Off the Shuttle: Tatted Paper Eggs

Here are all the paper eggs with tatted edgings that I've finished so far. Threads are all size 20, either Lizbeth or DMC Cebelia. All the rings are four sets of 5 double stitches separated by picots with the middle picot attached to the paper. The chains are either 3ds 3p 3ds 3p 3ds or 3ds 9p 3ds. Embellishments are a variety of stickers. More detailed instructions are on my posting at 

http://shoppingmystash.blogspot.com/2015/03/off-shuttle-tatted-paper-egg.html

These work up very fast and can be hung with thread as ornaments or used to embellish greeting cards. I'm finding them a nice little giveaway to let friends know I'm thinking of them.

The two below will be sent to a friend's daughters. One loves pink and the other likes purple. They are growing up so fast so I hope they still like getting little trinkets in the mail.

I gave this one to a family friend as a thank you for her Easter luncheon:

This one is on its way to an online tatting friend in Tennessee (you know who you are!):

This one is on its way to Staten Island to a pen friend with terminal cancer. I hope this cheers her up a little, but tatting seems woefully inadequate as a way to lessen my sorrow for her.

Off the Needles: Tweedy Cotton Scarf

I just finished this light-weight scarf suitable for cool, rather than cold, weather. The yarn is from stash I bought about three years from a yarn shop in Hillsborough, NC, on a visit to the town with my daughter. It's Noro's "Sekku" in colorway 1. The yarn is a blend of cotton (50%), wool (17%), nylon (17%), and silk (16%). 

Some parts of the strands were really thin, almost like heavy sewing thread. I'm not sure how well an item knitted with one strand would hold up with such thin areas in the skein. Fortunately, I bought two balls of the yarn so I could use two strands of the yarn for the project.

The pattern is adapted from "ZickZack Scarf Pattern," a free pattern on Ravelry. The original version is 96 stitches wide; my version is 60 stitches wide. Each row is knitted the same:[k5 k2tog k4 kfb] 5 times. I used size 3 needles.

Once again, I'm still fiddling with my digital camera to get the colors right. From what I've heard from others using similar cameras, achieving true colors of craft works is almost impossible without moving up to more expensive, professional equipment...which I'm not ready to do. What is showing up here as blue is really purple and lavender; there actually is no blue in this colorway of the yarn. The other colors in the photo, however, are accurate. 

Tatted Christmas Card Ornament Class

Yesterday I taught the "Tatted Christmas Card Ornament" class at the North Carolina Regional Lacers 2015 Spring Lace day. We had a lot of fun cutting and punching out paper shapes and attaching tatting to circles cut from Christmas cards.

Here are some examples that I brought to inspire the class:

Tools and materials we used:

Class participants working on their first project:

Off the Shuttle: Tatted Paper Egg Ornament

In my last post I wrote that I wished I had an egg-shaped paper punch to make Easter egg ornaments. Taking my $10-off coupon to A C Moore yesterday, I found a tool that fulfilled my wish. I thought if I couldn't find a punch, maybe a stencil would do the trick. The above shape was made using a Fiskars stencil. The package contains 3 templates: circles, ovals, and rectangles, with several sizes on each template. Of course, unlike with a paper punch, you still have to punch the perimeter holes for attaching the tatting. I used my usual 1/8" hole punch that I use on the Christmas card ornaments.

The paper is from a pack of assorted pastel cardstock from DCWV, Inc. The thread is DMC Cebelia size 20, color 210 lavender. The sticker is from a pack of K&Company's "Clearly Yours" epoxy stickers. 

The tatting pattern is one I use frequently on card ornaments:

Rings: 5ds p 5ds attach to card 5ds p 5 ds

Chains: 3ds p 3ds

I think I'll adjust the pattern on future eggs as it tended to curl up and required a lot of finger blocking to flatten out. I think lengthening the chains might do the trick. 

My tatting onto paper class is coming up later this month and I can't wait to share all the examples I've been making. Eleven people have signed up for the class and I hope to have some paper goodies for them to take home for inspiration. 

Off the Shuttle: Tatting on Silver Paper Ornament

I've been playing with paper and tatting again with new paper and a new paper punch I picked up on sale at Jo-ann's. The paper is DCWV's Cardstock Stack in color "Silver Shimmer." The paper punch is the "Chrysanthemum" punch from Fiskars.

The variegated thread is Lizbeth size 20 in colorway #175 "Scottish Thistle." The outer thread is silver DMC Metallic Embroidery Floss, which I believe has been discontinued (it's been in my thread stash for several years).

The tatting pattern is a simple ring (5ds p 5ds (attach to hole) 5ds p 5ds cls) with 2 rings per paper hole. There are 15 holes in the paper design so there are 30 rings around the edge. The chains between each ring are 3ds p 3ds. The chain of metallic thread is attached to each picot of the previous chain with 2 ds between each attachment. I wish the paper piece were egg-shaped as I think these would make nice Easter egg ornaments.

Off the Shuttle: More Tatting on Paper

Here's another example of tatting on a large piece of punched paper that I've made to show at a class I'll be giving at the North Carolina Regional Lacers' Spring Lace Day in March.

The paper is a piece of Strathmore 300 Series Watercolor paper. It was cut with a Martha Stewart Crafts circle edge punch with the Modern Lace punch cartridge. The piece is approximately 6" in diameter. The thread is Lizbeth size 20 tatting thread in colorway #165 "Grape Splash."

The circumference edging is a simple pattern of connected rings alternating with chains.

Rings: 5ds p 5ds p-attached to paper 5ds p 5ds 

Chains: 3ds p 3ds p 3ds p 3ds 

The center motif is "Christmas Rose Motif" from New Tatting by Tomoko Morimoto (Interweave, 2012, p. 55). 

Off the Shuttle:Tatting on Paper

On March 28, at the North Carolina Regional Lacers' Spring Lace Day in Chapel Hill, NC, I'm co-leading a short class on tatting onto paper. We'll be tatting directly onto round shapes cut from Christmas cards to make ornaments suitable for holiday decorating. During the class I also want to show examples of tatting on other shapes and sizes. Here is one of the larger pieces I've finished to take to the class. 

The paper is a piece of Strathmore 300 Series Watercolor paper. It was cut with a Martha Stewart Crafts circle edge punch with the Eyelet Doily punch cartridge. The piece is approximately 6" in diameter, the smallest size possible using this punch.

The thread is Lizbeth size 20 tatting thread in colorway 156 "Juicy Watermelon."

The pattern for the circumference is just two rows of a simple ring and chain edging:

Rings: 5ds p 5ds

Chains: 5 ds p 5 ds

The motif in the center is motif B on page 18 of 優しいタティングレ－ス － シャトルと糸で誰でも楽しめる [Tatting Lesson 1-2-3] (Nihon Vogue, 2014; ISBN: 978-4-529-05325-9). I bought my copy of the book at Kinokuniya Books in New York City, but it is also available from Handy Hands, The Tatting Corner, or DS9Designs tatting book suppliers as well as other sources of Japanese tatting books.