Confusion and a Surprise!

I was following up on some links from my google alerts on tatting and found http://www.newlacepatterns.com/. This site only says it's by "admin" but it has posts that I recognize from:

http://tatt3r-lace.blogspot.com/ (Lenore English)

and

http://elizabeths-lace.blogspot.com/(Elizabeth Zipay)

And I think some others too - but I don't know who. It appears to be a collection of favorite blog posts and covers knitting and all kinds of lace. None of mine, btw. LOL! At any rate, I think it's probably not a legitimate thing to do. Unless the "admin" has permission from the bloggers, and I have a feeling that is not so. You might check and see if any of your posts are there. I noticed a whole bunch of new ones today.

Tuesday night I found a notice from the mail carrier saying I had a package to pick up at the post office since I wasn't there to sign for it. I put the notice in my purse, a new one with a new pocket for that sort of stuff, and hoped I wouldn't forget. I did. But I was reminded this morning before I left home and stopped on the way into work. Now I knew a surprise was coming all the way from France so I was excited to see what it was!

Check it out! Lace in Britain!



"Embroidery cut (Renaissance brogue), on tulle, netting knotted lace Irish crochet, needle, pin Bigoudin, etc.. Dans la même collection que Dentelles en Bretagne, voici un historique et usages sur costumes, technique et terroirs. In the same collection as lace in Britain, here is a history of costumes and customs, technical and soils. C'est aussi 150 illustrations et tous les points dessinés, par étapes, avec patrons et modèles. It is also 150 illustrations and all points drawn in stages, with patterns and designs."

Chris is the lovely soul from http://www.dantelezenn.com/ who has translated some of my patterns and some from others into French for her tatting friends. Her blog is inactive right now as she just moved. Once she gets settled in, we'll see her beautiful work again! In the meantime, I'm enjoying photos of lacemakers of the past and all kinds of lace and even the projects at the end. One of my lace guild members used to teach French at the local high school before she retired a year or so ago. I hope she is there and can give me some insights on some of the pages.
On yet another note, I received some vintage tatting and crochet books from a woman whose 94-year-old mother-in-law no longer can use. Lynn wrote me, "My mother-in-law's name is Margaret Gianella Bruno and is 94 years old. She lives with her husband of 70 years in New Jersey but suffers with bad arthritis in both of her hands. Throughout her life, she and her many sisters (along with her mother) did all kinds of needlework creating beautiful pieces for all of the family. ..... It makes her very sad to not be able to do the intricate patterns she used to do when she was younger."

Lynn herself has no skill or interest in learning at this point in her life and asked if I knew anyone who could use them. I asked for a list of titles as I didn't want to take anything if if was valuable and she could get compensation for them. They are all fairly common vintage titles and I even have most of them, so I'm going to offer them as give-aways over the next few weeks. Although this blog is about tatting, some of you also crochet. There are a dozen or less books so I'll break them up into two or three at a time which allows more people to have a chance to win something. I think it's really great that Lynn is trying to find a home for them instead of just dumping them somewhere.
Just as I got to work this morning and was walking from the parking garage to my office (at least 7 minutes to walk!), I got a call from my son saying the crew was there to repair my roof from the tree damage! Yay! That means only one more issue, the garage, and maybe I can relax. Well, actually there are several issues related to my house that I want to take care of soon, but that will be the major one.

I spent last night knitting for a change. I purchased some needles and yarn on a whim at Walmart one lunch hour and kept them at work, playing YouTube videos on cast-on methods during other lunch hours. Yesterday I was bored with the cast-ons and decided to knit. Well...like many things, it's addictive and I just kept knitting, taking it home and knitting more last night. It will probably be a scarf for one of my little friends/relatives by the time I'm done. I rather enjoyed the simple knitting. I am suprised at how comfortable I'm getting with the continental method of holding the yarn in your left hand. It was awkward months ago when I tried it but I was going lickety-split yesterday even though I haven't knitted in months!

This is the mantra for anything new you want to learn: PRACTICE, PRACTICE, PRACTICE!