Happy Almost Earth Day!
I hope you have had a wonderful day that included lots of lovely green living
and eco projects, and that you are going to do something special for Earth Day tomorrow.
We are going to plant some baby trees.  That’s them in the pic to the right.
The Spool knitter is one that I made from a chunk of old wood that we found in Jim’s Dad’s workshop 10 or so years ago. Jim’s Dad was a champion recycler.
He would upcycle stuff in the neatest ways…. nothing much got thrown away around Mum and Dad’s house. If it could be …read more

Of course, I couldn’t stop at just one bracelet…
so I made a second one:

Because I had a plan…. bangle bracelets look better when there are more than one….
(BTW, the flash does nasty things to the bracelets…. in real life, they look smooth and kind of irridescent. The flash seems to expose their undies. How rude!)
AND, because I love Furoshiki.
What’s  Furoshiki?
It’s an ancient and elegant Japanese solution to carrying things in the greenest possible way.
Here’s a link: FUROSHIKI
I’ve impressed the heck out of all kinds of people by whipping a headscarf out of my purse and tying a couple of knots …read more

My husband started it all. He bought me a bag of mystery synthetic cheap and cheerful thread at our favourite second hand store, and then magically made it appear in my studio.  (He’s such a romantic! He knows that I am addicted to thread in all it’s manifestations – even cheap and cheerful mystery thread! LOL)

Part 1- upcycling a bag of funky mystery thread
So, I got out some of the tatting shuttles that I love to carve and filled them up with multiple strands of the threads:
Part 2 – Choosing colors and loading tatting shuttles
Now, some folks might say that …read more

In Part 3, the tatting finally began!
This is a rather unique approach to tatting…. there are no lacy bits, no loops, picots, chains, just plain Josephine Knots over a simple flat wooden bracelet with upcycled funky thread.
(Feel free to do this with gorgeous thread! It will be – well….. gorgeous!)
Now…..
What if you want to change colors?
Easy peasy….
1 choice is to cut the first color, leaving a few inches to spare.
Just pick up the next color, and hold the thread end from it together with the last  thread end, and carry on as if you were in your right mind.
When …read more

Once I had all the tatting shuttles full of the mystery thread, I started working on the bracelet:

I didn’t tie the thread to the bracelet (by the way, this would work on any bangle bracelet).
I just took the thread through, and pinched it to the bracelet with my left thumb.
Then, I started making Josephine knots over the bracelet. What’s a Josephine knot?
Basically, it’s the blanket stitch.
∞The tatting shuttle goes through the bracelet, from the front to the back, and a loop of thread goes over your left index finger.
The shuttle comes up through the loop and then is pulled …read more

My lovely husband, Jim, brought me home a goodie bag of mystery thread from the Sally Ann.
Not primo for sewing… so what to do, what to do….
Hmmmm…. good for spinning… yes! Will set some aside to use when spinning ‘designer yarn’.
Wait a minute…. this is T H R E A D, right?
T H R E A D !
Thread = tatting……yessssssssssssssssssssss………..
And, then I HAD it!
I decided I would  finally get around to finishing some wooden bracelets that I made last summer.
My plan was, cut out plain wooden circle bracelets and crochet yarn around them.
Good plan…. but – I have a …read more

The other day, this treasure magically appeared in the studio.  Woohoo! Obviously my Hunnybunny had paid a visit to our fave 2nd hand store. Mmmmmmmm yum! a bag full of fun…… now what to do with it….Obviously, it’s super cheap and cheerful mystery synthetic thread – and I don’t trust it to hold together anything vital. Visions of dissolving garment or accessory being lifted out of washing machine in pieces after cheap and cheerful thread goes ‘boink’.
(You weren’t supposed to WASH me, human! I no hold together when wet!)
Loved the colors, tho’, so had a little think about it……

(image source: …read more

Last week, I carved a couple of tatting shuttles. One of them broke, and I turned it into a necklace
Over the weekend, I took my tatting shuttle and cone of thread, and beads with me- everywhere!
I ended up tatting 2 friendship bracelets before I arrived at the cord for the necklace.

I’ve designed lots of tatted friendship bracelets over the years. I love making them, because they are so portable. Besides, it’s so much fun to give them to friends!
These two have already found their way onto friend’s wrists!
I need to make more.
If you’d like the pattern, I can …read more

In my previous posting, I showed how I got started making the Lady Hoare tatting shuttle.
I took the bits of recycled wood back out to the workshop, and cut the 2 shuttles out on the bandsaw:

Then finished up the openings with a smaller saw:

Next, time to make some sawdust:

You can see how it’s looking more ’shuttle -y’:

Time to switch to files:

OH RATS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I snapped one prong off! THIS is why I always cut out TWO!
(I didn’t waste the broken one- see what I did with it)
So, start all over and be a WHOLE lot more careful!

HURRAH! I actually finished it …read more

My clever son-in-law just made my daughter the most wonderful bracelet.
It’s a copper bracelet that he made by tweaking the design for the wonderful shuttles that he makes.
Shuttle bracelet 
I would HAPPILY wear one or ten of those.
ahem.
ahem.