2 quick tips

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Well tips are strewn about my blog - have to stay true to the name of this blog ;-D. Following are 2 quick tips, one of which you may already be doing.

Straightening Unravelled Thread - wind and rest!

  

When we have to unravel/untat stitches, the thread gains kinks (fig1) that are not merely unsightly but often affect future tatting. It happens because the thread balance/twist is disturbed. A quick fix is to simply wind that thread back on to the shuttle or the ball (fig2), allow it to rest for a few minutes (a minimum of 10 minutes), and voila, the thread is almost back to normal (fig3)!

In fig2, I wound the unbalanced thread partly on shuttle and partly on ball to show that either works equally well. To quicken the process, slide the unravelled portion gently between fingers, a few times while winding back.

Simple and quick, right!

Turmeric Powder for Cuts - rub and forget! 

Every Indian household knows the immense benefits of turmeric, one of the basic spices in our cuisine. It has antiseptic and healing properties - internal as well as external. You must've heard of the 'new' rage  'golden milk'? It is simple 'haldi' (turmeric) milk, an almost timeless legacy.  

What is known in Western world as 'alternative system of medicine' is over 3,000 years old based on the more than 5,000 year old Ayurveda (Science of Life) philosophy. 

So anyway, who does not get cuts, including bleeding ones? The quickest way to disinfect the area, stop the blood flow, AND heal the cut almost instantly, is to RUB turmeric powder over the cut. A gentle but deep rub in one direction such that the powder can enter the slit. Rubbing it in hurts obviously, but Do It.

In the above pic, this cut is 3 days old and it is still reddish, sore, hurt every time it came in contact with water and soap. I had Not used turmeric powder - simply used a tissue to stem the flow which took several minutes. 

But I'd finally had enough and rubbed turmeric powder. 

The above pic is taken one day later, AFTER I had spent the entire morning in heavy spring cleaning, with my hands in soapy water, etc.! But I had No problem, no reminder that there was a cut there! 

The trick is to do this deep turmeric rub immediately (I was actually surprised that it worked on a 3-day old cut). It seems to cauterize the tiny blood vessels, thus not merely stemming blood flow, but eliminating all soreness, pain, sensitivity. It kind of closes up the open capillaries and scar tissue starts forming immediately. 

It is like apply, rub, and forget !!!

Remember to try it next time - and rubbing it in is Extremely important, not simply sprinkling/applying it on top. This was my own discovery and my family/friends have become 'converts' ;-D. Turmeric powder is part of my first-aid box, besides the kitchen.

The only drawback is that there is a chance of yellow stains on anything you handle for the next few minutes until you wash it away. And for very deep arterial cuts, it may not work because the flow is much stronger.

Some more quick tips - https://tipsaroundthehome.blogspot.com/search/label/quick%20tips

rotten core

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… or rotten pulp ?!

I've been spending the last couple of weeks bringing my four Design Round Robin doilies up to date. They had been neglected for the last couple of months, but now I am finally at par. I will share them in more detail gradually.

This post is merely about one rotten evening.

I was tatting the 3^rd round on my Dancing Peacocks doily. Half way through I realised I’d been attaching it on the wrong side ! Much as I love fs/bs tatting, herein lies the disadvantage.

Not only can you see the colour blips in previous rounds (in pic below), but also how the stitches in the last round look more like rolled tatting with misplaced picots (purple in above pic) – a visual reminder that there is a distinct front and back side to tatted lace in directional and colour tatting.

About to snip off both threads, I remembered Jane McLellan's excellent pictorial directing us to snip rings and not chains.  I had stopped doing this ever since Carollyn's whip stitch method entered my tatting life, taking away all fear of hiding ends.

Fortunately, this round is mostly chains with stitches coming from the purple; tailor-made for the above technique. So off went the scissors on the mustard core thread and in no time I had rescued all the purple. Instead of cutting across the rings, I snipped through the core at the base of the ring.

For some of the stubborn points, especially near the lock joins, I inserted a fine crochet hook to make enough space for the scissor tip.

The unravelled thread is still wavy and vulnerable as seen above (these are 3 strands of Anchor embroidery thread). So I added another step -

I started winding this unraveled end on a new bobbin, giving it time to rest and recover. With the unused part of purple thread now at the free end, I started the round again with this ‘fresh’ thread. 

Turns out, I didn’t even reach the unravelled part in the corrected round - in a future post.

I lost my tatting and time, but did learn Aurora's method of capturing the inner ring in onion rings. Kathleen, who designed this round, used it and I followed accordingly. Aurora had shared it in the online class but I hadn't tried it out.

So not all was lost - new method learned, and pulp saved !!!  

Ahem..... the rotten core and pulp have twisted my arm to include their comment :

"Stop blaming the threads -- the fault lies in this tatter's scattered attention !"

happy tatting always ...
let's make sure our fruit and lace stay healthy :-)))