photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

Hurrah for

technology!

How amazing

to be able to do this!

I grabbed a

handful of

tatting shuttles

and then,

photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

showed how to

make a Lark’s

Head Knot

through the arms

of the Great Mother

tatting shuttle,

so it can be worn as a

pendant.

This is a handy trick to know,

as you can easily do this

with a key or scissors or other

tools, and wear them around

your neck, too.

I made the cord in the video with one of my Cordelia cord makers, but you could tat it – I made tatted beaded cords, and then gave them all away, so I couldn’t show them. (LOL!)

Here’s the video:

Post from: Hankering for Yarn

I love how they look, I love how they feel, and  I love MAKING tatting shuttles…..

photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay (copyright)

Because I am a tatting shuttle afficianado, I will often look at things and think:

Wow…that looks like a tatting shuttle!

So, the other day, I noticed that a plastic paper clip on my desk looked like it could be a pseudo-tatting shuttle….

Of course, I had to give it a try!

And, yep!

You can indeed, upcycle and re-purpose a plastic paper clip and tat with it!

And, that’s mystery thread that I bought by the armload when my local weaving store was going out of business.

So, with a little creativity, you can make lace anywhere, anyhow!

Happy Tatting!

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Ours was lovely, although we are all so exhausted we are walking into walls……

it’s been moving week for our daughter and her husband, so we’ve been scrubbing,

sanding, priming, painting, packing, moving moving moving…. yargle………

Anyhow…. we had a lovely supper with the whole family, and afterwards,  my daughter-in-law and son brought out a special little Easter treat….

the chocolate bunny was delightful, but even better…..

The lovely tin box it came in has become the home for some of my crochet hooks and tatting shuttles.

I have a major soft spot for rabbits, and as soon as my daughter-in-law and son saw the box, they knew that I’d love it. Bless their hearts!

They were right…. the box is lovely, and the rabbit is just wonderful.

I am going to enjoy keeping  small projects, or  crochet hooks and tatting shuttles in the new bunny box!

photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

Post from: Hankering for Yarn

I’ve been reading up on ‘play’ (click the link to read what wikipedia has to say about play)

image & photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

and playfulness.

Expert after expert has talked about the importance of being playful

for our entire lives.

There was a wonderful conference about Serious Play last year.

All the experts agree:

Play is essential to our well being, in body, mind and spirit – as individuals and as communities.

Being playful can alleviate all kinds of stress.

Playfulness increases resiliency and flexibility….and, whew… do we ever need to be flexible these days!

Because of the grim situation with the economy, we are all rattled and frazzled to some extent or another…. sooooooooooo…….

I thought……….

How about starting a challenge of playfulness?

Here’s the scoop:

For the month of April, I would like to challenge you to  show us all

your face of joy.  What does that mean?

Well, play with some yarn and make a face that shows an image of joy,

image & photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

whatever that means and however you interpret that. NO! you don’t have to be an “artist”  !  A few simple lines CAN convey joy!

For example: I drew a ‘joy’ face with spool knitted cord. (1st pic)

Then, I played with my photoshop program in the 2nd pic. (you don’t

have to do that…. I just wanted to play with it!)

The RULES:

1] Make a face that shows joy- BUT… the face MUST have yarn as some part of it. (Thread and string and wire all are going to count as yarn for this challenge).

2]Any technique that uses yarn IN ANY WAY to make a face, and, the more playful the better! (You can make a mask or a puppet or a doll or a wall hanging or or or… )

(knitting,weaving, crochet, photo collage, spool knitting, tatting, beading, embroidery… and…. and… or…..

ANY playful way you can think of to make a face  of JOY and you’re in!)

3] Send me a pic of your Face of Joy OR blog about it and link to this posting.

4] The challenge lasts for the month of April

5] You can make as many faces of joy as you would like….. please post a comment with your blog links if you’re going to post the pics on your blog, so people can see what you are up to.

6] Would winning a prize bring a smile to your face? Well…. I thought that it might…. so, I am going to give one of the challenge participants one of the one of a kind Homage to Jane Austen crochet hooks that I carved: ( I do ask that the winner pays the postage… sorry about that part…. )

image & photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

image & photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

All right! Now go have some fun! and make some faces of JOY!

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photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

It is a treasure. It’s 100 years old and has delightful photos.

I find it interesting that Mary McCormack consistently calls the spool knitted cords, ‘webs’, rather than cords.

I think that this is probably because she likens a child (she always uses ‘he’ as the supposed spool knitting  child, never ’she’, sigh) to a spider spinning a web.

Her projects all involve spool knitting yards of cord, mostly on 2 peg spool knitters, and then stitching them into shapes that are then assembled for the finished project.

To be honest, I don’t know if crafters nowadays would be willing to do that.

Hand stitching things seems to be a process that is really resisted.
As I was reading through the book, my attention  was caught by  the use of  the terms, ’round webs’ and ‘flat webs’.

I thought… hmmmm…. this bears further investigation….. I wanted to see if what she was showing was different from the way I make 2 peg cord.

I thought that perhaps, I should make a  2 peg spool knitter just like the one she uses in the book, but then, I thought…. nah, let’s just make the cords, and THEN see about making some spoolies like hers.
So, I got out one of my Cordelia cordmakers, and  cast on in a figure ‘8′.

photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

McCormack does all her spool knitting on 2 peg spool knitters using the figure ‘8′  wrap. She doesn’t start with a slip knot, just by taking the yarn around the right hand peg. She uses a dowel with a center hole that she drops the yarn down, but since I am using a Cordelia cordmaker that doesn’t have a hole, I just hold the tail in front of the cordmaker.

