Wooden spools

I was at a thrift shop the other day and noticed in their notions area a handful of wooden spools with a variety of threads on them.  I love wooden spools – I like their look, they are fun to play with, and they remind me of time spent at my grandmothers house.  At 25 cents a spool, how could I not bring them home with me?
Usually when I do something like this the items end up in a drawer or box somewhere because, though I couldn’t leave them at the store, I don’t really have a use or place for them.  But not this time!  I had a sudden idea and ran with it.
I thought they would make cute Christmas tree decorations.  I added a bit of tatting that I already had, strung a string through the center and, presto! tree ornaments!
Yes, they are hanging on a Christmas tree.  No, I don’t have my Christmas decorations up yet. I’m going to have this tree at the craft show this next weekend, using it as a display for my tatted snowflakes.
I’ve been tatting a lot recently to get ready for this craft show.  I don’t feel like I have enough items for it, but I could be wrong. I’ve been getting everything together today so I can plan out the layout of the tables but ran into a snag when I found one of my tables was broken. My wonderful husband has done some repairs on it but I can’t use it until tomorrow.  Then I’ll find out just what I have and how I want it laid out for the show.  I’m hoping to have it pretty much together by tomorrow night.  Wouldn’t that be a surprise?
“To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk.”
Thomas A. Edison
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Once again

Yes, another lamp shade.
Tatted decorated lamp shade in Lizbeth black, size 20
I have had such fun decorating these lamp shades and the cans they sit on.  The tatting seemed to go quickly and easily, probably due to how excited I was to see them completed; even decorating the cans went quickly.  You see the cans as decorated very simply, which is true, but I have a tendency to over think things like this, but this time I didn’t.  I just went with the ideas as they came to me, keeping them simple instead if getting elaborate as I tend to do. 
I’ve been getting a lot of tatting done, mostly making edgings for cloth runners.  I’m using size 10 thread, which seems huge after using size 20 almost exclusively lately. I ordered several rolls from Handy Hands a few weeks ago specifically for the runners but had to order again yesterday.  I forgot that as size 10 is so much bigger the balls don’t go as far as I expect them to.  I have only completed one runner so far but am working on the edgings for a third.  The hardest thing doing edgings for me is it’s not really done until it’s stitched to the material.   
It’s a sunny day today, but cold and blustery.  Yesterday afternoon it was over 70º F but dropped 40º in less than three hours.  We’re actually pretty lucky here, there were only a few snow flurries, not like the snow they got farther north.  I’ve gotten rather spoiled with the mild weather we’ve had so far this autumn.  It is November so I should expect colder temperatures – just not temperatures we usually see in January!
Today in America we celebrate Veteran’s Day.  One of my daughters put together a poster for work to recognize and thank veterans for their service.  As I helped her collect pictures of family and friends who served I realized how many in our family have been in the military.  I want to thank them and all veterans and active duty military for their service.  Their service and sacrifices are recognized and appreciated.
Thank you!
“For it has been said so truthfully that it is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us the freedom of the press.  It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech.  It is the soldier, not the agitator, who has given us the freedom to protest.  It is the soldier who salutes the flag, serves beneath the flag, whose coffin is draped by the flag, who gives that protester the freedom to abuse and burn that flag.”
Former Georgia Senator and Governor Zell Miller

A little shade

Here is another lamp shade I decorated.  I’m not as happy with it as the Ecru one – the tatting didn’t go quite as I envisioned it (and I think I glued it down crooked….)
This one is in Lizbeth size 20 black.  Even though it didn’t come out quite as planned I felt it was still usable, I just hid part of the disappointing part under a bow 🙂
The flat-backed gems are from my in-laws’ 60th wedding anniversary party a few years ago.  We sprinkled each table with these “diamonds” and I could not throw all of them away when we cleaned up.  Plus I had purchased a bit more than we ended up using (okay, way more), so now I have a lot of these left.  I haven’t used many of them yet but thought they added a bit of sparkle to this little lamp.
Dressing up the cans to go with these shades has been fun.  I’ve been cleaning up a few cans to keep for crafting purposes for a while but hadn’t gotten around to dressing any of them up until I did these lamp shades.  So far they’ve come together quickly and I’ve been happy with all of them.  Reusing tin cans, using up bits and pieces of craft-y stuff, easy and comes together pretty quick – Family beware!  They will probably  be showing up in gifts for all occasions soon!
“But friendship is precious, not only in the shade, but in the sunshine of life, and thanks to a benevolent arrangement the greater part of life is sunshine.”
Thomas Jefferson
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Seeing the light

Or at least that is the plan.
Every year my sister and I try to do one craft show together; she with sewing and hand embroidery and I (of course) with tatting.  We get two booths together at the local Christmas craft show and spend a day seeing the cool things other people make, visiting and – hopefully – selling a few items.  There are only a few booths that have electricity available and they cost a few dollars more, which we’d rather not pay, so I’ve been thinking of ways to bring light to our booths without the cords.  We’ve done the battery powered Christmas lights the last several years, which is great, but there should be other, inexpensive ways to bring more light to the booths if we can just think of them.
A light bulb â˜¼ came on for me about a month ago – the battery powered lights that are advertised for closets and under counters might just work. 

