around ...  At any rate, the pink one came out to my satisfaction, with far fewer mistakes.

Sometimes I have to leave the beads alone and concentrate on the pattern which I find does become distorted to a certain extent when you add the beads. The heavier thread also made this one easier to tat.

It is a Susanne Schwenke pattern.  

The thread is Altin Basak, #50, also from Suneeti, as were the gold beads.