Catch Up Part 1

It's been a while tatting friends and it will be a while longer before I can get fully caught up. I have had to devote my time to doing paperwork for the pending court case in regard to the car accident 2 years ago. I started updating and there was such a lot to cover that it took me 3 days just getting everything together. I have updated to November 24th and I realize there are more new items to post, but if I don't work by date I'm sure to miss something, so here it is. I'll pick up from the 25th forward when I do the next post.

Margaret decided to add tatting to her repertoire of fibre arts and joins the challenge with some pieces that she did at the Fringe Element gathering in Ayr Ontario. Once she had some basic pieces under her belt she took off tatting the snowman from Monica Hahn's book Christmas Angels and Other Tatting Patterns. One head done, one body to come.

Elizabeth has been tatting lots of things to fill orders, mostly copies of things already posted, but no pictures to show until after Thanksgiving. Lots of kitty pictures though.

Meme has posted pictures of the amulet bags she did for the September exchange, both done in DMC thread. She mailed them off without taking pictures because the battery in the notebook died. Fortunately her partners scanned them for her. Aren't they lovely? The Christmas colours of red and green were used for this centre motif from the design on the cover of Iris Niebach's book.

EeKoon has been silent for a while, but she's been stitching away at several projects which are nearing completion.

Pamela has been tatting lots of dragons designed by Martha Ess. The large one done in Flora size 10 and the smaller versions done in Flora size 20.

Sylvia has been working at moving all of her images from her old blog on to Blogger. She'll pick up the challenge where she left off.

Wendy has lots of quilts to show, basket quilts, crayon art quilts, a yo-yo advent calendar tutorial complete with ornaments and some more information she's found on oya lace.

Anne has 2 more knitting projects on the go, a shawl and a hood. She tatted design by Lene Bjørn in both Aida 10 and DMC 80. What a huge difference thread size makes!

Connie has posted a snow flurry of crocheted snowflakes done for a friend's business. The open centres will have other hanging bits added to them. Just imagine these with sparkly bits hung on a tree.

Iris has created an olive necklace and she had a difficult time finding bead colours that were compatible. The thumbnail on the blog doesn't do it justice, so if you really want to see it click on the picture in her blog.

Norma has displayed some crocheted snowflakes originally intended for the seniors centre bazzar and the tatted Christmas ornaments for her own tree. She usually does a new ornament for her tree every year, but since this is the first year without her hubby she wasn't sure she wanted to. He was proud of her tatting so she decided to keep up with the tradition. She's still working on her Tast challenge and her CQ blocks.

Diane has another ornament done using Marilee's hand dyed Leafy thread on a purplish ball. She's using a shuttle made by Sherry which makes a lovely tinkling sound as the thread passes through the tips. She's continuing weaving squares and he Mom found a vintage tatting book for her. She started the edging right away, but will have to wait until her Mom mails it to her because she left it behind when she came home. She's been tagged again to post 8 things about herself.

Bob tatted another tree, but this one is full of lovely fall colour leaves in cluny tatting. Is this going to be a 4 seasons design with all of them mounted together?

Bev tatted Mary Konior's Reflection in a Vintage J & P Coats thread that didn't give a size but appears to be about size 20. It was mounted on a card and sent to Mary. Jane Eborall's elephant was done in size 30 Omega. The yellow and white motif is from Christel Weidmann's Tatting: 60 original Lace Treasures tatted in DMC size 10. Valdani no. 12 in variegated blues was used for another of Christel's designs. Bright Copper and blue Valdani were used for Christel's Design #8 that Bev wants to try again with a larger thread. Bev posted a picture of Elgiva Nicholls and she's wondering if anyone knows anything more about it. The other picture is of Bev and her daughter who dropped in for a surprise visit.

Kelly has plans to de-stash and finish up some UFOs next year so she's making a list of what's in the stash and what projects she has on the go that she wants to finish. That sounds like a good plan.

