Category: tatting

2024, A New Year

2024 is here, and it has been cold! And snowy! We’ve had more snow this winter than we’ve had in the entire two previous winters. Now, like most of the country, it is very cold! The thermometer reads 1º F but the windchill is currently -22º F. I think I’ll stay inside. I am glad that my dog doesn’t mind the cold.

Bonnie in the snow on wandasknottythoughts
Bonnie in the snow

Bonnie is a Corgi/Border Collie mix. She’s a bit taller than a Pembroke Corgi but still has pretty short legs. Getting around in the snow has been a bit of a challenge. She likes it, though.

While staying in the house, I’ve gotten quite a bit of tatting done. I’m working on a couple of patterns I submitted to Lisa Adams at Tatting Corner for her Tat Days in July. They are coming along nicely.

I’ve also been working on writing out the pattern for a square I did back in 2018. It’s been test-tatted but I haven’t quite finished the corrections yet.

Jubilee Square on wandasknottythoughts
Jubilee Square

The previously unnamed square is now Jubilee Square. When joined to other squares it makes a lovely mat. That will also be on the published pattern.

There are several January birthdays that I wanted to recognize with a gift, so made them cross bookmarks. The pattern for the Graduation Bookmark is on ‘My Patterns’ page.

Three Graduation Bookmarks on wandasknottythoughs
Three Graduation Bookmarks

I’ve also been working on improving my tatting. I recently purchased a Clover Picot Comb so I can make even picots, especially long ones. I’m enjoying this gauge better than I have any other gauge I’ve tried. It’s actually kind of fun. Not that I’ll use it all the time, but when a gauge is needed, this will be my choice.

Using a picot comb on wandasknottythoughts
Using a picot comb

I’ve also been playing with different tatting techniques. Natalie Rogers, on her Tat Your Own Adventures FaceBook page, has put out a tatting-related Bingo game with a PICOT card (instead of BINGO). There are several techniques on it that I have done before but could stand to review and practice. There are also a few that I’ve not done, including the Vapour (or vapor) stitch. I am so glad there are YouTube videos!

Vapour stitch practice on wandasknottythoughts
Vapour stitch practice

Trying new stitches opens up possibilities for pattern ideas. Thanks, Natalie, for the game!

(There are no links in this post, I receive nothing for mentioning products or services.)

I would have had this post done yesterday but I was way-laid by a book I started. I have to limit the books I read as I have a hard time putting them down until they are finished. Maybe it would be different if they were studious type books, of history, or of learning, but I mostly read stories that entertain me. Which isn’t bad, unless I don’t put them down. The worst of it is that reading a book keeps me from tatting. I do have audiobooks, but there is nothing quite like words on a page.

Do you have tatting plans for the new year? Any books you want to read?

“When you lose yourself in a book the hours grow wings and fly.”— Chloe Thurlow

Tatting in the movies

This is my opinion. I am not compensated for anything mentioned in this post.

I was watching a Christmas movie yesterday (yes, I know it’s not Halloween yet!) and there was a dress with tatting on it!!

I was searching for something to watch so I could sit down and tat. I’m not into watching scary movies so those are out. I just wanted something kind of light-hearted, maybe with a little humor. There are a lot of Christmas movies streaming right now so I tried a couple and found them too silly so went on to another one. I found the 2015 movie “The Spirit of Christmas”. I’d never seen this one and it sounded interesting.

The movie is a little different than most Christmas movies as Christmas isn’t the center of everything. It is a romantic mystery set at Christmas time about a ghost. I was pleasantly surprised by it and my husband liked it, too. Parts of the movie take place in about 1921. And one of the characters wore a dress with tatting on it!

Tatting in "The Spirit of Christmas" movie on wandasknottythoughts
Tatting in “The Spirit of Christmas” movie

I think tatting was on the dress cuffs as well, but I’m not sure. But this is obvious! So cool!

If you are into this kind of show, I highly recommend it. Not just for the tatting.

“The whole of life is just like watching a film. Only it’s as though you always get in ten minutes after the big picture has started, and no-one will tell you the plot, so you have to work it out all yourself from the clues.”
― Terry Pratchett, Moving Pictures

