giving and receiving

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…. thanks q

According to the Hindu calendar, Guru Poornima is celebrated every year on full moon of the 4th month - this time it fell on the 27th. As per scriptures, it is a day to offer respect and gratitude to one’s teachers. So this may be almost a 3,000 year old legacy! 

Thought I’d give my thanks to each tatter/blogger I’ve had the pleasure to meet online – I always learn a little something and add to my knowledge, be it from a beginner question, peer consultation, or expert advice.

Firstly, I’d like to thank the extremely talented Mari-jan. We got acquainted, and have been in touch, when they asked to publish my pattern in their publication, De Frivolite(k)ring . Recently she celebrated her 1^st blog anniversary and surprised me with this lovely handmade silk plum blossom and handwritten card. 

  

Update : Mari-jan has posted details about this technique here.

Next, as a thank-you gesture for helping her out with some tatting snags over time, Jean Gordon shared this joyful bookmark pattern! I got down to tatting it almost immediately, spurred by her tatted models.

This is the Butterfly Bookvine designed by Kimberley Donohue 

published in #16, KNOTS tatting newsletter, March 1997. 

Jean made a few tweaks and re-wrote it.

I really liked Jean’s colour scheme above! 

I chose the closest I could get from my Anchor size 40 stash. I want to make another with more colourful butterflies and vine using embroidery thread.
It measures 13×3cms without tail.

Butterflies are superb in that there was no need to hide ends at all since we end with a split ring! Instead of using 2 shuttles, I left a long tail in the beginning to use for the 2nd side of split ring and one antenna.

There are 2 versions of the butterfly in the pattern. I chose the more decorative one. 

For the vine, instead of SLT, I used the Reverse Join to switch threads, thus ending up tatting it with one shuttle and green ball thread. 

One has to keep track of the joins, though. I kept making mistakes linking to the butterfly and ended up retrotatting.

You know I like tails on my bookmarks. So a lock stitch chain it was. But for the tassel, I have to thank Stephanie Wilson. Last year, when she was test tatting one of my patterns, she shared her wonderful idea – collect all the scrap threads and make tassels! 

I finally remembered in time, and am so happy with the result, even though these were the only scraps left from recent projects in my tiny collection box. I added a green border on either side of the wrap-around -- ALL scrap!!!.

Here’s another of Jean’s tatting sample (still unblocked). She’s been tatting for just over a year and already learned interlaced rings (the 4-shuttle braid) & the floating twisted picot!

Blogging has brought me so many extraordinary friends!

Many many thanks to this tatting circle of friends qYq

65 + 126 + 24 and one

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Sent and received !

Rather sent and received and sent and received and sent and received and sent and received...

When the hubster realised I was going to send 55 squares, he panicked and insisted I courier them. Cho chweet. 

In the end, though, I sent in 65 squares : 55 from Cathy’s original pattern and the rest from 3 of my patterns (Classic Square ; Heart Square ; & Quatrefoil Square in size 40). I tied them in batches of 5.

Since the rates were same for the first 500 gms, I asked Usha whether she would like me to include her group's work as well. She couriered me the package, & I received it along with a surprise  ....

A beautiful letter and her exquisite lanyards and oh so lovely beads !!! 

Yay. It came in handy almost immediately when my new glasses became a bit loose & I feared dropping them! Very light & beautifully worked - the sparkle of the crystals is not captured here. 

So the 1^st sent was by Usha & her group; received by me.

The Happy Tatters group had collectively sent in 126 squares, some from own original designs. 

9 tatters with 126 squares and wishes (scroll down for screenshot).

Even with our collective tatting and stuff, the padded envelop barely weighed 200gms!

Thus 2^nd sent was by me (through my BIL); received by Cathy a couple of days later.

Meanwhile I received another envelope from Vrinda, delayed by a day, with 24 more squares - 

4 each from 6 original patterns! Wow!

We decided to send this by ordinary mail, keeping our fingers crossed.

The 3^rd sent was by Vrinda; received by me.

4th sent was by me in a new envelope; received by Cathy about 12-13 days later.