Mary has tatted so many lovely things Ruth's fancy snowflake from her book Easy Tatting which she used to teach her granddaughter Meagan how to follow a pattern, then Marilee's Carnival Earrings pattern using Marilee's hand dyed threads, Sharren Morgan's Double Petal Flower Earrings (Meagan did one too) and a new earring design called Half hearted. Mary used more of Marilee's hand dyed thread for a very beady version of Sharren Morgan's earring and she describes how she attaches a post style finding. The butterfly from Sherry Pence's new book The Exquisite Collection of Tatted Butterflies was used to adorn her grandson's card.

Carol shows us a "batty" purse Sherry Townsend knitted for her and her dog Rebel poses for the camera with his pal Gizmo.

Ruth posts a delicate one row snowflake made with 2 shuttles that's a variation of the design she uses for doll house doilies. The Sweet Christmas edging folded over a bangle bracelet, makes a Christmas wreath, but it needs a little something hung in the centre. The bare threads cross over and under each other in a Celtic latticework in the Twisted Snowflake. She unearthed another snowflake design done last year. This beaded eight sided snowflake was designed to go inside the wreath, but it's a bit too big. She has included the pattern for this one on her blog. T. Gobbler Swoop the Tatted Turkey has been turned into a jigsaw puzzle for us to enjoy.

Mark had a great time at the Living Lace of Omaha event and picked up some Valdani threads and some bobbin lace supplies. He was commissioned to make a 2 inch heart and "Millefiore” tatted in Oliver Twist in variegated purples and blues is the result.

Snowy has tatted her own set of sample motives the smallest of which was done with Valdani thread and the largest some hand dyed thread given to her by a friend. She used Valdani 50 "precious pansies" and King Tut "shekels" to make the Jon's Daisy Picot Snowflake.

Marilee has added Forest and Golden Glow to her colour palette and tatted her Vision necklace in burnt ochre. She has also added a very good tutorial on using a magic thread to her blog.
Laura has been tatting a colourful flurry of snowflakes. She tatted one of Jane Eborall's patterns in DMC Cebelia size 20 with iridescent seed beads. The Flutterflake pattern by Emma Crew was tatted using DMC size 80 for the butterflies and the white is DMC size 20 Cebelia. She has Denise Munoz's book Snowflake roses which all have the same centre rose motif and she has been making them in Flora size 20.

Dawn has been working at creating a tatted horse. Her first draft is here using up the thread aalready on her shuttles. It looks pretty good for a first draft. The daffodil doily from a Workbasket pattern is done in yellow and blue varagated threads from Rubi Brillante size 10/2. The rose doily is done in a pale yellow #1061 and red #932 sulky threads size 30 and is a Myrtle M. Hamilton design also from Workbasket. In between tatting projects Dawn has been doing cross stitch.

Charlene joined a Yahoo cross stitch group and has been working on a number of projects.

Marty has been hard at work designing butterflies. Butterfly 4 tatted in yellow Cebelia size 30 is in profile although that's not the way it started. The next design trial was also done in Cebelia 30 with the final one in Coats pastels quilting thread. Marty thinks it might be too square looking so she had another try using Coats jewel tones quilting thread but it looked too skinny in the middle, so she tried again. They all look good to me

Melissa has been busy embellishing a lot of Christmas gifts with embroidery, applique and tatting. She added tatting and some silk ribbon embroidery to a velvet perfume case and she tatted the Clover Drop Heart in variegated Rubi Perle cotton which is a bit fuzzy but Melissa thinks it makes it look softer.

Sherry tried dying her own threads patriotic red white blue and gold orange brown. The cross is "Heritage Cross" by Dee Powell in size 80 thread. The critter picture she shares is a praying mantis that hs been hanging around her front porch for a while.

New book, new designs, new adventures

Announcing Sherry's first Tatting book!!!!! Congratulations Sherry.

Pamela has posted pictures of some of the earliest doilies she tatted all made with size 60 thread, back when she had eyes to see such fine thread. It is a far cry from what we tat now, but just as beautiful as they were decades ago.

Sylvia has been having problems with her blog going offline so she's in the process of moving things over to Blogger.

