I managed to tat something this evening! This is the partridge from the partridge in a pear tree in Pam Palmer's Twelve Days of Christmas. Checking an entry from back in May, I know this is thread I got from Karey Solomon. If I make the pear, I think an old gold would be good for the pear. I'll see what I have in my stash. I'm not too keen on making the pear right now, but I can always make it in the future. I really have wanted to make this bird for a long time though.

Maybe I need a place to put all my flying tats! Dragons and dragonflies and butterflies and birds! I ran across Mark Myers Tinkerbell diagram recently too. Unfortunately, I have to make up my own stitch count first. I should make up a sample sheet with rings in assorted stitch counts so that I have something to refer to in terms of size when I get around to that pattern. Also in different thread sizes. I think I've even seen something like that in one of my books but it seems like it was only one thread size.

I got quite a bit of home stuff done today. Laundry, changed sheets, swept floors, even cleaned the toilet! I spread it out and watched some Quantum Leap DVDs and did some needlelace. The tatting was last today.

I'm out of town for a good bit of tomorrow, driving to Nashville, IN to do some ergonomic assessments in a regional home extension office. They are part of the University so we offer our services there too. I hope it's a nice drive and I do love Nashville, having family roots from both sides there. Decades ago, either Felix or Chris Brummett was the local law enforcement person there. DECADES ago. I've only seen photos of the brothers. Actually, it was almost a century ago now that I think about it. I can't drive and tat so no new stuff to post tomorrow unless I'm really energetic when I get home after four or five hours driving total.

Oh hey! Well...my calendar says the first day of Autumn is September 23rd. What happened to the seasons changing officially on the calendar on the 21st of each quarter? I was going to say....Tatting Tea Tuesday and the First Day of Autumn are on the same day but I guess not. I just might celebrate it anyway!

I wasted a lot of time today one day surfing around but I'll show you the results of that in another post. I ended up checking my blog links because at the end of my list are several that do not have RSS feeds so they don't show up at the top when they're updated. There are also a few blogs that haven't been touched in nearly two years now so I guess I should delete them.

Amongst the live links but not showing updated is Bina Madden's website. I was delighted to see a butterfly pattern dedicated to Wilma Walker. So I printed it out and made a few notes on it to tat it tonight that night.

In the delightful synchronicity that I live in, when I got home, I found the latest issue of Tatting Times, a quarterly publication by Karey Solomon, and inside what did I find, but lo and behold ~ the very same pattern!

That meant I HAD to tat it, right?

Bina writes an excellent column in the I.O.L.I. Bulletin about tatting, btw. I think Bina is a brilliant designer. What I've noticed about Bina and a few other brilliant designers is that they seem to have engineering minds. They can't help it. They need to be challenged. They see every line, curve, angle and proportion of space. Their minds are always ticking and their fingers clicking (with shuttle sounds, of course).

I work from a different perspective. Not better or worse, just different. Not brilliant either, just different. I believe in the KISS principle. KEEP IT SUPREMELY SIMPLE! ( I don't use that other word.) So when Bina throws in larks head knots and front and back tatting and such, I just sort of zone out. Don't get me wrong - she does the same thing with my patterns. So what we each do is adapt the pattern to fit our personal tatting tastes. That's not a bad thing. I'd rather someone adapt my patterns to suit their way of tatting than to not tat it at all. Of course, it does take a certain amount of experience and skill to know how to do that - so keep learning everything you can.

That's why I made notes on the pattern when I printed it out. She was doing FS/BS tatting and a few other things. I just wanted to know how many stitches in each element. There weren't numbers on the diagram so I had to read the pattern and figure out the stitch count. If you've ever tatted Jan Stawasz's patterns, another brilliant designer, you know what I mean. I LOVE his designs but tat very few of them because I have to rewrite them in terms I can tat from.

So I tatted the butterfly.

Twice.


I was a little confused by the difference in numbers from top to bottom which I knew was the FS/BS notation but I didn't always interpret it right. It turned out pretty good except I made a join wrong at the very bottom. I also had to reverse the order of the half stitches of the ruffles depending on the direction I was going in to make sure they all turned the same way.

So I tatted it again. I really didn't like the ruffly effect on the last wing chain and I was going to change it to picots but I didn't. I got sidetracked just as I was beginning the wings on version 2 with some personal issues and didn't get back to it til last night. I'd lost my motivation by then. Other than that, it's pretty much the same, I think. I finally got around to blocking it a bit ago but I did fix those bottom rings.

Happy Mother's Day!!!!

There is a clematis vine on a trellis just outside my garage and I've been noticing a redbird flying away from the very same spot whenever I get close. I took a peek earlier last week and saw there was, indeed, a nest with eggs. I couldn't tell how many as I didn't want to get too close and cause the mother to abandon the nest. My middle son, Jason, took me out to breakfast/lunch today and when we got back, I remembered I had my camera with me after hearing the mom fly past when I got stuff out of the car. So I stuck the camera at what I hoped was a good angle and took two photos. One was just leaves but this one shows at least ONE new birdie in the world. Happy Mum's day Red Lady!

Yesterday, two lace guild members and myself drove up to Chesterton and spent a wonderful morning dying fiber under the tutelage of Pat Winter! I say fiber because they dyed mostly silk ribbon and I dyed cotton thread. It's amazing how fast time flies when you're having fun! I was the designated klutz this day, spilling dye a grand total of THREE times! I am not usually this clumsy but I hadn't slept well the two nights previous and it all caught up with me last night. I laid down on the sofa at 9:00 p.m., thinking I'd snooze for 20 minutes or so and then rinse out my threads. HA! I woke up at 10:30 p.m., made my last email check and went to bed, not getting up until 8:30 this morning! I think I was just tired.

So before I left with my son this morning, I rinsed all my threads and hung them to dry. They're still a little damp so I've got out the rest of the skeins I'd presoaked and started finding containers for the dye I brought home with me. I need to go get some more containers. LOL! But I will play more when I return.

Before I left Chesterton yesterday, Pat gifted me with this beautiful seascape brooch and I wore it on my jacket today at the restaurant. I can't get over all the tiny tiny details in it! My son looked at it and said, "hmmm...kinda busy..." LOL! I forgot he had lasik and probably can't see those teensy details all that well.

Last night before I ended up on the sofa, I finished tatting this motif I started the night before. I think the thread is some I bought from Karey Solomon at a Tat Day somewhere. It doesn't show so much in the scan, but I really like the confetti-like appearance.

I got the motif from this book, the picture on page 18 if you have it. It's really kind of hard to see but there are three of them on a bag and it's tatted with beads plus a center pearl is added during stitching to the bag. This one was a test tat for me, to see how the thread and the pattern worked out. I believe I will tat three now, with beads, and also make a bag as instructed and sew the motif to it.

And hey, if you want to see some stunning tatted lacework, go to this website: http://www.artedeldettaglio.com/eng/index.php
This is the home page with a slide show but check out "articles" which shows and describes tatting embellished items that are stunning. I've said before that we tend to tat small items but there are some people who go beyond that and tat works of art. Maybe I should attempt to make something on a larger scale. Some day.