budding dahlias

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Snowflake #6 in Land of Laces’ 25 Snowflake Project !

By the skin of my teeth! The new keyboard arrived last evening and I’ve been working to get the pattern out alongside the new snowflake. Phew, made it! Staying off the net helped me reboot as well ;-P

So, taking your feedback into consideration, this is what I’ve come up with.

  Budding Dahlia Snowflakes  

click to download free pattern pdf

You are in for a treat again, with 4 patterns in one! 16 patterns (main plus variations) have now been shared in the past 6 weeks - not bad at all!

I used seed beads between the mock rings to add colour, stability, and a better finish.

There is one unflipped half stitch right after closing the mock ring to lock it into place, then the bead is moved in place from shuttle1.

I think these look cute and can be used as embellishment in so many different ways!

But to challenge myself, I tried adding more rounds. This is the medium-sized version made with ball and shuttle since the Josephine rings at the tip are mock rings in order to create a pointed chain.

I have listed numerous other ways in which one could make pointed chains for an overall different effect. eg. a seed bead, dot picot, right angle, mimosa knot, one-stitch scmr, SLT, pointed chain, etc.

Wanting to keep a connection to the JRs on rosette, I stuck with JRs throughout. But I’d love to see diversity.

This is the large version with dahlia in mind. It continues from the medium version and is worked similarly, but free-form, with petals of differing lengths.

This is undoubtedly a flower flake pattern!!!

Some petals are lock joined to a free picot on round1, but most are joined to the space between 2 chains in round2. Use a finer crochet hook to pull up a loop for joining. Petals are also linked to each other towards the base – after 2 or 4 stitches.

And a bonus sunflake variation! I tweaked the count of this maroon trial, since some of you liked it. This requires 2 shuttles and the difference in the chain arch when a JR is thrown versus when it is a mock ring is clearly visible here - the smooth chain versus the pointed chain.

download free Budding Dahlia snowflakes pattern here.

All previous patterns are listed under Snowflakes here  

h hit

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I don't swear, but if I did, this is how it would come out "h hit" !!!
In one of her recent posts, Ninetta talked about 'the missing e'... My keyboard decided it has had enough of 'o' and 's', sigh. ;-P

I've tried to insert (copy/paste) the missing letters, but it's no fun, except for the weird-looking words and sentences (if one can call them so) that form :-D My autocorrect also decided to take some downtime!

The new keyboard should arrive soon. Till then, please excuse me for not responding to emails or commenting or facebooking. I'm taking this opportunity to stay away from the net as much as possible and 'de-toxify'. And enjoy my tatting :-)   SO there !!! 😃😄😆😉

let it go

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… or not – that is the question!

I skipped this Sunday’s snowflake (we started with 28 weeks for 25 flakes, so …). For one I felt drained with all the pattern writing – some of the patterns are really tough to get through in as simple a format as possible. 

For another, I was simply unhappy with all my attempts. To the extent that I kept picking up a different pattern to work up! Look for yourself …

I designed and tatted this in 2016 as a first round. I really like it and can’t seem to let go of it, but creating another round has me stumped. 

Disregarding my past sketch (see the brown in lead pic?), I tatted this last week. 

This yellow/green one is another attempt at an outer round. It ruffles when tatting but lays flat with blocking.

What is your verdict?

TõT

Then I tried to extend this small vintage snowflake. Those long chains are meant to be narrow. I like the shape they create individually & collectively, but clearly too large for this center. Having run out of thread, I’ve left it for now.

TõT

This is another flake that emerged from my mistake here. I made the left one in Dec 2018, but there is significant ruffling along the periphery, hence did not share. I’m giving it another go, using a larger center, but keeping the outer arms same. It should work, right?

It is worked in one pass, but during trials I like to work rounds separately so that one can snip off and discard parts instead of the entire tatting.

 Along with your verdict, suggestions for names will be most appreciated :-)))

TõT

And before I sign off, here’s what Barbara Slodka shared with me. Dani Rotach’s Celtic Starfish from Finger Lakes 2015 Tatting Seminar. 

From what I can see, it also uses the same numerical formula for the arms, though it is so much more ornamental and more advanced than my MatheMagical star! Isn’t it beautiful?!