Joyce Moore over at http://yarnjourney.wordpress.com/ nominated me for the pink Kreative Blogger Award on Saturday. I'm not passing on awards or tags although I do appreciate the honor of being nominated. I just don't have the time to follow up on them. Joyce knits and crochets from vintage publications and her work is beautiful. I went to her blog because of a google alert on tatting (yes, she tats too!) but she does all kinds of fiber arts. I just now saw more that I had no idea about from my last visit....drawn thread work, hairpin lace with mohair yarn, a beautiful knitted shawl, and MORE. Go see!

Well, now that I know Diane has her package, I can show some of what I've been working on in recent weeks.

Yes, another pouch. I even found the original pattern, after the fact. I had traced around my original because I couldn't find the pattern pieces and they always seemed a bit bigger than the first one. The other night I was going through some folders looking for something else and found them. The part I really like is finding a button/bead combination for embellishment.

I also made a matching gift card holder. I tweaked the pattern on this a bit and still have the curve on the opposite side of the original pattern but I really do like it better here, even though I did not plan it. I added some additional interfacing so that it is a bit stiffer.
I used a different fabric for the lining on this one too. I think the way the card sleeve is supposed to be on there is to have equal sides for the pockets but every time I make it, it's bigger on one side than the other so I need to find a way to get that centered better. I used black velcro this time and it looks better.

You can't do something for a librarian and not include a bookmark! This is the triangle from Vida Sunderman but I was disappointed in the thread which is Altin Basak size 50. I wet the bookmark (before adding the tassel) and blocked it. I could tell it was noticeably lighter in color and that the "sizing" was gone. I was already pretty short on time so I decided not to make another, but I won't be buying that thread again. I knew some of the older ones had problems with the dye not going through the thread completely but thought that had been fixed. I think I just bought this particular ball in the past 2 years.

I figured Diane was as anxious for Spring as I am so I started tatting some dragonflies. I actually started out tatting butterflies but for some reason, they just weren't turning out. I got two halfway done and abandoned each because they looked so bad.

But then I got bored with the dragonflies pretty quickly and decided to try a butterfly again. This time I went to a much loved pattern of one in profile. It's a pattern by Rosemarie Peel but I don't remember where I got it. It's not from any of the books I have and I think someone just gave it to me. Now this pattern is a little tricky because you have to make LONG picots and then add the beads when you are making the chain around. I was also using a smaller thread so the picots were too long for the number of chain stitches between joins so my blue one isn't right.

It bothered me so much that I made another one - and I got the beaded picots to lay smoother but realized later, that I somehow got the upper and lower body rings reversed so that part is not right in either flutter. It's still one of my favorite patterns. I just need to do it when I can really concentrate on what I'm doing!

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This is not for Diane. It's the other project I'm considering for my lace group in April. It goes much faster and I think they can probably finish this one. I'll check with the members who are coming to my crochet class and see what they want to do. (They still liked the rose sachet more)

It appears that many magazines are going out of business. jcaroline has the scoop. Then today I read something about all the newspapers going out of business but I've been expecting that for a LONG time.

Okay, I've been holding off posting because my 1,000th post is very very near. I plan to do something a little special with it so stay tuned - just 2 posts away!