The Un-Learning
or .... another way of looking at it ... it's not just about the flip.
Do you still remember how you first learn to tat, shuttle tatting in particular.
How your fingers have minds of their own and wouldn't just go the way you want them.
How they cramp up stiff trying to keep the loop thread in place.
How the little pinkie turned black and blue from the many turns of the ball thread around it so that it will not slide.
How you did the happy dance when you finally get the thread to flip.
How the loop grew smaller and smaller as you make the flipped stitches because you don't want to let it go in case you cannot get it back round your fingers again.
Then .... when you are confidently flipping your double stitches, someone comes along and say to you ... " No, don't let the thread flip!" .. and you go ......
"What the ______ (fill in the blank)! after all the trouble I've gone through, now you are telling me don't flip?"
Well, what can I say. Tatters are very creative and have come up with various techniques to use for making tatting more beautiful. And now we are un-learning the flip for some of these techniques like the split ring and the daisy picot, or the front-side/back-side tatting.
What? Tatting has a back-side? *rolling eyes* that is for another day, :-)
No tatting to show this time. I have not tatted any since the last post.
Do you still remember how you first learn to tat, shuttle tatting in particular.
How your fingers have minds of their own and wouldn't just go the way you want them.
How they cramp up stiff trying to keep the loop thread in place.
How the little pinkie turned black and blue from the many turns of the ball thread around it so that it will not slide.
How you did the happy dance when you finally get the thread to flip.
How the loop grew smaller and smaller as you make the flipped stitches because you don't want to let it go in case you cannot get it back round your fingers again.
Then .... when you are confidently flipping your double stitches, someone comes along and say to you ... " No, don't let the thread flip!" .. and you go ......
"What the ______ (fill in the blank)! after all the trouble I've gone through, now you are telling me don't flip?"
Well, what can I say. Tatters are very creative and have come up with various techniques to use for making tatting more beautiful. And now we are un-learning the flip for some of these techniques like the split ring and the daisy picot, or the front-side/back-side tatting.
What? Tatting has a back-side? *rolling eyes* that is for another day, :-)
No tatting to show this time. I have not tatted any since the last post.
You make me laugh! The flip, no-flip thing is a toughie... I'm sure no one turned to Shaun Johnson and said, "Great job, now let's build on your skills - stop flipping."
ReplyDeleteI very much appreciate your wonderful unflipping split ring tutorial and hope to not flip more often in the future!
Back-side? Yes, please save that for another day!
Ann
GREAT post.
ReplyDeleteI haven't learned to do a split ring yet, and I was a bit frightened when I read I would have to un-learn the flip. What the flip? (a term actually used in place of the F bomb where I grew up) how do you tat without the flip? Then I continued on to your split ring tutorial. . . That is amazing! You explain it so well! I am so excited to learn it I am getting off the computer right now and going to practice the non flip split ring!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the awesome tutorial!
Hi Jon, you often give me a giggle with the way you say things, I look forward to your post about the backside of tatting.
ReplyDeleteas for me, frontside/backside is the only way to tat
LOL, it always seems that just when one thinks, "I've got it!" - the rules change! Sort of like chasing rainbows.
ReplyDeleteYes, I think I remember feeling this way when I did my first split ring, LOL! It was so hard NOT to make the threads switch!
ReplyDeleteVery amuzing and oh, so true. I remember the first time I read in a pattern, "don't flip the stitch." "WHAT?" Keep the new things coming!
ReplyDeleteWhat a fun post for me to start my day ^_^
ReplyDeleteI remember last month when I learned from Ellen to make a lock chain, and I had trouble to unflip the last ds...I mean how hard it is to unflip it? It's like the BASIC of learning shuttle tatting. Everyone has done it in a first place, even before we able to make a flipped DS ^_^
I know how you feel - I just taught myself the split ring, and boy was it tough! I kept wanting to flip the thread.
ReplyDeleteLOL I'm new to tatting and I find this post hilarious!!
ReplyDeleteAll that time used to master the flip and now you have to master the un-flip??
How is it that yo have to learn something that was considered a 'mistake' that you were trying so hard not to do in the first place! The brain is going to be real difficult in accepting this ROFL!
Thank you for all the beautiful and hilarious comments to this post. If you all had a giggle reading my post I was chuckling to myself reading your comments. The bottom line is - every tatter will face this as one of the steps to improve our tatting skills.
ReplyDeleteAs for the analysis of the back-side tatting, it will be a long wait because I have not done enough of it to be able give an insight.
What, what, what, I can't flippin' well flip.......... Oh well, better learn somat new (again) I s'pose. Actually I tried the upside down spider method, at least I think that is what it is called, but either I haven't got enough fingers, only got four and the thumb(!) or, and this is the most likely, my fingers ain't long enough. Sigh, always something new to learn. Oh well, at least I'm not one of those who says they are too old to learn, when I do I'll be kicking up the daisies - tatted ones I hope!
ReplyDelete