Yesterday,  I posted pics of  an improvised drying rack for hanging tatting shuttles after I have varnished them.
Lynn posted a comment saying that she uses  a pasta drying rack for drying her lace bobbins.
I thought that this was a great idea, and filed it away in the- hmmmm… ‘clever… file’….
When we dropped in on a garage sale,
I spotted a wire basket
that gave me an aha moment…..
I thought…
it’s not a pasta dryer
but ….
this will work
BEAUTIFULLY
for drying  the tatting shuttles.
So, that’s my ‘yay’ for the day.
And, now, there’s another totally excellent book that I want to give the thumbs up to….
‘Tatting with …read more

I just did a quick google search about tatting shuttles and other needlework tools.
One of the neatest things that came up was a site that has a copy of a book called:
‘Old Time Tools and Toys of Needlework’ 
It’s such a charming read that I found myself getting totally absorbed in it!
I loved reading about the Lady Hoare shuttles.  The quotation about the joys and pleasures of needlework is just lovely. I don’t want to break copyright, so I won’t quote it, but definitely recommend a quick browse (or leisurely schmooz ).
Interesting that the poet Chaucer wrote about ladies doing something …read more

Tatted butterflies make wonderful earrings.
I fell in love with Kreinik’s Metallic 1/8″ ribbon thread and wanted to tat some butterflies with it:

There’s 5 meters on the spool, but I didn’t know if that would be enough to tat 2 butterflies.
So, I decided to do an experiment.
I wound 5 m of Rainbow Hemp Beading Twine from Jolly store  onto my tatting shuttle and tatted these Rainbow Butterflies:

Poifeck!
You can get a pair of earrings with less than 5 m!
So, I went ahead and wrapped my shuttle with the spool of
Kreinik Metallics #209C 1/8″ Ribbon yarn  
and it tatted up BEAUTIFULLY!

I am …read more

I have had a life long love affair with lace making.
I started making lace when I was a little girl, when one of my grandmother’s friends taught me how to knit lace. She showed me that wrapping the needle with the yarn made holes and that I could figure out how to make wonderful things by putting those holes together.
I got addicted to crocheting lace in my teens and then in my 20’s, when I discovered tatting, I felt like I had come home!
Tatting and crochet really are ‘peas and carrots’ )
There are endless possibilities when you put them …read more

I am working non stop on my new book, and it’s going great.
While it is still in the pre-publication stage, I really can’t talk about it in detail. But… oh boy…. once my publisher releases details, I’ll be happily yakking about it!
Can’t talk about the book, ‘cept to say that I am busting my chops on it, but I CAN tell you about the red butterfly shawl that I am tatting and crocheting.
I am just about finished tatting the small flowers that are filling in lots of spaces between the butterflies…..

And, soon I’ll be connecting the dots…. well, no, not …read more

Yesterday, I posted a note about the tatted cord that I have just designed. It’s for a Lady Hoare tatting shuttle that I made and broke… rats… so it became a necklace.
Here’s how I tatted the cord:

With a dental floss threader, thread a heap of ‘e’ beads onto the cone of Lion Brand Lamé yarn.

The cord is a sequence of *5 double knots (dk), slip a bead down the thread to the last dk, 1 dk, 1 picot, 1 dk, slip a bead down to the dk* repeated from * to *
The pic above …read more

I just posted about the friendship bracelets that I tatted while I was in the design process for
this tatted cord:

I am really pleased with the cord. I wanted it to be simple and not too frou frou.
It’s light and really pleasant to wear.
I am going to make it up in other threads to see how it looks in other colors and textures.
I loved the process of coming up with this design, and now, I am super inspired about designing all kinds of other tatted jewelry!
Fun!
Image Source: Noreen Crone-Findlay (copyright)

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

Yesterday, I posted about carving a Lady Hoare tatting shuttle from recycled wood.

I broke one of the tatting shuttles

sigh.
I tossed it into the sawdust bucket for burning next winter.
Tammy suggested that I reclaim it and use it as an inkle shuttle.
I like my inkle shuttles to have straight sides, so it wouldn’t work for that…. But…
I had been thinking that the Lady Hoare shuttles look like little dancing people….. so…..
I raced out to the workshop, grabbed the broken shuttle, and drilled a tiny hole.
I put a wire through it and a bead onto it (for the head) and
Voila!

I decided …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