Seen at the fair

I thought I’d show you the other tatting that was entered into the fair. These all competed against each other (and me!) as there was only one tatting category.
The snowman won first and the larger snowflake won second. My doily (from last week’s post) won third. The Christmas-colored doily that hung below mine didn’t win anything, but it was make by the same person who made the snowman, and you can only win one ribbon per category.
I thought this was a lovely display. Isn’t this a great idea for showing off your tatting?
This was actually entered as Heirloom Embroidery, not tatting, but check out how she added joined the panels together. Wow!
This is a Bobbin Lace bookmark, made by a woman that also entered tatting. Isn’t it beautiful? The other one is machine embroidery, and looks great, too. I don’t know how the judges make their decisions!
This is a Halloween quilt that took second place in that category. I didn’t compete against these, but I thought they were wonderful. My pictures don’t do them justice.
This one took champion in the holiday quilt category. It certainly is spectacular.
Congratulations to all the people to enter their pieces at the fair. Keep up the great work.
And to all the people out there who tat – think about entering something next year! I know you’re out there. We’ve got to keep the category alive!
“The greatest barrier to success is the fear of failure.”
Sven Goran Eriksson

Patriotic pins and Hobby display


This has been a very busy week.

I was inspired by Steph’s heart and Kathy’s version of Sue Hanson’s 5 point Celtic motif, all in red white and blue. With Flag Day June 14 and Independence Day July 4th there is a lot of time yet to be patriotic also. So I tried the 5 point Celtic motif, too. I did it two ways, one as the pattern shows and one with two rings instead of one large. I’m not a big fan of making large rings even if I like how they work in a pattern. I added a flag star wooden button in the center and put on a pin back on the two on the left. Both were made in DMC size 10. The one on the right is size 20 in a variegated red white and blue. It is so busy it’s very hard to see the actual pattern. The two pins are for my parents and the other was just to make. My sister saw these and said she would love to have several to decorate her side table at home when she sets it up for the 4th. Okay, they don’t take long, I will probably make one or two. I’m counting these as #18 & #19 of the 25 Motif Challenge.

This last Friday the home where my dad lives had a Hobby Day. They had seen my tatting on my dad’s hat (a hat band) and asked me if I would like to participate. So my sister and I dug up stuff we’ve made and set up together. The displays were of hobbies of both residents and staff and us. There were some wonderful quilts (hand quilted!), jewelry, a salt-&-pepper shaker collection, angel collection, wooden toys, a few other things and my sister’s embroidery and my tatting. It was a very fun afternoon. I demonstrated tatting to a lot of people and we showed off a lot of our pieces that we’ve actually kept instead of given away.

They started us out on one table but were so happy with what we had brought that they got us another table so we could put everything out. I even brought a few books along so people could see that patterns are available.

We intermixed our things kind of like we did the few times we did craft shows. And our work some times even compliments the other’s.

Some of these things were gifts to either our kids or each other. The green doll with the embroidered apron my sister made for one of my daughters. Until recently she was in the Air Force and her husband still is so they haven’t got a place they know they’ll be in for any length of time so I still (!!) have a lot of her things at home, including this doll. It came in handy today.

This baby tied blanket my sister made for her daughter. “The Three Little Kittens” was my niece’s favorite book as a child to the point they had to buy several copies of it as it wore out. My sister rarely keeps anything for herself but gives things like this away for birthdays and Christmas.


I used to make doilies quite frequently. I don’t so much anymore because of how much time one has to put into them.

The birdhouse towel in the lower part of the picture was a birthday present from my sister to me. We have to tell people it wasn’t done on a machine, sometimes even turn it over so they can see the back side.


These two pillowcase dolls my sister and I worked together. She made the doll bodies and clothes and embroidered the ladies bodies while I tatted the skirts.

My sister does a lot of pillowcases. They make wonderful wedding gifts, or for graduation or…

The one at the bottom is mine from another birthday.

The large tatted piece is my BIG UFO. It was supposed to be a table cloth for my brother-in-law. It was started many years ago and this is as big as it has gotten. We are all in agreement that I need to find a finishing round and call it good. It’s made in ecru with size 30 DMC so takes a long time to get very far. It has been fun, though.

The green book is my newest acquisition, bought just the day before.

And finally, this is my sister, Elaine, and myself.

We really enjoyed ourselves that afternoon. We weren’t trying to sell anything, just having a good time sharing our hobbies with anyone that would listen. I don’t know how many people came through, but it was pretty constant for the three hours they ran it. While we were setting it up we had people come by, too.

It was a lot of fun, and then I had to go to work. I guess the fun has to end sometime.

Thanks for sticking around through this very long entry. But I just had to share!

Picking up the shuttle again

I’ve finally picked up my shuttle again after a few weeks of recouping from being very busy.

This is just something I was doodling with, nothing really planned. The threads are all size 30 DMC, in pink green and blue. I had shuttles already wound with these colors, so that’s what colors I used. It just kinda grew by itself without a lot of conscious thought on my part. The only part I really gave much time to was the interweaving of the pink and green rows. It kinda works.