I bought a package of these push-on lights, and sure enough, they give off quite a bit of light even in a lighted room, especially if they are aimed at something not too far away. 
Then I thought that it would be a little more aesthetic to have shades over the lights instead of them being bare, so I picked up enough little shades for the lights I’d purchased.  The shades were very plain and had to be dressed up a bit – besides, people would be able to see these easily from a distance and be drawn over to our booth, right?  Which was the point in the first place.
I made an edging long enough to go around the bottom of a shade in DMC ecru size 30 as I had two shuttles already wound with it. I put it on a shade (without glue) to see how it looked, then placed it over one of the puck lights.
Oops.  The harp of the light shade hung down so low it hit the puck light, so the light shade sat crooked.
I had to come up with a way to hold the shade up high enough the harp was clear of the light.  I thought and I thought, and I played and I fiddled until I finally came up with something that works.   I’m sure there are better ways but craft sticks, buttons and beads are what I ended up with.  These are for the display only, not for sale anyway, right?  They just had to hold up the shade.
But the whole thing did sit kind of low on the table.  Maybe I needed something to make them taller?
That’s when I thought of the tin can. It had to be decorated, too, of course.
I sure am putting a lot of work into the display this year, especially as I’m not sure just how much light will be seen from these in a lighted room – but it’s such a kick to decorate those lamp shades!
“In order for the light to shine so brightly, the darkness must be present.”
Fancis Bacon
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Three pigs and a flower


I finally got all the pigs done as well as a flower.  The lady who asked for them was very vague about what she wanted exactly,  I  had nothing to go on except “flower” so I made one with threads I had on shuttles already.  If nothing else she can tell me what she likes about it and what she doesn’t.
I’m very pleased with all the pieces except the purple pig, which I think looks a little off.  Maybe I should redo it. 
Yes, I think I should. 
Apologies to Gelett Burgess

‘I never saw a purple pig, 
I never hope to see one; 
But if you’ve ever had a swig, 
You might just swear you’ve seen one.’


“Purple Cow” by Gelett Burgess

Side tracked

I have a whole list of things I need to be doing:
finish the pigs
make another pig for a friend of mine
tat several edgings for table runners
tat snowflakes
tat earrings
tat more snowflakes
For the last two days, instead of getting any tatting done at all, I was side tracked into putting together a themed basket for an auction.
In our community we have a retirement village that is in part sponsored by most of the area churches.  All of these sponsoring churches were asked to donate a themed basket to be auctioned off at a yearly fundraiser that is later this week.  This basket was brought up at our congregational meeting this last Sunday – and the basket has to be turned in today (Tuesday.)  As no-one else was inclined to do it, I volunteered.  So, for the last two days I’ve been hustling to find items for the basket and get it put together.
The theme: “Tea”
Yesterday I went shopping for the items I wanted in the basket.  The church gave me a set amount of money to spend and I had to come up with enough tea related items to fill a large basket, enough to make it worth bidding on, within that budget.  I am the only one that made the decisions on what would go in it *hehehehe*
I started out at Prairie Harvest, a local store that is a kind of a health food store but also carries loose teas.  I also bought some of their homemade peppernuts and some colorful candies to put in.  (I bought some wheat free peppernuts for me while I was there – yummy!)  I went next door to Kitchen Corner for a tea infuser and tea bag rest.  Then down the street to an antique and flea market to look for tea cups.  I found a set of two cups and saucers with pink roses on them that I liked, as well as a hanky that I thought would look good in the basket.  Then to a secondhand store where I found a basket I thought would work.  Then to the Dollar Tree where I picked up the filler paper, flowers and cellophane to wrap the basket.  Then to Wal-mart for a few more choices of cookies.
[I was not compensated in any way by any of these stores.  I just went to the ones that I thought would have the items I needed]

Whew! That was a lot of shopping in just a couple of hours.
Then home to start trying to put it together.
This morning I made the tag with the church’s name, theme and contents and finished putting everything in the basket. And, of course, it had  be decorated a bit, too.  And then it had to be delivered.
I did include a little bit of tatting.  I found a bookmark I had made a while ago in Lizbeth Pink Cocoa that fit right in with the pink in the cups and hanky.  I also put a tatted butterfly on the front of the tag and a couple of simple tatted flowers on the back.