Wendy has been participating in several swaps. She highlighted a number of tutorials on her blog and she's still on the hunt for more information on Oya lace. On the quilting front, she has the blocks sewn together for a patriotic quilt top that has taken several years to collect all the bits and pieces. She also has a Fall quilt top pieced together and a notice about a stolen quilt.

Anne has completed the Icelandic shawl it used 148 grams of yarn and she has only 6 grams left. That's cutting it close! Now she can choose a project from one of the books that just arrived.

Tami has been too busy to blog, but now she's taking the time to show us what she's been doing.She stitched a lot of snowflakes for her son's wedding, tatted lots of flowers for the bouquets and made a Kleenex case for the mother of the bride. She's still working on the edging for the bride's hanky.

Connie was tagged posted her responses.

Diane has been busy helping her daughter who is directing a school play and hasn't had a lot of time to tat, but inspired by the ornaments she saw on the internet she did manage to get one done, but there are 24 balls in the package and only 41 days until Christmas.

Bob tatted Sherry's butterfly body in Crochetta size 8 to make them hairy using half the stitch count and the wings were made in DMC 80. I never would have thought of doing that, but it looks good.

Kelly finally has some pictures of her tatting.The first piece is from the Tat-along project and she's now pleased with her tension. The Albino Bat is from Mark's site. Next is one repeat from the Cecelia Doily it's made with a soft thread that won't hold it's shape. She plans on making as many repeats as she can from the ball of thread and turning it into a small doily. She's not sure where the pattern for the triangular motif came from, if anyone recognizes it, let her know so that she can credit the designer. It's also done with a soft thread so she'll have to mount it on something so that it holds it's shape. Soft thread was again used for this motif from the Tat-along project and the finished piece will have to be attached to something to hold it's shape. The last 2 pieces were just little doodles to finish up the thread on a spool.

Clyde's Christmas cactus is a mass of flowers.

The NNC group celebrated the first anniversary with an exchange of gifts. Jon received a quilted wall hanging and crocheted coasters and she gave 3 crocheted doilies and a tatted pin cushion. She was looking at The Pearl Tatting book by Riego and she thought she had an easy pattern to try out, but it wasn't constructed the way she thought it was. Instead on the rings being joined to the picot of the first ring, which leaves a big hole in the middle, the rings of the first side are tatted but NOT joined. Then they are joined as the second side is constructed, crossing over each other and filling in the centre gap. It makes an interesting difference.

I was just contacted by CBC TV about doing a segment on tatting and I'm really excited about it.

TA DA! Snowy has the pink doily finished even with all of the extra help the cats gave her.

Marilee has a new collection of earrings. She did a simple split ring design, that is beautiful and elegant. Her snowflake design done in quilting thread seems firm enough to hold it's shape without stiffening. Her weathered stone colourway seems to be very popular everything she's done in that colour has been snatched off the shelves, but now she's working on a deep green colour.

Jon's tatted doily reminded Laura of her grandmother's crocheted doily. She found the crocheted doily and filmed them side by side. You can certainly see the similarities. Laura did Jon's Daisy Picot Snowflake again just so she wouldn't forget the technique and even in such a short time she had to sit down with the instructions again. The thread used is DMC Cebelia 20.

Marty's Butterfly 3 had a re-work in Cebelia 30 and it was looking pretty good so she did it again in Coats pastel quilting thread and discovered as she was completing it that it would work better if she started it differently so she did it a fourth time in Coats jewel quilting thread and best of all NO ends to hide. I really like patterns like that!

Melissa has been reclaiming fabric from thrift store finds to use in creating a CQ purse for a friend's Christmas gift. She's also tried the vintage Block and Scallop edging and it's the first time she's done block tatting and the first time she has consistently used a picot gage in the horizontal position. This edging is looking like it wants to curve, so she may just make it into a circular motif.

It's a leaf. It's a chick. It's an eagle. It's Martha's ever evolving tatting. Doesn't Martha come up with the most engaging ideas?