I am so very fortunate to have seen firsthand all the lovely tatting from the Happy Tatters group !!! You can see a lot of their work on Usha’s blog. Above is a screenshot from Cathy’s facebook listing

And Usha’s gift to me is priceless!

I can take credit for motivating Vrinda to share her square patterns ;-P She has used different techniques to create her squares, and given them adorable names, too. Cathy put each pattern up on facebook.

I also have Vrinda’s gracious permission to share them on my blog. So don’t go away – my next post will have her square patterns (in my notation). And also a listing of the various 3x3 cms squares that creative participants have shared (it’s good to have the links all in one place, right?).

The deadline for receiving squares has been extended to the end of this month 

and the tatted fabric will be displayed at Les Halles Saint Gery.

Many many thanks to Cathy for her graciousness and help throughout,

including sharing her personal address for the courier.

Oh, but before I leave there was another lovely sent & received a few weeks back (this has been a hugely delayed blog post due to health reasons). 

This is the latest and sadly last issue of Frivolté(k)ring. This time they included my Block Heart bracelet pattern. If you remember, last year I had the privilege of sharing my Curly Cross pendant pattern with them. Since it is their last, I asked for a physical copy instead of pdf. They graciously obliged.

A very special thanks to Mari-jan !

Between all this sending and receiving, I have made new friends and forged old ones !

That’s what this global initiative represents – a unity of purpose and meeting of minds.

Oops I forgot to thank the men in my family - hubby & his younger brother for their role in the Tat a Monument in Pink ;-P

floating in air !

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Here's a peek into what I've been up to; why the Quatrefoil series is on hold... 

Floating Beads 

UPDATE : This pattern is now in pdf format, Click to download

I'm working on a necklace set with a smattering of beads and crystals in tatting.

It started out as trying to hang a large crystal bead inside a ring - a thrown/floating ring. Couldn't find any tutorials to create that effect.  

Tempted to ask my beading friends, but forced myself into figuring out a solution. Many attempts later, here's a pic of a couple of the 'uncut' or unraveled trials - the ones on the left show how the chain distorts. Then success (the 3rd from right) !!! 

This has been tested by Georgia, Eliz, Usha, Stephanie. Their valuable feedback will be included in the pictorial.

Gradually the floating beads method evolved. It works not only in thrown rings, but regular rings, (I snipped off the pink thread by mistake, hence couldn't complete the outer ring properly.)

and even a string of beads inside the ring !

And another idea struck - how about using the string as as a central picot ? 

I’m not sure whether this has/has not been done. Also one doesn’t need the exact floating bead method – it can be made with a simple long loop. But I’m merely showing how my brain worked at finding new applications/effects.

Then I wondered about using it on normal chains. Here I loaded the crystal teardrop on a picot, attached right back before proceeding. The inset shows it attached using the floating beads method. While the former is kind of flush against the chain, the latter is held at a slight distance as if on a shank. Instead of single crystal, a string of beads can be used.

While I haven't tried it on a mock ring or an SCMR, I don't see why it shouldn't work.

And whether you want to or not, I will bore you further with pictorials on how to do it ;-D Fair warning ? Patterns will follow much later, though.

I’m just so excited that I could figure out some beading for myself – getting the hang of it ;-P

UPDATE : All Floating Beads effects and pictorials are listed here.

Second reason for floating in air was the exciting attachment I got in my inbox. One of my patterns has been published in a Dutch magazine De Frivolité(k)ring alongside very talented and experienced tatters and designers. The booklet, published twice a year, is distributed among the Dutch tatting circle - Frivolité(k)ring Nederland. It’s in Dutch. I had asked for the pdf version, not the physical booklet.

Mari-jan had contacted me many months back but I had no idea which pattern they had chosen. Turns out it is the Curly Cross Pendant – the one I never got around to writing/diagramming a proper pattern for. And they’ve actually posted beautiful step-wise pics (without beads) with written pattern.

many many thanks to all I've named here. 

You make tatting so much more pleasurbale

twice the pleasure, double the twirls ….

happy happy dance !!!