Category: TIAS

Tatting for little boys

I have two grandsons and have been thinking of things to tat for them.  Little girls are easier I think.  You can do things for their hair, their dresses, their socks (Fox has done some really cute ones), all kinds of things.  But boys aren’t usually into the frilly things, and my grandsons aren’t old enough to really appreciate bookmarks.  I’ve thought of several things, like pillow cases with critters on them (haven’t done one yet) and maybe things to hang on the wall (haven’t done that yet, either).  One thing I was going to do for Christmas but didn’t have time for I have finally gotten around to: insulated cups.

This is “Paprika the Dragon” by Martha Ess, in Lizbeth #122, Caribbean,  in size 20.  There is one opaque black 8/0 bead and 12 opaque rainbow 10/0 beads.  The cup/glass is one that you can decorate an insert for. I don’t remember where I picked this one up at, but Hobby Lobby and Micheal’s have carried ones similar to it. 
The flowers, bird and butterfly were made when finishing off shuttles and are a mixture of threads.  I have a baggy (and a few other containers here and there) full of things like this that are great for putting on cards and letters.  And now, cups! Tatting Paprika was fun and didn’t take much time.
Here is the insert before I put it in the cup.
I was very pleased at how this came out. I gave this to one of my grandsons the other day and understand that it has been well used already.  He hasn’t drank out of anything else since he got it.  He says his “grandma made it and it has a dragon and flowers on it.”☺
Now I need to make one for the other grandson. 
I’m calling this #24 of my second 25 Motif Challenge.  I keep forgetting when I make something to count them!  
Let’s not forget the TIAS!  
This is Day 5. I have no idea what it could be.  Day 6 will be out Wednesday (Jan 25), maybe that will help in figuring out what it might be. 
“Boys are found everywhere on top of, underneath, inside of, climbing on, swinging from, running around or jumping to.  Mothers love them, little girls hate them, older sisters and brothers tolerate them, adults ignore them and Heaven protects them.” 
Alan Beck 

TIAS Day 3

Jane’s TIAS has started.  This is mine up to day 3.  It actually looked better but it curled a little and I tried to flatten it out which deformed the SCMR a little bit.  I can live with it. I have no guesses as to what it might be.  Last year she had us flying in an airplane and the year before crowing with a rooster, so this could be anything! If you haven’t started the TIAS it’s never to late to start.  She is going to post day four tomorrow (January 19).

If you don’t want to participate you might still go over and check out all the different shuttles people are using on this.  A lot of participants have taken this opportunity to show off some pretty nice looking shuttles. I haven’t shown mine – I chose to do this in Lizbeth Victorian Red #670 in size 20 using Clover shuttles in green and orange.  The green doesn’t look too bad but the orange clashes badly. Hey, they were the two shuttles that I found that didn’t have any thread on them. Most of my other shuttles either have projects on them or little bits of thread that I would have to do something with before I could start. None I found had enough for this project – Jane said you will need two shuttles filled with thread.

Anyone remember this post? Trayna asked for that pattern awhile back and posted about it on her blog recently.  As I have been working on updated and sharing some of my older patterns I thought this one would be the next one up.  My previous post showed it with the arms joined at the picots and with beads but the pattern doesn’t reflect that.  I don’t think it will be hard to figure out how that was done, but if you have questions please feel free to contact me. My contact information is on my profile page.  The pattern is up on the sidebar.

Has anyone noticed that I missed Tatting Tea Tuesday?  I’ve been working some different and very long hours this last week so was just too pooped to post.  But it’s only late by a day – not too bad. Back to normal today, so I have a bit more enthusiasm.

“Enthusiasm is excitement with inspiration, motivation, and a pinch of creativity.” Bo Bennent

January is National Hot Tea Month

Did you know that January is National Hot Tea Month? This article is from 2009 but the link is still posted on the front page of TEAUSA.com.  It has a few things that are nice to know, especially if you like tea 🙂

Today for Tatting Tea Tuesday I’m drinking a cup of Strawberry Misaki from Teavana, a gift from Tabatha.  It’s a blooming tea, which means it comes in a ball that when steeped in hot water blooms into a flower. Pretty cool!  I was going to take a picture of my bloom (I’ve heard of this before and always wanted to know what the bloom looked like) but I forgot and drank the tea before I got the camera out.  Mmmm, strawberry tea.  It’s a very light flavored tea, but I like it.

Have you read Trayna’s blog post from Sunday?  She was so nice as to tat one of my snowflakes 🙂 She had seen it in one of my posts and asked me for the pattern.  She did a lovely job on it, too.  It’s part of her 100 snowflake challenge – to make 100 snowflakes in a year(!).  Knowing she was making snowflakes I sent her the pattern of another snowflake, which she was so sweet as to test tat for me (good thing that she did!). It is the snowflake I had decided would be my Christmas snowflake one year, which I posted about in December 2010.