Starting Monday I finally go back to regular hours at work, so maybe I’ll finally get back to my regular schedule. And then maybe I’ll have more energy for tatting!

I should be tatting

The excitement is over for awhile, and things are pretty much back to normal. But I haven’t picked up a shuttle all week! I think my mind is taking a break. There are a few ideas percolating in the back there but they haven’t yet made it to the top. Maybe next week.

The weather has decided to be cold again, after all the interesting, warm weather we had last week. There were actually snow flurries on the way home from work last night, nothing sticking. There was fog and haze this morning with the chance of the roads being slick, but I don’t have to get out this early, so I didn’t worry about it.

I was on eTatters and see that it is moving to InTatters. I’m trying to make sure I have everything from eTatters, like my friends, so I can find them on the new sight. I’m registered as tattldy there, so look me up when you get there. I’m slowly figuring out how to get around there and what’s what. It might take me awhile to get used to the changes, but I’ll get it – eventually!

Too tired to tat, oh dear!


The last several weeks I have just been too tired to tat. My brain just couldn’t stay focused enough to accomplish anything! I was chosen to work on a special project at work which required me to change shifts for a few weeks. Instead of starting at 3:30 PM and working ’til midnight I had to work from 6:00 AM to 2:30 PM. I’m getting too old to appreciate the change!

So I thought I would share a project my sister and I did together as few years ago. This is the skirt of a pillow case doll. My sister made the doll and the dress, then did the embroidery work of the lady’s top and parts of the umbrella. She used pearl beads on the brim of the bonnet. Then I tatted the skirt, the brim of the umbrella and the little accents to each side.

One really nice thing about DMC is that you can match embroidery floss with the Cebelia tatting thread. The lady is in green because we both just happened to have those colors. We both really enjoyed this, so made another one in blue so we could each have one.

Next week I go back to my regular hours so I’m hoping I won’t be so tired. I have to get those booties done!

I made it to the New Year!


Well, I survived the holidays. I made it through multiple family get-togethers, family dinners and a baby shower with minimal stress and fuss. Actually, I think everything went smooth and we all had a great time. My youngest daughter was able to come down from Omaha with the baby on the 23rd, a few days earlier than expected, though her husband had to work so couldn’t come.

For Christmas day I invited my parents and two of my aunts to dinner. I kept it very simple – we had soup and just a few sides. It made for very little stress when fixing the meal as the soup cooked in the crock pot over night and everyone brought something to go with it. Instead of spending all my time cooking I decided to use real dishes (instead of paper, the usual) and set a pretty table – which is usually the last thing I worry about. I also put a tatted snowflake by everyone’s setting for a small gift. I made several of Micheal’s quick snowflakes as I was running out of time and they tat up so nicely. The result was simple but very much in the season. We sat around and visited for hours, a very nice day indeed.

As for the new year, I don’t have any resolutions, but I do have a long to-do list. I have actually printed it out and put it on the refrigerator so that I can mark off each project as it gets done, and also so I don’t lose site of what needs to get done. It also will make it easy to see at the end of the year what I succeeding in finishing and what I didn’t.

Wishing all of you success in all the things that you want to do in 2009.

Christmas Ball Ornament

This is my first Christmas ball ornament to cover in tatting. The Monthly Challenge for December is ornaments of any type. This is my answer to the challenge! I’ve admired balls covered in tatting but had never tried it, thought it would be too hard. This one is made with DMC Cebelia size 20 thread #816 with 3mm gold beads. The beads are mostly in the rings and end up in the ring’s mouth. I loved how Michael (Msquared) had done the beads on his ‘Snowflake and Silver’ and thought I’d try it. It didn’t come out looking quite like his did, but I thought the result worked quite nicely.
I was asked if I would share the pattern, so here it is, untried by anyone but me. I tried to add a diagram on how I finished off the bottom but I couldn’t get it to look right in the post. So if anyone happens to try this and can’t figure out just what in the world I was trying to say, leave me a comment and I’ll try to answer it (a little more clearly!)
Abbreviations:
RW – Reverse Work; DNRW – Do Not Reverse Work
B – bead; Ch – Chain; R – Ring; p – picot; + – join
Christmas Ornament in Blue and Red
Pattern is for a ball 2 ¼“ in diameter, using size 20 thread. Number of stitches in chains will need to be adjusted for different diameter balls and thread sizes.
2 shuttles, beads on both
Top
*Sht1 R (with one bead in R) 2-2-2-2-2-7 Close. Bead will be at R mouth. RW
Ch 10 B 10 join to 5th p of prev R. RW*
Repeat between * until there are 10 rings and chains.
$ Ch 15 DNRW
Sht2 (with one bead in R) 5-5 Close. Bead will be at R mouth. DNRW
Sht1 Ch 15 join to base of next R. DNRW $
Repeat between $ all the way around. Cut and finish ends

