magical Mexican wave

a Mexican wave of tatting !

Different time zones can be quite limiting in many ways.

Or they can create a Mexican wave ! While some sleep, others are awake to carry on tatting and the wave goes around unending. My volunteers eagerly raised their shuttles (to my call for help) and worked as a tatting-wave and they deserve a similar ovation.

My 5 test tatters are from 4 different continents !!! Through the day I kept getting progress reports, pics, & feedback. Oh, it is so exciting to be a part of this wave. In less than 24 hours of sending out the pattern, I had my answers! I feel so blessed to be surrounded by such a community. Now it's my turn to finalise the presentation and tat a new error-free bookmark.

While I slept, Robin successfully took on the challenge of flattening out the quatrefoil hexagon. Here's my working of it ... 

It lays flat but the rings need to be worked carefully - some have a tendency to get squished. 

I found the hexagon that wanted to be a square. Instead of a mock picot it has a tiny 4ds split ring (SR) between the 2 SRs. 

I like the pattern it creates and a fabric of these squares would definitely be much more interesting in 2 colours. 

Both versions together for comparison - the inner square is more defined in 2nd version.

Which do you prefer ?

So, back to the hexagon.  I did another one without picot space between split rings. Kind of squishes the SRs,  don't you think ?! Space between the 2 SRs provide some flexibility. 

Jenny did something interesting - instead of a mock picot with equal thread lengths, she allowed the upper one to be longer, and the lower one to remain flush. It worked for her !!! 

A single colour CTM version causes the sequence and direction of work to change !

And some more excitement - I traced out a continuous path along the hexagons to create as large a fabric as one desires --- a Magic Hexagon ! So the wave continues ;-D  (I guess it is a fancy name for one pass tatting, but much more appealing ;-P)

I placed the 4 individual medallions I had and it works on this rings only pattern ! Can it translate to a rings & chains pattern is something that needs to be seen.

In fact, for the same reason, there are 2 ways one can tat this in one pass or as a magic hexagon (some split rings will become true rings and some true rings will become SRs!) - 

• complete hexagons climbing out with split rings     OR
• as half hexagons in a kind of undulating wave.

Very early days though. Need to work on it some more - what will happen if another round is added? A one-pass rectangle made of these hexagons is easy to figure out.

I didn't have an updated pic last time, so here's how far I got in the magic square prototype. I've had to drop it for the present till the pattern writing, tatting, and presentation are over....

And the Magic Wave continues across continents with Jane sharing her own experiments - do check out her recent posts on the topic ! 

Now here's an idea.

How about a Global Tatting Mexican Wave ?

Start from the East and follow the sun till it sets in the West, with tatters working on a butterfly or heart or any small motif and then uploading a pic immediately on any social media they follow. 

I remember something similar was tried a few years back. Did you participate?

tatters are magicians who create enduring lacy waves !