This one.

 
If you like it and would like to give it a try, I’m adding the pattern to the sidebar.  I’m touching up the pattern for the one that Trayna made and hope to add that pattern soon as well.

Don’t forget, Jane’s TIAS starts today!

“May you always have walls for the winds, a roof for the rain, tea beside the fire, laughter to cheer you, those you love near you and all your heart may desire.”
Irish blessing 

Something New

for the New Year.

Okay, I made it at the end of December, but just barely!

I had two shuttles loaded with Lizbeth Blue Ice #163 in size 40 and had a thought, basically on a variation of one of my other patterns.  “What if I tried this…” And this is what came about.  As you can tell by the Clover shuttles beside it, the star is pretty small made in size 40.  It didn’t take too long to make and looks good in that color, don’t you think? (I had a hard time photographing it. I tried it on a black background and it was way too bright so showed up fuzzy and stark white.)

And guess what?

I have it diagrammed already!  It didn’t take too long to do that, either.  I guess practice does make things easier. Check the sidebar, I’m going to be adding it there.  How soon depends on if I have trouble or not 🙂

I’m using the new blogger changes and still getting used to the way it looks.  The one thing I definitely like is how it adds the pictures.  It doesn’t add them all at the top anymore, where you have to move them down if you’ve started adding text.  Some of the rest of the changes are still debatable on whether I like them or not, though I suppose that eventually I’ll get used to them.

Have you heard?  Jane is having another TIAS (Tat It And See) starting on January 10.  Check it out here.  I did the one last year and it was a lot of fun. My piece from last year is actually hanging on the Christmas tree as an ornament – my grandsons thought it was pretty cool.

I started this Tatting Tea Tuesday with a cup of Zen green tea by TAZO, a gift from Tabatha.  (Thanks, it’s very good!)  I didn’t really tat yet but I did work on the diagram for the star – does that count?  I do plan on getting a little tatting in today sometime, somewhere.

I hope everyone is having a wonderful start to the New Year.


“Every day is a fresh beginning. Every morn is the world made new.”
Sarah Chauncey Woolsey

Dragon sighting

This little guy flew in on the Arctic wind blast that gusted in yesterday. My boss thinks he’s an Ice Dragon due to his coloration. I haven’t gotten much out of this small dragon, mainly his name, which he says is Jarek. He does seem to be attracted to my earrings that I had laid on the table – they don’t look too shiny here but the picture doesn’t do them justice.

When he first arrived he and I had a few problems. He twisted and turned and generally was a bit of a pain and wouldn’t lay down, making me feel quite ambisinister. He finally settled down a bit when he saw my earrings. He looks to be a Flying Minor Norwegian Dragon, in shades just like Lizbeth #142 Turquoise Twist, as described and patterned by Anne Bruvold, though I haven’t seen his type described yet. While trying to get information of where he’s from he indicated that there may be one or two more dragons flying in soon. How exciting!

Something not quite as exciting, but definitely intriguing, is Jane’s TIAS. I still have absolutely no idea what it might be. I think Isdihara’s suggestion to it being a skink is the closest so far, but that thought may easily be changed as we get closer to the end.

My version of the TIAS through day 7

I’m sure there are lot of you out there that are being effected by the really nasty, cold, icy, snowy weather that’s happening on the eastern half of the United States. Here in Kansas, in the middle (where I am) we didn’t get much in the way of ice and only a little snow, but the wind and cold are definitely letting us know it’s winter. At 2:30 PM it’s 7° F, wind gusts up to 44 miles per hour, creating a wind chill of -13° F: translates into, it’s cold! I know there are places that have it much worse and/or will be getting it much worse, but it’s still cold! Good news, my boss called a little bit ago to let me know they canceled work tonight – yeah! I don’t have to get out in this! Whoopee!

I’m enjoying multiple cups of hot tea this Tatting Tea Tuesday, which are definitely helping me enjoy being inside instead of out! Now that my day has opened up I’m hoping to entice a few more dragons inside. Do you think if I raid my jewelry box they might show up faster?

“The Lenox Globe (in the collection of the New York Public Library) bears the phrase ‘HC SVNT DRACONES’ (i.e. ‘ hic sunt dracones ‘) on the eastern coast of Asia,
‘Here Be Dragons!’, they warned “.
taken from draconian.com

Tea, TIAS and a Surprise

Welcome to Tatting Tea Tuesday!