I am using 2 strands of yarn held together, just because I wanted a thicker cord. I realize that that could be confusing….. sorry about that…..

So, you take the yarn around the right hand peg,between the pegs,  and around the left hand peg, then back between the pegs……and around the right hand peg again.

photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

Then, you lift the lower wrap of yarn over the upper wrap….  of course, I had to take the picture, so I left the loop lifter dangling in space, but you’re not going to do that…

McCormack has the reader take the yarn around each peg, always following a figure ‘8′, and lifting the lower loop over the upper loop.

This creates a cord that is actually closer to being square than round. I worked the McCormack figure ‘8′ style for several inches. I kept looking closely at the resulting cord, trying to see if it looked any different from the cord that I make by the ‘zip round the pegs to the outside’  technique. I decided that I needed to try the ’round  the outside of the pegs’ method to see if I could see any difference in the resulting cord.

photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

The littler girl in the picture captured my heart…. she has the classic resignation of the younger sister who knows that she is always going to be the one who is ‘the student’ when she plays school with Big Sister.

And, that Big Sister is ALWAYS going to be the one clucking, ‘giddyup’, and that she will always be cantering in the reins….. never the one who cracks the whip….Anyhow…. back  to the cords…. I placed a bit of yarn in the center of the spool knitter to mark where I had shifted from wrapping a figure 8 to going around the outside of the pegs.

I still was lifting the lower loop over the upper, so the only difference was not taking the yarn between the pegs.

I spool knitted for several more inches, and if I had not placed the pink yarn in the cord,   honestly, I would never have been able to tell the difference between the 2 wrapping techniques. So…. if you prefer to use the figure 8 technique, then do that. If you prefer the  other way of just going around the outside edge, then by all means, use that method. McCormack’s second technique for working with the 2 peg spool knitter creates what she calls, |The Flat Web|

photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

This is a really neat, decorative cord that I quite like. The Flat Web is worked in the figure 8 wrap method. Wrap 2 figure 8’s on both pegs. Lift the LOWER TWO wraps over the upper wrap  on each peg. Then, wrap 2 figure 8’s again, and continue to lift the lower 2 over the upper one. (This is also  a great way of ‘beefing up’ a thin yarn ) I wouldn’t use the ‘Flat Web’ cord for dolls or toys, but for jewelry and embellishments, I would definitely choose it. Here is a comparison of the ‘Round Web’ and the ‘Flat Web’ cords:

photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

Both are made using 2 strands of Lily Sugar’n Cream cotton. Spool knitting cotton is more challenging than spool knitting wool, as cotton doesn’t have spring or memory, so it’s not as fast as wool or most smooth spun synthetic yarns. I thought that it was really neat that McCormack has wristlets in her book. Just goes to show that some things that go round, come round again even if it takes 100 years.

photo by Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright

Post from: Hankering for Yarn

Nora Murphy weaves together the story of knitting her young son a sweater with stories about her life, as well as historical explorations of women’s connections to the making of yarn and clothing.

Reading the book is a lot like subscribing to a favorite blog and getting to know a very pleasant and intelligent person. Her style is very intimate and accessible.

Ms Murphy speaks passionately about the lives of women from ancient times right up to the present.

She talks from the heart about  women who work in abominable conditions now in order to clothe us….

and poses questions about how we can help to make their lives better.  Important information indeed!

I love Knitting the Threads of Time and HIGHLY recommend it!

By the way, I couldn’t resist looking up the url for the story about the exploding knitting needle.

I also went… cringe… and got out my bamboo needles to finish knitting the  sock in the picture above.

To photograph the book , I plunked the book and the sock in question on a sweater that I designed and knitted more than 20 years ago.  Why?

Because I have a fun story about this sweater.

I was wearing it to run errands. I was zooming into the grocery store, when a street person stopped me and did a happy little dance, and twirled his finger in the air, asking me to do a pirouette so he could see the back of the sweater.

He giggled gleefully and crowed: “Beautiful! Beautiful! and you did it all with 2 sticks and string!”

He then danced away, miming knitting and grinning over his shoulder at me, calling out:

“2 sticks and string! 2 sticks and string!”

Ah, yes … “2 sticks and string!”

There are so many stories about 2 sticks and string, and Nora Murphy tells all manner of them with grace  and intelligence.

(image source: Noreen Crone-Findlay. Copyright, not to be used without permission)

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There have been a heap of changes and I am soooooooooooo excited to be part of the new direction !

One of the biggest changes is that Hankering for Yarn will soon be part of Bliss Tree, which is an oh so nifty website/community.  I am looking forward to seeing how this all unfolds!

I have all sorts of ideas and plans for Hankering for Yarn, so stay tuned!

I will be playing with all things yarn:

Which is why I combined all those things in the picture.

If you can tell me what everything in the picture is, leave a comment in the comments section below, and you’ll win a prize!

Alrighty… you have until Tues March 10 to list off everything in the pic, and tell me what it’s for….

and yes…. there is a  mystery object in the picture…. let’s see if anyone gets it!  LOL!

I feel like I have come home again…..  I am happy dancing! Won’t you join me?

Thank you so much everyone who has posted so far…. I had planned on masking the answers, but woke up this morning to discover that answers were showing up….. oops!
That really ticked one reader off, ~sorrrrrrrrrrry~
SO – being a very creative hoppitty bunny, I am going to award MORE than one prize!
Alrighty?

(image source: Noreen Crone-Findlay copyright)

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Celtic Interlace

Celtic Interlaces translate so beautifully to needlework of all descriptions…. knitting, crochet, tatting, embroidery…. you name it!

Post from: Hankering for Yarn