This is the time of year when everything slowly accelerates. Thanks to the weather and some of Bill’s health-problems like his new not-yet-fully-installed pacemaker, hospital trips and doctors’ visits took up time we needed for gardening, so the garden is a weed paradise without its full complement of veggies. What’s in is getting munched on – by something that’s enjoying it instead of us. Today’s supposed to be a nice day but once again, it looks like rain. But that’s okay, we’ve got one last doctor’s visit – the third this week – to amuse us. Maybe we should call these our new hobby?
However.
Doctors’ visits are good for the production of Seneca Santa hats. I can do one per office visit, two per “short” medical test. My stock of hats, to match a boatload of beautiful mittens sent by June, is rising. Fortunately – for Seneca Santa, at least – we’ve got more visits next week.
And wet weather is good for tatting. I’ve been working on the projects I’m teaching for the Fringe Element tatting group in September. The theme is My Favorite Things - being Canadian, they put a “u” into favorite . Because my own favorite things include books and paperweights, I decided to revise the marble cosy paperweight from my book ‘Baubles, Bangles and Beads” to accommodate a larger marble. And then I went for one even larger. I’ve found a vendor who sells even larger ones, so I plan to look for more next week. I’m supposed to have a poetry book coming out this August - wow! A book I’m not publishing and printing myself! – and I’ve got to meet with the editor, who lives vaguely near the marble guy. Between doctors’ visits, of course.

The other thing I’m teaching is an ornament for a book cover – in this case, a creative journal whose interfacing pages can be personalized with writing and sewn in samples. The idea came to me in a brainstorm. I couldn't take a good picture, because between the sheen of the velvet on the cover and the sparkle of the beads, my poor attempt was more shine than book.
By the way, the folks who organize the Fringe element event are a wonderful group who manage to be well organized and informal at the same time. This event often has room for a few more, too. Find out more at
http://fringetatters.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/2011-tat-days-registration-form.pdf
And because I couldn’t garden, I created a tatted one. This is one of the projects I’m teaching at the IOLI conference in early August. I’ve been sketching and tatting these for a full year; here is the final version.

I haven’t been sitting on my hands, honestly. I’ve been tatting quite a lot, and I’ll have something to show for it soon. I’ve also been doing a whole lot of work of various sorts. A bunch of writing, and a new venture – acting in a melodrama. It came about that at the end of May, I was asked to write an article about the Old Havana Theatre. http://www.oldhavanatheatre.com (The Schuyler County village currently known as Montour Falls was once known as Havana) This brave new enterprise brings another dimension of fun and culture to the area, and I was so taken with the spirit of things that, interview concluded, I blurted out that I’d be happy to help this venture get off the ground, ushering, promoting, whatever… which is how I found myself singing and dancing onstage, playing the train whistle and spooning cool-whip into a pie tin for the obligatory pie-in-the-face conclusion to the entertainment. It was a wonderful distraction from Bill’s medical woes, and in these days of truly offensive political revelations, it’s been wonderful to know that at least someplace virtue triumphs and villains get what they deserve (tastefully)!

Then my friend Laurie came to visit… and we spent a bunch of time together between work and the other friends she also needed to see. On the hottest day of the year - so far - we sat and spun wool in the shop… because the downstairs atmosphere is pleasant and cool. Now I’ve got to figure out what to do with this lovely art yarn Laurie made. Wool is one of our connections; we met in the 1970s at a spinning guild, and over the years, the threads of connection have multiplied.



One thing we did together a very long time ago was to take a dyeing class together. For a while this was Laurie's livelihood; now it's part of mine. Wednesday I mixed up a batch of dye to "revise" some alpaca I'd been gifted with - I was trying for a dark blue-purple but came out with a grayish dusty-grape. I did get wool roving and silk yarn to achieve the wished-for color - it was only the alpaca that wouldn't cooperate!

This morning I found out that I’d gotten into a fiber fest I’d been wait-listed for (as a vendor); mostly because I was too distracted by other work and Bill’s stuff to get my application in on time. So I spent the first part of the day dyeing roving and silk – here’s what my clothesline looked like for a while. Fortunately it was a perfect drying day; so I got the rest of my stuff assembled and packed the car to its gills for a 5:30 am start tomorrow.