Okay, I’m a little late in the day posting, but I made it! We had a lot of running around to do today and I didn’t get much chance at the computer ’til late. While we were out I had to wait on my husband for a short time so I was able to get a little tatting done. It wasn’t on any of my current projects – they are a little hard to take with me at the moment. I’ll probably find time to finish it soon, so will post about it next time.

So, how many of you are doing Jane Eborall’s TIAS? Isn’t’ it fun? If there are any of you out there that are not participating because you’re not sure what it’s about, check out her blog and give it a try! It’s a lot of fun. And you’ll be tatting it together with a lot of other people, so you can see how everyone is doing. These two pictures are of my Day 2 and Day 3. Day 3 looks HUGE compared to Day 2, but they are in the same size thread. I scanned these on two different scanners, one I’m familiar with, the other is new to me. I didn’t realize just how it would come out! The one on the left is made with Lizbeth size 20 in Caribbean – and it’s actually both Day 1 and Day 2 together – and the one on the right is in Victorian Red, Lizbeth. I have no idea how these will eventually go together or what the end result is going to be!

And what is the surprise I mentioned in the title? Well…

A couple of days ago I found an envelope in the mail with a lot of foreign stamps on it. ???? It was quite intriguing. Upon opening it I found a Christmas card and this beautiful snowflake! Isn’t it great? It’s from Trayna, who won my blogoversary give-away.

Thank you, Trayna, this is lovely!

I took it to work to show everyone there and got into a little discussion with my boss about if this is a snowflake or a star. I insisted it is a snowflake, he thinks it’s a star. We left it that it’s very pretty, which-ever it is!

I have made some progress on our Pastor’s table runner. It’s slow going, basically because I only have a general picture in my head on how it’s going look when it’s done. And then I change my mind every once in awhile, which doesn’t help. But I finally like where it’s headed. Now, if I can just find time to work on it! I have to work on it at home, so that slows me down a bit. Small projects like snowflakes and bookmarks are so much easier to finish because they can be taken almost anywhere with me. A ring and chain here, a few more there, and it’s done before you know it. *Sigh* But this will get done, eventually!

First Tatting Tea Tuesday of 2010

“It was a cold and stormy night…”

Okay, it was a cold and cloudy day, this first Tatting Tea Tuesday of the year. And it’s supposed to get much colder. Those of you north of here already have it worse. I hear the high in Omaha, Nebraska was -5 yesterday. Brrrr! I need a cup of hot tea just thinking about it!

For today’s tatting I sat down with a nice cup of hot tea and started Jane’s TIAS (Tat It And See). I’ve never participated in one of these before, but it looks like fun. Plus the added factor of doing it “with” other tatters is appealing. Jane has already posted the first samples on her TIAS blog. Here is my attempt at Day 1. I have no idea where this is headed.

In the introduction to her TIAS, Jane recommends at least three shuttles, and five if you don’t want to wind and unwind, and three colors of thread that ‘get along’ with each other. I have located four empty shuttles and started emptying the fifth. Just to make it easier on myself you understand. As we have no idea how much thread is going to be needed it’s hard to know how full to wind the shuttles. Oh, well, I chose colors I like so I’ll be able to use the left-overs pretty easily. I’ve chosen Lizbeth threads in size 20; Caribbean, Victorian Red and Black. I’ll find out whether that was a good choice or not pretty soon, I suppose.

Other than that, I have three projects I need to work on. The most pressing is a Christmas gift that I didn’t have time to do. I had to give them an IOU – to our Pastor and his wife! Every year I make them a table runner – material for the center, with tatted edgings. They really look forward to them *warm fuzzy feeling* but I just ran out of time this year. So that will be my main project, hopefully finished in a couple of weeks. (Hey, I dream up new edgings for this every year. This time I have a very ambitious one that I hope works out!) I’ll post about it when it’s done.

The second project is for my sister. She gave me some material that she has collected, to use for runners. A couple of pieces she really likes and wouldn’t mind a runner of her own. As she does so much for me (and she has a birthday coming up) I thought I should make her one. I’ll start it right after I finish the one for the Pastor and his wife.

The third project is *head hangs in shame* something I started for my sister and her husband a long time ago and never finished. A table cloth – in size 30 thread! Why, oh why did I do that?? Actually, I tried to find a pattern I liked and do it in size 10, but I never liked any of those that I saw. So, what else could I do but come up with my own pattern, which looked wonderful in size 30? It’s been a running joke that I give it to them, enlarged each year (mostly), at Christmas and then they give it back so I can work on it. I really think it’s time I just get it done, once and for all. Well, okay, it might take several months, but I’ve got it out, my shuttles are wound and I have some motivation for it. Wish me luck!