chipping and churning

Pin It now!

..... but chip in please.

For over a month now, on and off, I’ve been chipping at the Tatting Resources page.

It was being neglected, and also becoming disorganized what with increasing links.

Updating it seemed like a good opportunity to overhaul. Reorganising into neater compartments, more logical categories, and consistent font.

It is tedious and time-consuming. The bright spots are when I stumble on to posts with 'forgotten' tips/techniques or 'new' ones. During my search I came across plenty of interesting posts and sites (quite distracting ;-D). And this one tops them all – images of Mary Konior’s very own tatted lace, many of which are in her books. They got to actually hold the lace at Tat Days!!

Categorisation is not easy. My friend Jane McLellan readily answered my questions, clearing the path. And I now see that she has added her tips and pictorial links on the right panel of her blog. Thanks, Jane :-)))

Mind you my page is Still very much a work in progress – with loads of links still left to add. There will also come a day it will revert to draft in order to systematize the formatting before uploading again. Just thought I’d share and ask for your opinion as well as input – if you find something missing, or would like change or to add, chip in please.

Soon there will be a new page dedicated to Designing – tutorials, lessons, process, diagramming, and so on.

6 months since I asked your opinion about my posts. Time to review - do you think there has been some improvement in my presentations? I've tried to consciously reduce the text. All left-aligned now ;-D I could put fewer pics, but it is so difficult to choose! 
And sorry, Carollyn, I have too much of a backlog to leave the posts up for long ;-P 

back and forth

Pin It now!

Barbara Arango spotted a bag where the fabric had tatting prints. She successfully converted the print into an actual tatting pattern – reverse-reverse engineering?!

I remember Frivolè and a couple of other bloggers have also done similar conversions.

And she generously shared a sketch of square motif pattern on facebook.

I chose colours and size to match Ninetta’s Quad 13 square which I made back in 2015. Both have a similar kind of composition in terms of tatting techniques - lots of thrown or floating rings.

I think the green kind of overpowers the tinted brown in the new motif. May be I should've made the inward facing large rings in the tinted shade to balance the colours?

TIP : It can be worked in one pass if both shuttles have the same thread. I would start with the right twin ring working clockwise and exit from the left twin ring worked as a split ring. Then continue around. Just one set of tails to hide at the end.

It is interesting how they both measure the same despite their open versus dense look. 

Both are 3” along the sides and 3¾” diagonally in Anchor 20.

Will take a pic of them together when I find Nin’s square. I liked it too much to give it away!

I enjoyed tatting this. Barbara’s are in all-white in finer threads and they look very pretty!

Many thanks to Barbara (and  Ninetta) for sharing their patterns :-)

valley of flowers

Pin It now!

Valley of Flowers mandala doily/coaster
Eleonore Endrucks Leichtenstern  
Pattern #28 from Schiffchen-Spitzen 1920 

UPDATE: 

NEW VERSIONS- https://tipsaroundthehome.blogspot.com/2021/10/bagatelle-to-bagaball.html

PATTERN PDF -  https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vG2g0JCVsy8cy2DfGKHEhxleq_7Rveba/view

Starting in 2015, as a summer holiday project for the Online Tatting Class, I have been converting many of Endrucks’ patterns to modern notation in English. These are (mostly) still only on paper as I didn’t get around to actually tatting a sample. The ones I tatted still need a proper presentation. So besides the angel lace and angelette, I haven't shared anything since. I've also come across a couple of errors.

When Georgia shared pattern #28 in this Bellaonline article, I had already written out my own notations. It is such a pretty pattern that I was eager to convert it into thread. 

I took a few little liberties especially with picots to highlight flowers.

The entire book can be downloaded from Georgia Seitz’s Archive (Endrucks 1920 & Endrucks 1920 diagrams insert).

There is some beautifully natural ruffling after some of the rounds, eg. the one above. However I kept tatting and it lays flat easily after blocking with the rolling pin. 
The magenta rings were supposed to be thrown rings on the previous round. Instead I shifted the rings to this outer round and the previous is chains only, so that I could play with  colours easily.

You can see I’ve gone to town with the palette. I had a floral theme (perhaps I was inspired by Jane McLellan’s doily?) and though some colours were changed as I went along, it turned out fine. 

The chains in Endrucks’ tatted model are pretty loose (see last pic below) whereas my tendency is to pull the stitches close. Hence a few stitches had to be added on some chains - starting with the ones under blue flowers, and the 3 corresponding ones in later rounds.

Just shy of 4” in Anchor pearl Cotton which is equivalent to Lizbeth size 20.

I’m calling it Valley of Flowers Mandala – it does have the mandala look about it, right? And I need a Zen-like state to tolerate these soaring summer temperatures of 45+ degree Celsius with no respite for yet another week.

Now for the eye-opener .... 
What I missed while converting the pattern, Georgia Seitz's experienced eye caught!!! Although she wrote in the article, it still took me some time to locate!!

CLIMBING OUT WITH CHAINS : Endrucks worked all 9 rounds continuously WITHOUT any split rings or split chains to climb out. She used simple chains!!! Can you trace these?

Not acceptable by modern standards, yet I think this is a great way to climb out especially when we are doing trials of possible designs – quick and easy and obviously lazy ;-D

Hope you are enjoying much better weather and lots of tatting creativity :-)

UPDATE: For all links and pattern pdfs in modern style scroll through Endrucks 1920 Project document - https://docs.google.com/document/d/17LEVftXweztBIOWh4sL4BB7bX65ssoOsOn4oXIgCepY/view