Tatted Easter Eggs

Eliz took a break from her doily to tat some colourful Easter eggs. Plain eggs, eggs with beads and eggs with buttons. Must be time for breakfast because all this talk of eggs is making me hungry.

While we have been busy tatting away Ruth has done an awesome job with the Tatting Pattern Calendar. It takes a lot of work not only keeping up with daily postings but also coming up with patterns that can be used.

Don't forget if you have some designs to share that Ruth is always looking for more entries.

March - (since it's windy) hats, trees, kites, shamrocks

April - Eggs and crosses, items for showers (baby, wedding, & rain)

May - Flowers & gifts for mothers (hanky edgings & decoration motifs)

Hearts, Doilies, Crosses and Shamrocks

Arlene has tatted a collection of shamrocks for work. Isn't it amazing how many different patterns there are for 3 leaves and a stem? Arlene has also completed a wonderful purse using a pattern from Tatting Lace, a Japanese text. The patten was challenging as she had to guess what they were talking about. She thinks she might save this for one of her girls' weddings.

Jon has completed her doily and its absolutely stunning. What a marvelous gift to give someone.

EeKoon has posted an updated wish list.

Marilee has tatted a cross from "The Complete Book of Tatting" by Rebecca Jones. Tatting it was therapeutic helping her to cope with the loss of a family member to cancer. Condolences on the loss of your loved one Marilee. It's never easy to lose the people we care for.

Laura re-worked Ruth's shamrock and this time it worked. It looks lovely.

Martha used silver metallic Oren Bayan and Cebelia size 20 in colours 797 and 800 to tat this marvelous heart. She used the split ring lattice work technique Mark Myers developed, for the centre to give the whole thing a textured look and feel. The heart was created for the Hearts with Wings exchange last month.Sylvia attended the Bristol workshop where Sue taught pearl tatting, then she came home and made a lot of lovely bracelets using the technique. Mary Maynard's Celtic design is Sylvia's 7th motif.
Eliz has worked out the centre for her rectangular doily. It's looking good.
Melissa needle tatted Birgit Phelps' SweetHeart pattern and she was given permission to share her needle tatting instructions. Melissa is working on a crazy quilt round robin and she added one of her tatted motives to the block, embellishing it with folded roses and leaf beads.

Heart, Icicles, Clover and Doily

Gail has been doing some "mindless" knitting as she tries to keep herself occupied and not thinking too much about selling a house while dealing with incompetent people.

Diana has had some computer troubles that kept her offline, but she's re-connected now and hopefully will be able to post some more motives soon.

Clyde has done 21 motives for his 2nd set (I feel like such a sluggard!) it's made with a light olive DMC 80 #3052 and dark olive Venus V201. The pattern is Lacy Medallion Luncheon Set, Salad Doily from the book The Tatter's Treasure Chest by Mary Carolyn Waldrep and the finished doily is 3 inches across.

Laura tatted Ruth's shamrock, or was it the four leaf clover? Done in Cebelia size 20.Marty has tatted a modified section of Ice Crystal. The original Ice Crystal design is a doily from the Blomqvist and Persson book. A single repeat of the pattern was posted on the old etatters site. Marty has replaced the top part of the repeat with a long chain and rings so that it can be hung as an icicle. Both variations she has done are very pretty both with the gold beads and the crystal beads.Eliz has tatted another daisy picot heart and she thinks this one is much better that the first one she did. Now she's working on turning a circular doily into a slightly rectangular one. Would that make it oval, or a rectangle with the corners missing?Melissa is working on embroidering a chihuahua on a shirt for her mother in law. What a creative idea for a dog lover.

Everybody's Tatting

Sharol tatted Easter eggs from the Big Book of Tatting by Darlene Polachic, but altered the pattern slightly to get more of an egg shape. They're really cute.

Arlene has been too busy to post for a while, but she has been tatting. She has a whole flock of butterflies to wing their way off to her exchange partners. What a delightful splash of colour they make and all of them are so different.Although Jon isn't Irish, she's done a wonderful shamrock for the Tatting Pattern Calendar. There's nothing wrong with bright green, it looks marvelous.
You all remember that Riet has thieves break into her house and steal a lot of things including a box with her newly designed tatting. This design was one of the pieces she lost, so she reconstructed it. A wonderful daisy picot bookmark.

Sharon has posted a diagram showing how the motif she used for the V-Neck might be used to make a triangular shawl. She has also posted the heart earrings she included in her newsletter.