I think I may have come up with something. Which is always so much better than coming DOWN with something, right? But I haven’t seen this anywhere before and I find it intriguing.

Finalizing bookmark designs for my IOLI classes in early August, I was finishing a bookmark in pearl tatting and that “what if” intuition kicked in. What if… I used two threads in the pearl tatting method to tat a Josephine chain? I started with one color… hmmm… I could already see it looked intriguing. So I tried two.

Pearl tatting is also sometimes called Maltese tatting. Maltese in cats means gray, so I’m not sure how this form of tatting got dubbed Maltese. Maybe someone will tell me. Particularly because the Maltese ring, while similar to a Maltese (pearl tatted) chain is also quite different. Here is a started bookmark in three colors. I’ll be playing with this design a while longer, but in three colors, you can really see what this chain looks like.



Or almost. What you can’t quite see is the texture head-on. I can’t quite see it either unless I take off my glasses and regard it cross-eyed. (Easy for me, probably more difficult for you. But you can FEEL it.) Using two threads to tat the Josephine, you end up with something that looks more like rick-rack – it’s flatter than the usual Josephine or spiral chain. Which definitely makes it nicer for a bookmark.
Here’s how I tatted it –
Using one thread, I made five of the second half of the stitch, and then a sort of roll(not a stitch but a passing the shuttle over the thread to set the spiral; drop that first thread, pick up the second and repeat.

Try it and let me know what you think?

April was a totally wonderful month – but looking back, it seems to have gone by in a total blur. After a brief recovery from our Finger Lakes Tatting Seminars I was off to Spokane for the Shuttlebirds.

As always, it was totally wonderful! I’m always impressed when a large group of people work together like a beautifully choreographed dance, everyone moving quickly without bumping into anyone else and getting a lot done in a brief amount of time. Because I had the good fortune to be staying with Lillian D., who was this year’s food captain, I know how much pre-Tat Days work went into making the food look effortless, but there was also lots more to do in the kitchen once people started to arrive and it all happened smoothly. Patti Duff is the presiding genius behind this conference, and she manages to do it all, including answering a zillion different questions, without once losing her cool. Here's a photo of one of the projects I taught - tatted mittens. (They'll be in the November Tatting Times.)



Then I had a couple of weeks before the next big thing... and one of the things that happened was having the chance to get one of my favorite knitters started on spinning. Like vampires, spinners (and tatters) always want to get others bit by the same fiber obsessions. Most of the identifying features have been cropped out to protect the innocent... but look! She's very definitely spinning! This picture was taken weeks ago, by now she's probably got everything spun.



I’d been asked to teach at the end of April for the Blue Ridge Mountain lacemakers and tatters from the Keystone Lace Guild. I already knew a few of these ladies – world class tatters. I was also intrigued by the location – Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, a place I’ve always wanted to visit.

So, combining two interests, I spent a lot of time researching tatting at the time of America’s Civil War and it was fascinating. Most of us know that at the beginning of the 1860s, tatting had not progressed beyond the ring and the false chain (a bare thread over which button-hole stitches looking like double stitches were made with a sewing needle). By the end of the War, Madame Riego had introduced the true chain; the proliferation of home sewing machines had encouraged the manufacture of smoother threads - and tatting was off and running.
For this event I created a tatter’s adaptation of the “housewives” soldiers took off with them to war. A real one looks like this http://www.civilwarantiqueshop.com/pi43.htm

It gave me food for thought.

The great day arrived and Bill and I, fortified with months of historical reading, packed the car and left for Gettysburg. Because my time was short, once we arrived we went to the Gettysburg National Cemetery, where we took an interpreted walk with a park ranger, listened to a gaggle of embarrassed teenagers recite the Gettysburg Address under a bust of Lincoln. There was a lot of side-poking, giggling, toe-scraping and other recognizable fidgets of teens under duress – but the speech was incredibly moving anyway.



