Remaining Elegance

Finally, finally, they're all finished.  These are the last of Jon Yusoff's Elegant Tatting Gems -- well, the last for me, at least.  They are elegant:  "Elegance is a synonym for beauty that has come to acquire the additional connotations of unusual effectiveness and simplicity."  Exactly so, I couldn't say it better so I borrowed that bit from Wikipedia.   All of the patterns in this remarkable book are made with the most basic tatting elements -- the simplicity.  But, they are put together is such a way as to create little bits of deceptive complexity.  Effective, indeed.

You may note that "Nilam" is all pointed instead of nicely rounded as Jon intended it.  The pointy version fits on the ornament easier than a rounded version. I'm using these snowflakes to make ornaments to complete my (two- or is it three-year-old?)  25 Motif Challenge.  Some of them are completed, I just need photographs.  Others are partially completed, but need some tiny fill-in motifs of some sort.  I'm working on that. 

Jon's Elegant Tatting Gems and Tatted Snowflake Collection are joining my Iris Niebach pattern books in my "most favored" stack.  They're fun to tat but challenging enough to be interesting.

More Elegant Tatting Gems

Yup -- been tatting, just not posting.  The computer has been in use -- it's school science fair season.  Wanna know how to clean a penny?  Never mind.

I've done some more of the beautiful snowflakes from Jon Yusoff's book Elegant Tatting Gems. I'm still making them all in red and green DMC size 80 tatting thread, but they're no longer in order.  I goofed on "Nilam" (joined a picot that shouldn't have been joined) and had to remake it -- goofed that one too (all the internal picots are too long) and now am going to have to find more red thread before I can finish any more at all. *sigh* 
Not that all these others were perfect right out of the gate:

As you can see, I had some problems with Lazuardi.  First, I wanted all of the round one loose threads out of my way -- I kept catching them in the rings I was making on the second round.  Second, I didn't put in magic threads, so I sewed in the ends.  Rather, I attempted to sew in the ends.  What I really did was break the thread on the first round.  I started over, but used the wrong size picot gauge and the long picots were just too long.  The last one looks pretty good, though.  When I was doing Kencana I made too many picots on the first red chain, so I did the same for all the others and then joined the bottom ones.  It makes the snowflake a lot rounder.  I did that one over too, and like the less rounded look of the original pattern much better.  Not too many problems with the other four on this page, but I'm not telling how many times I unpicked some of the rings!

Drum Roll, Please!

I've wondered from time to time if drum rolls are anything like cinnamon rolls -- maybe, but not so fattening, eh?  Anyway, I found all thirty-two comments and asked the Random Number Generator at random.org to pick me a number.  Wheeeee, the first and winning number was 9

Oh, dear -- she didn't want it!  Not hook-ish enough.  Yeah, that's why I'm giving it away.  :)

Okay, back to the random number generator (I was tempted to just draw a number out of a hat -- that's pretty random, isn't it?).  But -- I randomed a new winning number -- it's number 10, {Huh?  That doesn't seem very random to me -- it's right after 9.  I was tempted to keep pushing the button to see if it would give me 11 then 12 then 13 then 14...but I didn't think I could handle the stress.}

 Congratulation, 10 -- who is:

 






Padded package with gift of no value coming up (they don't charge you import duty for something with no value do they??).

Happy Holidays!

I hope you're all having a holiday.  I'm going to enjoy mine because I don't have to work for six days.  To celebrate and I'm giving away this shuttle.  It's a white Clover shuttle covered with a bit of a fractal with glitter decoupage.  If you like this shuttle, leave me a comment.  Since I'm not working for six days, I'll get a random number picker to pick a random number long about the 28th of December.  Happy Holidays!

Commenting for a chance to get this shuttle is closed -- commenting for any other reason is welcome!

And then there was October

I totally forgot about October.  I didn't do ANY tatting.  Nope, none --- well, maybe some standing in lines.  I crocheted most of October.  The building engineer where I work came out to my dad's house and put up his new carport.  It came in a box with a zillion parts.  We helped, but he brought the know-how and the tools.  Dad's old carport got blown upside down into the neighbor's backyard in a really bad windstorm (it was held down with a rail road rail -- not a wooden tie -- a steel rail!).  That won't happen to the new one, unless it takes the driveway with it -- there are bolts about ten inches long and as big around as my thumb holding the thing down.