Laura tatted Esther Paris' linked hearts from the Tatting Pattern Calendar and she's not sure what she's going to do with them. Marty injured her shoulder slightly and had to take a short break from tatting. She's back to tatting with Graciella another of Iris Niebach's doilies in more Coats machine quilting thread. She notes that it looks too busy and detracts from the design. I think the colour changes are a bit too short and it's probably better used on simpler designs. Marty also tried using it in combination with DMC size 80 and she likes this effect much more as it gave a denim effect to the lace "Design 43" from Christel Wiedmann's "Tatting, 60 Original Lace Treasures". She liked the effect so much she used the same combination for the bookmark she created out of " Design 39" from the same book. Eliz has added 5 new motives to her blog. An adaptation of the Ear of Corn bookmark done all in green, another of Jan Stawasz flowers, the Meshed Heart by Wally Sosa, Ruth's version of Jon's Daisy Picot Heart and an adaptation of an edging from an antique book that she turned into a button cross.

Melissa has finished her green silk heart and turned it into a pendant. She made a slight mistake on it even though she checked several times and was really disappointed about it when she noticed it several rings later. It still looks great and I'm sure her friend will love it.

Some more motives, and some techniques

Ruth has added some helpf instructions to her blog that will help people navigate through the Tatting Pattern Calendar, and other blogs too. Thanks Ruth.

Mark has added some Maltese Split Ring tatting to his blog. Interesting possibilities.

Sharon's finally got some tatted motives to show. Nine of them all the same, lined up around a V-Neck collar. She's ecstatic to finally have the lace for the newsletter done and now she can show us what she's been working on.

Jeanne has tatted a lovely pair of variegated hearts. The larger one is done in Flora size 20 and the smaller in Coats machine quilting thread. I just tried the Coats thread a few days ago. It comes in some lovely colours but although it compares in size to size 80 tatting thread it isn't as strong. I broke the thread several times closing rings and had to keep reminding myself to go easy on it. Jeanne has also taken a break from tatting to do a little knitting. Pictured is a small credit card size bag. She's also knitted some hats and she's working on a shawl. Are you going to add some needle tatted motives to the shawl?

Quick catch up

Sorry for the infrequent posts. My computer time has been dedicated to getting my newsletter out. I've had the roof leak 4 times this month because of ice build up. It's not the ice, it's the melting that's caused the problems and mopping up wet carpets takes up a lot of my leisure time, that and spending the last 3 days taking the car into the garage for various repairs. I'm doing a quick (it's taken me 2 days to get through it) run by all the blogs to update things or it will really get ahead of me. So here's a quick peek at what's been going on and I know that there have been more things added since I started, but I'll catch them on the next dash around as I have to do this quick and go shovel the snow.

Ruth has a brain teaser on her blog. In response to the question how do you re-create a crocheted bullion stitch, Ruth has posted a picture. Now she has us guessing as to how she did it.

Clyde has tatted Jane Eborall's dolphin in a variegated blue Altin Basak thread that was sent to him by Patsy Goodman as part of the thread exchange. Don't you just love Jane's patterns?

Mark has been busy making costumes, but he squeaked out enough time to create a split ring ground diamonds in the center with a row of ring and chains and an outer row of zigzag chain with rings thrown on either side strip of tatting to be used on a cell phone cover. He'll be teaching it at the Spring Fling in April.
Kathy has 2 new motives posted. The first is a pattern from the September 1954 Workbasket and she used Rainbow Linen thread for it, which she found difficult to use. I don't think I've ever heard anyone find linen thread easy to work with in shuttle tatting. The second motif is from the October 1950 Workbasket and it was done in size 40 Olympus thread.
Elizabeth has been incredibly busy since the challenge started in August. A new baby when you already home school 2 little ones will do that, so it's taken her a while to get going but now that she's found some time she has posted her first 7 motives. She began with a ring and chain doodle of her own design in a lovely variegated pink thread, next is a blue edging from a Mildred Shire Clark video and a fan in matching blue from Craftown.com, then a pair of purple medallions from the DMC Tatting booklet, followed by a bright yellow medallion and edging also from the DMC booklet.

Maria has added 4 new motives to her blog. She was having trouble posting so the pictures have been uploaded without any description. Three of the new designs are pretty white snowflakes the fourth is a layers confection in white with sparkling crystal beads on top. It looks like a flower and I think it would look lovely on a hat or worn as a corsage.

EeKoon has added more on her cross stitch work and over the Chinese New year she acquired some tatting books from her aunt with lots of traditional pieces to tat.

Jeanne posts a lovely red heart with a beaded border. It's the Heartfelt Heart, by Karey Solomon made for the heart exchange.

Laura show us just how durable tatting is. This towel with the hen and chicks edging is over 75 years old. More work has been done on the friendship doily as Laura adds her round to Elizabeth's. LaRae's Wordless Wednesday shows a cute guy with aspirations to be a fireman. Are all firemen this cute?

Charlene continues with the TAST challenge with some work on CQ hearts.