We also went to the top of Little Round Top, a Union stronghold, and drove around to various memorials, including the “Bloody Angle” where charging Confederate troops were slaughtered as they tried unsuccessfully to breach Union lines. We met a lot of people in costume or uniform, well-prepared for at least five years of high-intensity re-enactment.



The following day, I went to Needle and Thread http://www.woodedhamlet.com/about_us/index.html who hosted the group. This is a beautiful fabric store near Gettysburg, specializing in Civil War era reproduction fabrics. Actually, I’d gone the day before to shop a bit, because I knew I’d be tempted. And I was! And knowing that fiber stuff makes the best souvenirs, I gave into temptation. Darlene and Carl, the owners, were wonderfully welcoming, and their selection of goodies made me think about making one of those Civil War reproduction quilts. Just thinking…. Only thinking! Carl told Bill the wool they stock for re-enactors' uniforms is made by the same mill in England that wove the wool worn by the soldiers 150 years ago. Bill went back to the battlefields and walked around looking at things from the Confederate viewpoint while we had our class.

But I'm not sewing quilts for fun yet, because there’s a lot more tatting to do. I’ve got patterns to proof tat for the next set/s of classes, and a bit of everyday sewing to work on – for example, I’ve got a lot of fabric and a kind of hybrid quilt-batting/foam rubber stuff to turn into chair-pads. And knitting – I did finish two pairs of socks-in-progress, and a good thing too, it’s been cold enough to need them. In the photo, they're being inspected by our "invisible" cat.



Of course, I started another pair, I had a bout of dental work and I was expecting a lot of time in the waiting room. This incidentally didn’t happen, so the new socks are still on my needles. As is – on a different set of needles – a summer sweater I’ve begun for whatever summer festivities arise requiring an interesting shell. I’m not very far along with it, but then again, neither is the season. (Is it ever going to be summer this year? I have my doubts.)




So… back to the tatted housewives. I made bunches (and still have a few left) wide enough to hold tatting needles. This is mine – I’ve been learning needle tatting which is a challenge after the speed of shuttle-tatting. (The motif on the cover will be in the August Tatting Times.)

I take my hat off to those who shuttle tat, particularly those who shuttle tat beautifully and swiftly. Like Carolyn, who was in the class and already finished the project. Here’s Carolyn’s beautiful work. The thread was my HDT in the “Sunset” colorway. Way to go, Carolyn!



I had a wonderful time with the Blue Mountain lace group, multi-talented people who are terrific tatters as well.

Shhh…. Can you keep a secret? If you can, keep reading, and you’ll find a heartful shawl down a bit in this entry. First – be kind to me – I gave birth this past week. The newest book, “Wandering Wheels,” came back from the printers and was introduced at the Finger Lakes Tatting Group’s Tatting Seminars in Lodi, New York. Handy Hands has it now, as do I and I’ll have the booklet with me in Spokane next week.
I’m excited about the design possibilities in continuous Catherine Wheels in tatting and I can’t wait to see what other folks do with it!






I taught two classes at this year's Finger Lakes Tatting Group conference in Lodi this past weekend – the Rose Garden Pincushion, which uses floating chains, and the Pick o’the Bunch grapes class using the wandering wheels technique. If you weren’t there, it’s hard to explain how wonderful the weekend is – even for its organizers! There’s a lot of learning and sharing going on, a great chance to catch up with friends and make new ones, amazing food, eye-candy every direction you look, treats of all descriptions. Once again, Bunny Baker surpassed herself in the culinary arts department… and Bunny herself is such a sweetie that people tend to naturally gravitate toward the kitchen. We had a talented wood-turner who made our commemorative shuttles – she calls herself the Naked Woodworker but she does, actually, wear clothes. I wish I’d taken photos, but luckily, I didn’t have to – Sheryl Coleman did, and describes the event beautifully in her own blog http://www.crunchybanana.com/2011/04/finger-lakes-tatting-conference-2011.html As for me, after I came home from taking Nina to the airport… I went to sleep. Until yesterday, I fell asleep at any time I wasn’t actually in motion.