Middle
@Sht1 (with one bead in R) 2-2-2—2-2-2. Close. Bead will be at R mouth. RW
Ch 15 DNRW
Sht2 R (with one bead in R) 5+5 join to R of Top, pull p through a loose bead before joining. Close. Bead will be at mouth of R. DNRW
Sht1 Ch 15 RW @
Repeat between @ around. Cut and finish ends

Bottom
^ Sht1 R (with one bead in R) 2-2-2+2-2-2 join to long p of Middle R , pull p through a loose bead before joining. Close. Bead will be at R mouth. RW
Ch 10 DNRW
Sht2 R (with one bead in R) 5-5. Close. Bead will be at R mouth. DNRW
Ch 10 RW ^
Repeat between ^ around. Cut and finish ends

Insert ball into tatting. As tatting is adjusted around ball evenly, pin in place.
When happy with placement insert a pin in the center bottom of ball. Thread needle with about 12” of tatting thread. With thumb hold down about 2” of thread, then pull needle through p of 5-5 R opposite the pin. Count 5 or 6 rings over, pull thread through p, repeat, each time going on the far side of the pin (thread will have to make a turn at the pin). This will weave the rings evenly at the bottom. Tie and cut when happy with tension. Work in loose end and cut. Remove pin.

On to other things – I’m working on another of Bob’s coilies, except this time I’m pretty sure you’d call it a doily, as it’s in size 10 thread and is quite a lot bigger than the one I did in size 30. I’m thinking of trying another round on it to make it a bit bigger. This is going to be a Christmas gift and I’d like it to cover a little more table space. I’ve actually finished with Bob’s pattern and now I’m deciding my next step. Stay tuned for further updates, and maybe a picture.

“Coily” is done, and snow

Here it is, the ‘coily’ from BoB the Bike. He said it was too small for a doily but too big for a coaster – I’m not sure what size thread he was using. You have to be a little careful with his pattern – he warns you – because he didn’t say when to reverse work. I figured out what worked for me. Another thing that made it a bit tricky was I’m picky about front and back, so the last round I had to start over and get it face up. If I’d looked closer I would have figured it out but I was in a hurry to finish and see how it looked. It’s made in size 30 pink DMC Cebelia, I can’t remember the color number. But it turned out great! I think it goes very well with the bouquet from Lorena. Bob mentioned he was thinking of another round but couldn’t quite seem to get one to work. I think another round would look good as well. It’s going on my list of things I’d like to do.

Well, it’s winter in Kansas. We woke up to snow this morning. In our area it was just enough to cover the ground but the grass was still peeking through. It was 25 degrees (F) with winds between 25 & 35 mph -the snow was falling pretty much horizontally. Thank goodness we didn’t get more snow, the drifts would have been bad. I stayed in the house for as long as I could but I finally had to get out about noon, and then later to go to work. Wichita had a little more snow than we did so what snow they had was drifting across the streets and making them slick. The road right outside where I work was a solid sheet of ice. Getting out of work tonight could be interesting. I think we’ll let the crowd go past before we head out. Some people just do not know how to slow down!

Christmas is getting closer and closer and I have so much to do! If I could only get organized to see just what it is I should do. I’ve been doing a lot of small tatted things which I usually give in cards, but also a few other, larger things (I keep seeing all of the neat things everyone is doing and I just want to try that…and that…) but I don’t really have a plan on where they are going. My excuse for sitting around tatting is that they are gifts, you know, to justify not doing the dishes, or folding clothes, etc, etc. I’ve several people I know would like receiving a tatted item, but which one to which person??? Note to self: make a list of people to give tatting and what item I should give them (okay, this should already have been done, but I had to take out time for the grandbaby, didn’t I?)

Speaking of the grandson, I chatted with my daughter the other day through Skype so we could use the webcams, and got to see him. He’s loosing some of his hair and his eyes are getting lighter. And he’s still such a cutie! He was awake and bright eyed, at least for a little while *sigh* I’m hoping they’ll get to come down sometime at Christmas, but that could depend on the weather. Of course, the road goes both ways. I have more vacation coming in January…

I’m working on the pattern for my ornament that I shared on the Monthly Challenge. I need to read through it again, and probably again, to get it as clear as possible without actually making it again. I keep checking back to see if anyone else has posted an ornament but as of a few minutes ago I was still the only one. I’m really curious to see what everyone else is doing. I do go and check out a few blogs, but there is only so much time in a day! Well, happy tatting every one, until the next time.