A mystery

Well it is to me anyway. 

A week or so ago I spotted this shuttle on Fleabay. Whoops, I mean Ebay. I looked at it and wondered. As it was a BIN (buy it now) I flipped it into my basket and bought it.

Now I grew up using the original Milward black shuttles with the separate hook and know that they were made not far from where I live. Then the Aero was 'born' with the hook and bobbin and I converted to that (eventually) and never looked back. It was also made 'just down the road'. 

Now this new one has the Milward name on it and is blue and modern and made in Germany. Milward and Aero are related and Aero were re-located to Germany many years ago but what are these companies up to trying to confuse an OG? Does anybody know anymore about the Milward/Aero/Coats relationship?

I've just found another one like mine but in yellow on Fleabay (cheaper too, darn) and am now wondering if this is Pony (do NOT like their shuttles) who are now re-branding? The seller bought the blue one from a store near her a few months ago so that answers one question - it's new. She also said the shop was closing the haberdashery department due to Coats UK ceasing trading. Can the news for us crafters get anymore dire?

I never seem to stay focussed!!!

What IS the matter with BC3? He can never stay focussed on one thing!! Instead of carrying on with the latest doily he's decided to have a go at more rings. Must admit I enjoy going from one thing to another.

Yesterday I didn't' achieve much in the way of tatting. I went to a nearby town to help out with silver surfers, shopped on the way back, had lunch and by the time I'd finished pottering and a little bit of time tatting it was quarter past four and time to meet a friend. We were off to see the lights switched on in town. There was a wonderful laser light show displayed on the front of the Birthplace too. Bet poor old Shakespeare was turning in his grave!!

Life goes on!!!

And on and on!!! More progress on the doily. 

Actually although there's still some way to go I like this as a finished item with (probably) a little tweaking it could be a flower and stopped there.  BUT I will continue!!!

On other matters - I've changed the blog header (may work further on that!) and widened the page a bit. I think this threw out the comments section somewhat. I'm hoping it's sorted now after a few hours 'fiddling' with the settings. I also found that I was quite closely linked to Google+ which I never use. I'm not sure how it works as when I visit I find other people's 'stuff' on there. Is it like Facebook? 

I'm so enjoying 'life after Facebook' although I do pop in there to put my walk photos up there and very occasionally to check out other things but I'm now getting a lot more tatting done!!!

Rings on and in rings

Ah, remember that necklace I got from the charity shop? This one.  Well, here it is in it's demolished 'state'. 

There won't be a pattern for this but there are some tricks to doing the joins. One day I may get round to writing that down. The second one down (variegated thread) has a missing ring in it but I don't think many people would notice - only you experts reading this!!!

Two new techniques

Only really, really simple ones that I've been meaning to get round to for ages.

First of all is the lock chain which can be found here. 

The next one is the real reason I started doing the these pages. Over the weekend I uploaded the TIAS (Tat It And See) and realised that there was little out on the internet about the ZigZag chain. As I'm using this in the TIAS I thought I'd better kick myself into making a page. It's SUCH a simple technique (like the lock chain) that I suppose I didn't feel it was worth the effort of 'paging' it!!! Anyway I have and here's the link to the ZigZag chain. 

Dora page 12/13 start

The start of another Dora adventure. I've abandoned the other one for now but knowing me the temptation will still be there so I'll be getting back to it sometime. 

For those who have the book this pattern is on page 12 and 13. Just hoping that this adventure will last and succeed!!

Meantime when I'm not tatting (that's when I'm sitting comfortably in my armchair in Tat Corner) then I'm still working on the TIAS.  Hope to get the information page ready and available for you soon.  I'm pleased with this one although I think it's going to be an easy guess.  Mind, I think that every year!!!!