Another day's blobbing!!!

The colours are the same as yesterday's - promise!!! Blobbing doesn't make for good photos, I guess!!

Can you see that on this one I've put the orange diamonds next to the centre - just to make it more interesting!!! Even blobbing has to hold some interest in the old fuzzy brain whilst stemming the flow from the stupid little nose that is mine and mine alone!!!!

So, admittedly not a lot of tatting has been done lately but I will have some more progress on the Jan motif to show soon. Maybe even tomorrow!!!

More progress on the patchwork

These are the colours I’ve chosen for round 2 of the patchwork. This is round 1 and the centre finished.

I think this round will be a big contrast to round one but I’m hoping that round three will pull it all together. Well if not then there’ll have to be a round four!!! Not sure BC3 will be able to manage that!!!

I’ve spent a LOT of time ‘blobbing’ over Christmas as I’ve not been well. I’ve had a STINKING cold so have not had the energy to do much more than sit and sew while watching catchup TV. My friend down the road calls it ‘blobbing’ and that’s exactly what it is. Sitting like a blob of something and doing nothing in particular.

Cutting out the fabric

Now if you go back to this link here you'll see again where I'd got to with the 'whatever it is'.

The next decision needed to be made on colours for round two so I got the fabric out and started cutting. 

Well the colours I thought would work for the next round left me with lots left over so there was a quick change of mind and I carried on cutting those to make enough for the following (3rd) round. 

Again I needed to re-think round two and that's what I've got in these two little bags. Enough for round two and round three - unless I change my aged mind yet again!!!

I think I'll have enough to keep me busy over the next few days so I'll wish you all a happy Silly Season (Christmas) and leave you with a break of a few days from the OG. 

Well I'm guessing nobody has time or inclination to read the ramblings of a slightly bonkers old git in the UK during the festivities.

Jan's Waistcoat pattern

Now my friend Sue (Pigmini) showed me the waistcoat she’s currently working on. This was about six months ago and I fell for the motif lock, stock and barrel. 

Trouble was that I didn’t have the book it’s in and I wasn’t going to ask her for a copy and put her in the very embarrassing position of saying no. Why ‘no’? Well Sue’s like me - a great respecter of copyright so I just admired what she was doing and thought about how I could get a copy of the book. 

I could probably buy it here in the UK but it would be expensive for just the one pattern I want to make. So I decided to wait until I got to Palmetto Tat Days.

What enormous luck - there was a copy in the silent auction. I stalked that copy for the whole time I was there as I found that somebody else was bidding on it too. Just before the end of the auction I saw her write on the bidding paper again so I waited for her to wander off and steamed in with another bid and I WON IT. 

I wanted to make it in two colours and without cutting and tying the threads. I managed it with a split chain and a SSSR hiding one inside.

Round one finished

If you look closely at round one you'll see that every alternate hexagon is different to it's neighbour.

Why - you may ask? Well it was because I feared boredom would set in if I didn't do something a little 'off piste' at times.  

I like that expression - ‘off piste’ although I’ve never been up close and personal with skis.  The closest I’ve been to piste is pissed but we won’t go into that in public!!

In this picture you can see I've joined the new six hexagons to the central one and now need to start thinking about which fabrics to use for the next round. Decisions, decisions!!!!

Round and round!

Now although this isn't tatting it does have 'rounds' like tatting!!! Well, that's what I think!!!!

These are the fabrics I've chosen for round 1 of the 'whatever it is'. 

Took ages to decide on what to use and how to use it. Can you see that I ran out of the patterned purple fabric so have popped in a plain one instead.

Now I'm going to have to be VERY careful when I join these six motifs to the central one so that I'm sure that the plain purples are all in the same place. That'll keep us (BC3 and me!) on our toes!!!!

Centre done

The first thing I did was find the fabric that I'd got very little of!!! This then formed the centre.

I've now got to decide what to do for round 1 and I will be sorting fabric to see what I've got of which colours which will go with this central motif.

I finished this last week so have already sorted out the fabric for the next round. Not easy as BC3 kept changing his mind!!!  I could become a world champion at dithering, you know!

A discovery!!!!

Nowadays I tend to go browsing the internet when I start something new. Well - not if it's a tatting project as I THINK I know enough to get myself by on that craft!! 

Something like patchwork does need some research although it's a craft I've done many times over the years. I've found out that it's now called 'English paper piecing' (EPP) which was a surprise to me!!! I guess times change even though there's never enough of it (back to Monday's moan!!!).

I found a really good video on the subject here. The main thing I got from this video was the fabric glue pens!! I'd never heard of them before (I lead a sheltered life!) so, off to the internet and I bought myself a pen!!

Some progress on the project.

Forgot!!

I meant to show you some of the fabric I intend to use in my next project which you've probably guessed by now (and from the paper shapes in my last post) is going to be a patchwork. All hand sewn from the comfort of my tatting chair!!!

I'm so lucky to have such a great choice of colours here and hope that this will be a truly colourful 'whatever it is'.

I've been asked what I'm making when I'm at my craft groups and I can truly and honestly say - I've not got a clue!!!!

A lack of tatting

That's true. I've been trying to finish off the Dora Young white doily which you can see back here but I've now been hijacked or sidetracked by another project!!!

I was given some fabric while I was in America this year and along with other pieces I decided to do some more sewing. 

Now sewing is done in the conservatory which I am too mean to heat. Also it's not pleasant sitting in there in the winter looking out on the rather sad looking garden so I tend not to spend too much time in that room in the winter. 

I decided to do some - well, I'll let you guess from the picture below!!!

Moaning Monday again!!!

Bet you thought '0h NO, not that crotchety old woman AGAIN.  Well  yes but honestly - it's only a small moan today and about something I can do nothing about. Least I don't think I can.

Time!!! That's the subject of my moan today. 

I keep running out of it and can't find new supplies on Amazon or Fleabay (oooops - I mean Ebay).

My routine is to do most of my blog posts on a Sunday morning and put them scheduled in drafts but last Sunday I got waylaid by a neighbour who needed help setting up his new Windows laptop. It was a steep learning curve for me as I think my last major dealings with Windows were back in Vista but I do get to do some when I'm volunteering in the library two sessions a week. 

I can report that a week later we're almost 'done'. The actual setting up wasn't too bad but it was making it easy for the neighbour to use the laptop that took the time. He wanted it to be just like his old Windows 7.

I now have 'time' back in my control for the moment so I really don't need to moan anymore!!!

Tatting with a sting in it's tail.

I try to take a bit of silliness to Palmetto Tat Days when I go. Not easy as there's already a lot of silliness and fun there anyway.

This year I thought of resurrecting the fleas again and infecting people with those but it didn't 'quite' sit right with BC3. Then I thought of other infections and came up with a bug. Yes, boring I know but I do like tatty bugs!!!

This one's got a sting instead of a tail. That sting infects people with the tatting bug!!! 

If you make it (and it's very simple with absolutely no ends to hide or sew in) then be very, very careful how you handle it and who you give it to. 

Thinking about that last sentence - you don't need to be careful as the tatter will already have been stung so it's only really the recipients who need to take care!!!

Another thought about that last sentence - we actually need more people to catch the tatting bug so that the world becomes a place full of contented people making knots in thread!!!!

Having made no sense at all in this post I think I'd better stop right here and give you the link!!