 This is the back before I added the flowers or included the bookmark to the list.  I added a little tea bag to bring in the basket’s theme to the tag.

The tea cups that I found.
The filled basket before I added the cellophane.

The completed, wrapped basket.  I couldn’t find a cellophane bag to put it in that didn’t have all kinds of decorations on it so I had to buy a roll of cellophane instead.  It was fun putting it around the basket – okay, not really.
I thought it came out well.  I don’t know that I will ever find out who will eventually get the winning bid on it, but that’s okay.  I had fun putting it together and it’s for a good cause. 
Now I need to get back on track with my tatting.  Where did I lay those shuttles down??
“Even if you’re on the right track you’ll get run over if you just sit there.”
Will Rogers

Earring patterns added

I’ve added the patterns for Small DragonFly Earrings and Leaf with DragonFly Earrings to my Patterns tab.
Thank you Stephanie for test tatting the for me.

Edited: 10/18/14 6:40 PM CST Made a slight correction in the pattern. I think it’s right now!  ðŸ™‚

A tale of two piggies

Well, three actually, but one isn’t done yet.
My sister was telling a friend of hers some of the things I’ve tatted, including a horse, a lion, dragons, that sort of thing, and the friend asked if I could make a pink pig.
Sure, no problem.  How big?  Three inches?  Well…
Flying Pig © Jane Eborall
So I went hunting for pig patterns.  You know, I found there aren’t that many pig patterns out there.  But Jane E. has lots of animal patterns so the first stop was there and it’s where I returned later.  
The first little piggy was made in Lizbeth #617, Magenta Med is size 20.  As you can see, it’s not very big.  My sister thought it was a cute baby pig. 
I decided I would try one in size 10 thread to show her the difference, but I don’t have any pink in size 10.  I do, however, have a purple in Cébélia size 10.  This little piggy was a little bit bigger than the other (of course) but still not three inches.  I sent my sister a picture of both so her friend could see what I had.
The friend said she’d like both.  And another small pink pig facing the other way.  And a flower. 
I don’t know how big a flower, or if it should have a stem or leaves or anything, but I’ll work on it.  And the third pig.
You might have noticed the pattern name is “Flying Pig” but it doesn’t have wings.  I was going to make wings but the lady doesn’t want flying pigs, just pigs.
If you’ve made Jane’s pig before you might also notice that the center is not per the pattern.  I tried multiple times to do the onion rings and every time I got all four done but couldn’t close that last one without breaking the thread.  Yes, I know, she has a pig pattern without the onion rings, but this is what I had printed out so it’s what I had to work with.  So I made three rings then changed to the chains.  I was going to do the final pig a little differently – either do a better job on the onion rings or do the no onion ring version – but the lady likes them the way they are, so I’ll do the third little piggy just like the first. 
And now I have the nursery rhyme stuck in my head.
This little piggy went to market
This little piggy stayed home
This little piggy had some roast beef
This little piggy had none
And this little piggy went “whee, whee, whee” all the way home.

Wooly Boy Bookmark


I saw this cute idea over on Batty Tatter‘s blog and just had to make one myself.  This one is made in Lizbeth #142 Turquoise Twist size 20 I think.  I know it’s Lizbeth size 20 but the color I’m not real sure about.  I had two shuttles wound in it and thought the bookmark would look good in it, but I’m not sure where the ball is, so I’m guessing.  Whatever the color, he turned out well, don’t you think?

I’ve been tatting a bit and working on patterns a bit but nothing I’m ready to share quite yet.  I’m trying to get motivated to start my Christmas tatting as I know time is getting short for making things for it, but I keep getting sidetracked.  I was asked a couple of days ago if I could tat a pink pig, so it looks like I’ll be tatting in pink for a little while instead of white.

While on vacation we saw a lot of live critters.

We saw this little chipmunk at the lookout just past Lake Irene in Rocky Mountain National Park

This big elk was watching over his harem in Estes Park City Park.  Yes, he was only a few feet away from us.

We came upon this moose while on a pontoon boat on the Colorado River as it comes into Lake Granby.  He was trying to catch up to a cow moose that didn’t seem to interested.

While on vacation we enjoyed the easy pace of the days, not in any hurry to go anywhere or do anything.  Now we’re back in the ‘real’ world where we have to meet deadlines and constantly keep an eye on the clock.  But while I tat life slows down just a bit, so I’ll just have to enjoy my mini vacations as much as I can.

“Time, as is well known, sometimes flies like a bird and sometimes crawls like a worm, but human beings are generally particularly happy when they don’t notice whether it’s passing quickly or slowly.”
Ivan Turgenev
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