Here’s the secret part. I’m whispering.
Today, feeling slightly more human, I finished sewing tatted heart motifs on a shawl I’d proposed for Kay Foster, sister-in-law of Barbara Foster of Handy Hands. There were 39 or so motifs, from many different states and I think four different countries, many of them with millions of picots. The hearts, I mean, not the countries. Believing as I do in sewing down every picot, that was more hand-sewing than I’d budgeted time for before the conference. (Doesn’t that sound amazingly professional? Like I actually budget my time? Yeah, right.) But today was the day to sit down and finish sewing-on the latest arrivals. I hung the shawl out in the drizzle to freshen it; tomorrow I’ll put it in the dryer on low to fluff it out and hopefully get off some of the surface fuzzies… and then off it goes. That’s why it’s a secret… Kay doesn’t know yet. Many, many thanks to all those who contributed one or more hearts!

Unveiled at last – the cover tattings from my new booklet, “Wandering Wheels.” The grapes and the flower cart are two examples of what can be done with “floating” or joined Catherine wheels – everything tatted from a single color was made with one continuous thread – no cut and ties until I was done with that color. The idea arose after a tatter came to my house and demanded that I design a bunch of grapes for her. (Marcia, I love you hugs and hugs worth!) This led me to experiment with ideas – tatting each grape separately, which Marcia did before I came up with this method, seemed like too much work – as she herself will tell you. When I came up with this method, I knew it was something I’d never seen before, which felt truly exciting.

I really like the flower cart and I’m thinking of tatting it again to put on a t-shirt. The HDT (mine – colorway is called “Oil Slick”) worked well for the flowers and doesn’t truly look like oil at all. This has just been so much fun! Can you tell I’m really jazzed about it? The booklet comes back from the printer next week (some copies are already sold) when I take in the pattern book for the next Tatting in the Finger Lakes conference, which is just two weeks away. I’ll have it there and in Spokane.

After the masters went to the printer, I knitted 7 pairs of Seneca Santa mittens, which the Thursday knitting circle helped sew together. (Thank you!) And worked on cleaning up the black hole… I mean, the studio. Not done yet, of course, but progress has been made.

We’re snowed in again – which frankly, I love (or would if it didn’t feel like the flu has returned for an encore). Nevertheless, I’ve been having a blast. Today I wrote an article that I feel politically much in tune with. As a journalist, my job is to present information without expressing the merest shred of personal opinion, but when I get a chance to write about something I really believe in – which fortunately happens often – I feel particularly optimistic about life in general.

My friend June is in town, and brought some Seneca Santa mittens with her. We had an opportunity for a nice long visit and sort through the yarn bins. I’ve been doing a few hats now and then when I have time. The yellow ones, incidentally, were mostly made by my friend Jennifer, who knitted a long, tubular scarf that had no home. She gave it to me, and because I had some of the same yarn, through the magic of crochet turned the scarf into 8 hats on a different wintry morning. They matched well with many of June’s mittens.

We drank a lot of tea, she made a pair of mittens while I crocheted 7 more hats – hats go so much more quickly than mittens. And voila! We now have 14 finished sets. June, who every year makes dozens of mittens, stubbornly refuses to dedicate her entire life to this project – she really does have a life completely apart from knitting. I think I’m going to have to spend some time in the next weeks making some myself. I’m hoping that if I can do some on the knitting machine, maybe the Thursday knitting circle could sew them up. The idea is always to get the first batch of mittens out the door and into summer storage before the tatting conference and - yikes! It’s only four weeks away. I’d like to have a bit more than 14 sets to send off. Each year I pledge myself to make or facilitate at least 100 sets, so any way you look at it, I’m a bit behind.

Next on the agenda – look at the sage wool shawl whose ends you see behind the mittens. It began its life as a beautiful piece of wool whose remnant was given to me by a talented needlewoman who was purging her fabric stash. What it needs is an array of tatted hearts so it may be sent to a tatter who was the unlucky passenger in a car hit by another car and is now recovering from this serious accident. I hope to send this, too, on its way before our April tatting conference.

I’m also at work on a new tatting book, hinted at in the last Tatting Times. I’m really excited about these new patterns – I’ll show a few of the results when I’ve got more of them tatted… and after I tat a few hearts.