A bit of a diversion!

One of my lovely silver surfer students asked me for a snowflake last weekend. 

I've got a few for her to look at as you can imagine. That's a bit of a lie as I have boxes full of 'stuff' that could be given or sold but I always want to make something new!!! 

I decided to use this pattern but in one colour. 

Well this can now be worked without needing a SSSR when there's only one colour involved as this simply becomes a split ring instead. The only thing I found was that I didn't get the quantity of beads threaded onto the shuttles quite right but that just meant that next time I'll add a few more to each shuttle 'just in case' I run out method.

More bells!!!

Here are more of the bells that are part of my current addiction!!!

The one on the left is made of the Lizbeth variegated red/white thread. I'm not a great fan of this colour way as the colour changes are a bit sudden. BUT I do love Lizbeth threads!

The one on the right is another of the HWT threads from Sue. Love this one as the colours are so subtle. 

I've now finished working on the new version of this pattern and it can be found in it's usual place which is here.

The bobbly yarn - finished!

Well here's the bobbly yarn which I showed you here!!!

It only took a couple of afternoons to knit it up!! It's not the sort of scarf that you 'throw round your neck' as it's nowhere near long enough. BUT it's absolutely just what I've always wanted to put in the neck of my winter coat. It's SOOOOOO snug and warm that I can't wait for the really cold weather to arrive so I've got an excuse to wear it!!!

I'm glad I've done it and had the experience of knitting with this sort of yarn but I don't think I'll do it again!!!!  Well I may do if I find another bargain ball in a charity shop!!!

The new whirly motif

You probably remember me doing this single whirl a while ago.

Well you know what BC3 is like - he HAD to find out what it would look like when done in multiples!!

This was a bit of a challenge actually because the whirls kept putting me on a wrong foot with the joins. A few sessions of backtracking (undoing!) occurred but I'm pretty pleased with the result. I have even memorised the pattern so I can take it 'out and about' with me as I'm making another mat in the same way!!! How's that for progress!!

I wasn't happy with the first scan so put a green background on the second time. 

There's a very funny story about the green background. 

I have some sheets of card by the scanner for white pieces of tatting so I chose a very bright fluorescent piece out of the stash. I scanned the mat a couple of times and it came out with a cream background. I was really puzzled about this and went off to ask Mr Google why this was happening. Then after a search which came up with no answers I decided to call it a day and picked the card off the scanner to put away. Well, imagine how stupid I felt when I realised that the green fluorescent was only on the ONE side of the card!!!! 

Now why did I tell you all that story when it just goes to prove what a dozy old moo I am?

Bells galore!

I'm still working on the bells!!! I'm afraid I've got rather hooked on these!! 

I had a hunt through my threads and decided that the ones I'd got from Sue Hanson a while ago needed another 'airing' so these are made with some of those. No idea what thread it is but she'd wound them onto little card thingies as 3 strands of HWT. Naturally I decided to be awkward and 'reassign' them to two threads wound HWT!!! 

The thread is lovely to use (and re-wind too!) and not a single inch was lost in the process!! Amazing really. 

You can see that the one on the left has a 'dip' at the top which was an experiment but one which I'm not going to follow up on. 

Well, actually it was a mistake, to be honest!!! It was an evening when I was really tired and I missed the split ring coming out of the centre!!!