Sylvia was sent a skein of Wildflowers thread in Sandstone colour and started doodling with it. She intended to tat a compass with it but when she had the 4 points done there was enough thread left to squeak out a little more so she did eight more little rings and a wee flower from Mary Maynard's book Rings of Flowers and look what she has created, a tatted clock.

Melissa tatted up a heart designed by Mrs. J M Blackman and had so much fun with it she did it again. The second one went much better which is why we often suggest beginners work on edgings so that they can become familiar with the pattern and concentrate on the stitches and making even picots. Melissa added a clear Swarovski Crystal bicone bead to the center of the heart and a silver bail to hang it from. Instant transition from motif to pendant! Now she's working on one in a scrumptious green silk for a friend currently deployed in Iraq.

More beautiful lace

Although we've been working through our challenge for quite a while, I'm still getting requests to join. Everyone is welcome. Just let me know your blog or web site address and I'll add you to the link list on the right. Every few days I'll check the pages to see what's new and copy some of the pictures to show here. There isn't the space, and I don't have the time to show everything, that's why the links are on the side, so people can see all of your work for themselves. You can join in the fun by either adding a comment below, or sending an email to sharon at gagechek dot com with the address of your blog.

Sharol has taken the Green-Trimmed Daisy Edge from the Big Book of Tatting by Darlene Polachic and worked it around a corner. She has also tatted a Christmas tree from a copy of a photo, but she has no idea where the pattern originates.

Jon is in the process of going back over the designs she created for the challenge and writing out the patterns. Some of them she has had to re-do because the lace has been given away and others she has re-done to tweak the design a little. She is also working on a large square piece made up of 4 large square pieces, several smaller connecting motives and then she wants to add a finishing round. It's looking spectacular.

Kristi doesn't have any tatting to show today, just some rosy cheeked kids in a snow tunnel. Looks like they've been having a lot of fun.

Snowy had a long trip to England and back with lots of time on her hands and she worked on a length of edging that was easy to pick up and work on whenever she didn't need to help navigate. On the return trip she worked on a Mary Konior pattern that was in a back issue of the Ring of Tatters newsletter because the stitch count was easy to memorize.

Sylvia has tatted a doodle in a bangle. It is made from the variegated purple Perfect Quilters thread, combined with the thin peach thread that she used on another motif.

Melissa has needle tatted a round medallion and now has to decide if she wants to use it as a pendant, or use it in her crazy quilt. Make another one and do both!

New Beginnings

Don't you love this yellow butterfly Ruth made? It was supposed to be a butterfly, but it began to be a heart so Ruth just went where it too her.

Sharol has posted a lovely heart too. This one is Heart O' Daisies by Teri Dusenbury.

Marilee is expecting to teach a class of beginners soon and she's come up with some simple pieces they can start with. More Newbies!

Laura's having some trouble getting the spirals tight enough on Ruth's Spiral Heart from the Feb 9th calendar. She took up the challenge to create a heart shape from Carol's Twelve of Hearts motif. The design isn't co-operating. Sounds like she'll need to start over just like Ruth did. It will be beautiful when she finds out what it wants to be.

Eliz has been getting her tatting patterns organized. She's tatted some bookmarks and a Jan Stawasz flower. She's got some more of her UFOs finished and put away and it sounds to me like she's really on a roll. Want to come and do mine next?

Melissa has just learned how to needle tat and she's jumping in with both feet and joining the challenge. After getting her toes wet doing some one ring flowers and butterflies, she did a row of back to back rings and then cleverly ran a ribbon between the rings and added a closure to turn it into a bracelet.

So we have some new designs, some new tatters and some new tatting designers. Who said tatting was a lost art? We're doing everything we can to keep it alive growing and expanding. What other needle art has so many people actively inventing new things to do and new ways of doing it?

Antique magazines, antique shuttles, modern designs

Ruth shows us the cover of an antique Delineator magazine. 1892 is waaayyyy before my time. Check out the covers of this magazine through the ages. It's a real snapshot of changing styles and in some ways changing attitudes. A modern version of one of the designs from the magazine is today's pattern for the Tatting Pattern Calendar.





Gail shares a picture of some of her collection of tatting shuttles. It almost makes me wish I used post style shuttles just so I could collect some of my own. Gail was wondering why the large bone crochet hook screws together in the middle. I'll bet it fit into a smaller case and separated for storage.




Mark completed the motif he was working on and used Photoshop to show a couple of variations on the design.



Eliizabeth adapted a design from Jan Stawasz's book, "Tatting: theory and patterns." to create a wonderful necklace. It is made with a variegated thread called "Silken Pearl" (the flower section) and DMC Cebelia (the stem and leaf section).





Carol has created a sort of "minty" butterfly. She calls this one a Buttermint Monarch and it looks really yummy.

LaRae's Wordless Wednesday post is an ice encrusted branch.