As a thank you, I crocheted an afghan for our engineer (who says he's always cold).  This is my favorite full-size afghan pattern, it's easy to do and doesn't need fringe (which drives me nuts).  It's made of worsted-weight polyester yarn so it can be tossed into the washer and the dryer.

For those who asked:  This is "Lacy Chevron" from Leisure Arts Afghan Parade which is Leaflet 335.  It's copyrighted 1984, so I don't know if it's still available.

Really Elegant Tatting Gems

These are the snowflakes I've been making from Jon Yusoff's book Elegant Tatting Gems.  I'm making them all in red and green DMC size 80 tatting thread.  I'm also doing them in order.  I've got seven and a half done.  This is just the first seven, not the half.

Oh, one of them is NOT in DMC size 80 red and green threads.  One of them is a Lizbeth size 20 pink and blue variegate.  I suppose which one is rather obvious.

These are really great little snowflakes.  They're all pretty and they are all done with basic techniques -- but when they're done they look so complex.  Amazing, right?

Challenge 17

Yeah, yeah, I know -- it was supposed to be DONE in one year not two or even ...ahem... three.  Finally made it to Seventeen though.

Last May (yes, May), I made these green snowflakes from the Ariel pattern in The Tatter's Treasure Chest.  They've been waiting until this week for the center bit and for getting stuck onto the Styrofoam ornament.  My dad's been visiting us so it was a golden opportunity to tat and chat -- I tatted and chatted; dad just chatted.  I made up the middle, and it didn't work quite like I envisioned, but I like it well enough not to take it off and start over!

Marking Time

I belong to the Bar.  Yeah, I know, scandalous.  It's not an interesting bar, though -- it's the Paralegal Division of the Utah State Bar.  To keep belonging to the bar I get to do 10 hours of Continuing Legal Education every year.  Usually I go to the free "brown bag" seminars.  That way the boss can't complain that I cost anything -- they're free and during lunch hour.  I take my lunch and am gifted with a cookie, a drink and some esoteric knowledge.

Once a year they really splash out and give me $100 to go to the Fall Forum.  I can get 80% of the hours I need in an evening and one day.  This year I went to the evening performance of "A Midsummer Night's Mediation Tragedy."  It was, too -- tragic that is.  There's a reason lawyers become lawyers instead of actors.  Don't get me wrong, they did a very nice job.  However, every one of those litigators does a MUCH better acting job when they're standing in a courtroom, NOT in a dining room! 

I take my tatting with me to these events.  Everything I need to know is on the handouts which I can download from the bar website.  I listen very closely, and I have a pen and paper in case I want to write something down, which I do now and then.  Now, there are occasionally people who don't think I should be tatting when someone else is speaking.  Not meaning to sound sexist or anything, but it's usually men.  I don't believe they can multitask after all.  I thought it was a rumor.  I've told them before, "I listen with my ears, not my hands!"  Every year I have to tell a new person.  I'm wondering now if some of them do listen with their hands!  Besides, tatting keeps me from getting up and wandering around the room, or talking on my cell phone, or playing sudoku on my smart phone, or doing my office work on my iPad -- which would be much more rude, and which I saw quite a lot of those same people doing.  This year I made four bookmarks.  I've only got three, though, because I gave one to another of the attendees who was interested (more interested in my tatting than in A Midsummer Night's Mediation Tragedy -- really.  Hard to imagine, eh?).  

I like Jane Eborall's butterfly bookmark because it's so adaptable.  I know the basic shape and stitch counts and it can be done without beads.  Now dropping a container of beads, THAT would be distracting!  These are made in Lizbeth size 20 Golden Yellow, Medium.  Yeah, I know.  It surprised me too.  Funniest yellow I ever did see -- that's what the label said though.  So, I don't really know what color-name is assigned to this red, white, blue and purple, but it makes good bookmarks!

