Martha's kitty

This is another of the patterns in Martha’s new book.  Isn’t it so cute?  

Thanks to Martha I’m now back in designing ‘mode’ too so watch out for some more fun to come.  

The King has arrived!

Nothing to do with crafting today!!  I’m posting this because - well, just because.

I have a boring grey car like so many other people here in the UK.  I am also HOPELESS at knowing any car’s make or model and class cars as ‘posh’ or ‘just a car’.  In fact cars to me are ‘that red car’ (a rare thing) or ‘looks expensive to me’.  So years ago when I realised I had this ‘brain problem’ I decided that I needed to have something to enable me to find my own car easily.  We have on street parking and you often can’t find a spot near the house so it’s a case of ‘hunt that grey car’ when you’ve forgotten where you left it a week or more ago.  

To make sure I can find my own car I had a solar ‘jiggly’ on the dashboard - our late Queen.  Sadly last winter she got knocked flying as I was trying to de-mist the window and she became crippled beyond repair.  

She’d been given to me by some good friends round the corner and I replaced her with a snowman just because there happened to be one nearby!

They saw this and decided that I really ought to have a King in the car and very kindly bought me a King.  So Charles is now guarding my car and I’ll be able to find it again when I need it!!!  Thank you, S & S.  I really appreciate my new guardian.

Starting the second scarf

As you know I bought two balls of this yarn but this time I wanted to use another pattern.  I went on a search but couldn’t make up my mind (I’ve got an honours degree in dithering) so decided to look into crocheting one instead!!!

I found this one on Ravelry  

I need something I can do while I’m chatting.  Guess what?  I’ve still managed to make mistakes!!! 

This is growing much more quickly because it’s crocheted so I’ll soon have to find something ELSE I can do while I’m talking!!

Test tatting

Before I start I am delighted to say that Etsy removed the offending item and has contacted the seller.  

I had the very great pleasure of test tatting again for Martha Ess and her new book which should be ready shortly.  In fact I’ve got another one to try for her which I will show you another day.

It’s always a pleasure to test tat for Martha as her patterns are SO well written.  It becomes (for me) a real ‘test of a test tatter’ because the patterns rarely have mistakes in them.  I find I have to concentrate really hard which does mean that BC3 has to be wide awake!!!

Major Monday Moan

Some years ago a tatter contacted me to ask permission to teach one of my patterns and I pointed out that it was far too long for a class.  However, without any further contact with me she did take part of my pattern, repurposed it and offered that as a class.  She re-wrote it (badly in my opinion) and the organisers recognised it as part of one of my patterns so added that her pattern was ‘inspired by’ myself. 

Roll on to another occasion when I happened to be sitting in a room not far from this person and heard her complaining about ‘her’ pattern being stolen by another person on another continent who had had it published in a magazine.  Here was I within hearing distance listening to MY pattern having been stolen by a thief.  What did I do?  Well, nothing.

Roll on another few years and this person is doing it again.  This time she’s selling an item from my pattern site in her Etsy store.  I have reported this to Etsy as I have a Creative Commons licence on my site.

Why do I have this licence?  Think about it.  Many months of work are spent on making a design and I don’t see why people should then take MY hard work (which I give freely) and make money from it without even mentioning their source either.  

End of Monday moan.