Sorry if you're bored with these moans but they're probably useful to somebody somewhere in the great 'scheme of things'!!!!
Today I'm moaning about abbreviations in patterns.
When I started tatting in 1956 (yes it was shortly after the demise of the dinosaurs) everything was written in longhand which was a big struggle to follow. No diagrams were in the leaflets and booklets I could afford with my pocket money.
Nowadays we have excellent diagrams and shortened notation too. Abbreviations are the 'normal' in patterns and are very welcome, believe me. But there's one thing that I'm noticing more and more and that is new designers inventing new names for the simple things that we 'oldies' know by the original ones.
I was looking at a pattern yesterday and I saw tp. Now what is tp? I looked for the list of abbreviations and there wasn't one in that pattern!!! I guess that tp is vsp (very small picot). Or it could be 'talking point', 'top picot' or even 'try picking' (your nose!!!). I had a guess in the end that it was vsp.
I do wish new designers would check what the 'normal' method of notation is instead of inventing their own. Don't ask me where I saw this pattern as I haven't a clue but there are many out there using 'new' names for what are already acceptable instructions.
Thankfully the practice of calling 'abbreviations' 'legends' has on the whole been lost as that really did annoy this aged old git. A legend is a story of olden times etc and not a list of abbreviations. Still, that's history now in Tat Land!
13 comments:
Jane you started tatting the year I was born ! And yes I agree, I wish everyone would use the same terminology! Hope you’re enjoying your summer �� Lyn
OMG, Lyn, you've made me feel old!!! Enjoying summer? What summer?!?!?! It's been a long grey (as in cloudy) summer but it'll probably get warmer and sunnier once the kids go back to school. Sod's law!!!!
At the very least, the abbreviations need to be explained at the top of the pattern.
We are in a very cold wet Hobart Tasmania seeing our daughter for the first time in 3 years but with all this madness called COVID I wish I was home in WA.
That’s a very good point, Jane. There’s nothing worse than when some people put them at the end of the pattern. A pattern is like a recipe and you don’t put the ingredients that you need at the end - they’re always at the beginning.
In fairness, I suppose the new young designers aren’t steeped in the older methods, and perhaps don’t now that nearly every technique is well entrenched. I agreee that abbreviations must be at the beginning, as they are in knitting patterns,
Your patterns are always very clear, I think there have been only a very few occasions when I’ve needed to ask you for help.
Surely, Maureen, new designers must have learned by following patterns and would know the abbreviations from that? If you set yourself up as a designer then surely you have a very good knowledge of the craft you’re doing and would follow in other’s footsteps?
Everyone knows tp stands for toilet paper. It must have been a very interesting pattern.
Oh, Martha, I wish I’d known that!!! I might’ve attempted the pattern but how do you tat with toilet paper?
I agree with you, Jane. This issue is exactly why I compiled my 'Illustrated Dictionary of Tatting' in the early 'noughties'. A revised edition was published by Lacis in 2007, and is still available at lacis.com for any newbies.
Thanks, Judith. Wish I'd remembered your book when I was waiting the blog but I'll certainly use it for a 'Monday NOT moan' sometime in the future. Probably next Monday. Remind me!!!
TP.... Tiny Porsche?? or Tiny Picot maybe?? I'd go for vsp too!
I’m surprised your comment wasn’t tiny something else, Sue!!!
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