Elegant Tatting Gems . . .

is a wonderful book full of ... well ... elegant tatting gems.  Lovely snowflakes made using basic techniques.  I've been working my way through the book, but have NOT been weaving in ends.  Those will have to wait until later.  For now, these are the ones I test-tatted for Jon.  At least three of them are.  I'm just certain the other one is one of Jon's as well, because I had it stored with the other three, but I can't find it in any book.  Anybody that recognizes it, please speak up!  All of these test-tats were made with size 80 DMC tatting thread.  My sister dyed all that white thread really pretty colors, didn't she?

There!  Jon got me all straightened out -- thanks so much.  It was one of the test tat patterns she sent, so it does belong with the others, after all.  She modified the design after the test-tat and it became Ratnawilis in her new book.  The change is really pretty -- but I haven't gotten that far in the book yet.

What? August!

It's hart to believe it's the end of November already -- I've been AWOL for 3 months!  I don't even have a really stellar reason.  It would be nice to say I won the lottery and have been on a world cruise and just too busy playing to blog.  Nope.  I didn't win anything; I've been right here at home; and I've been too busy working to blog.  Borrrrrrring!  On the good side of that my assignment at work has changed so that I just get to do the part I like -- all the rest of the stuff I used to do someone else is now doing.  Lovely.  Now I have to step into the Wayback Machine and show you what I've been doing for three months -- because I have done some tatting.  :)

How about the Fair, for starters?  I got some blue ribbons (1st), some red ribbons (2nd) and some pink ribbons (4th).  In ascending order then, I got a 4th place ribbon on my ankle bracelet and my hat (which for some reason shows as a pillowcase on my "premium statement" from the fair).  The ankle bracelet is the same one I entered in the county fair.  The hat is all new.  I made the initial just for the hat, but the top is decorated with one of Jon Yusoff's snowflakes.  Both are made in size 80 thread hand-dyed "Oh, Baby" by my sister.  The judges comments -- that I was hoping would be helpful -- just said "nice" and "precise tatting" for these.  *sigh*

The Heart's Desire bookmark is also the same one entered in the County Fair.  It got a second place ribbon at the State Fair.  I also entered my little crocheted Cthulhu toy which got a red ribbon.  The funny little guy has wings, arms and legs, but he's buried here in someone's quilt, so it looks like he's only a head.  He's being shipped off to the far reaches of the world, as soon as I find a spare minute to stand in line at the post office.







I got nice first place blue ribbons on the button doily, and the Easter and Christmas ornaments I also entered in the state fair.  The coaster I entered got a blue ribbon as well.  It's the square I designed in Sharon Briggs' Design Tat Class.  She teaches well!  I made it again in purple size 30 DMC Cebelia.  I've made four now so I have a small set of coasters, but I only entered one.

 

I was very pleased to have gotten a first place ribbon on the large centerpiece I adapted from a Jan Stawasz pattern.  I left out all the picots except the joining ones.  What made me so happy is that entry morning when I took it's picture, I noticed that I had missed a couple of joins -- there were the picots just hanging out there.  It's such a large piece that either the judges didn't see them or figured they'd cut me a little slack!  It's the same doily on which I reported not much progress last June. 

The first two pictures are those I took the morning we were taking things to the fair.  It did turn out really pretty, I think.  I was just upset that I had missed the joins.  I still haven't decided whether or not to try to fix it, or just figure, nobody's perfect and a man on a galloping horse won't notice anyway.  The second pictures are the ones I took at the fair,  after  I convinced the fair people to move it .  It was originally displayed draped over a white knitted something, and it completely disappeared -- not to mention I spent hours getting it blocked just right and they rumpled it all up.  I have no idea how the owner of the afghan they finally placed it on felt about having her work covered up.  *sigh*  I wish they had a bigger building!

The last thing I entered in the fair was over in the Creative Arts area.  It's a bit of Calligraphy in the Celtic style.  It got a blue ribbon, too. 

All together, it cost me $11.00 to enter this stuff in the fair, but I came home with $22.00.  Not too bad -- it bought me a nice lunch one day!