My Go-to Tatting

I finally finished the doily from earlier post, with the ends still to hide.

Doily #29 from the DMC Book of charted Tatting Designs

Hiding ends is something that I try to minimise when I tat.  I try to tat-over-tails when I join new thread mid-work so I don't have to worry about hiding ends later.  I just need to snip off the thread when I am done.  Where possible, I will use the split chain and/or split ring to jump to the next round.

Back to the doily ....

This may well be my go-to tatting for now, until I come across something else.  

You can see from where the thread ends are that this patterns begins at the small ring in the middle.  If I were to tat this again, I will begin at one of the rings of the flower.  There was a bit of manouvering needed when finishing at  the end.

Alas, ......

The story of my tat-life at the moment.  Can't recall how many times this had happened ..

I only needed enough thread in the shuttle to make three large rings and one small ring and ....!

Trying to get myself out of the rut, I thought I could do like Diane with her Spinning Wheel Glass Mat.  I should have a go-to motif that can get me through periods like this.  It has to be a simple one shuttle and ball motif that I can finish with only one full shuttle of thread.  It has to be a one pass motif because I don't like to have to cut and tie after each round.

Looking through my small collection of tatting books, I found this motif in the DMC Book of charted Tatting Designs.  It is the No.29 Doily on page 28 of the book.  This pattern fits my criteria except for one part where I had to do the SLT, which is not a big problem really.  I used size 40 Lizbeth #109 for this.

Have not actually decided if this is going to be my go-to motif.  If you can see, the flowers all round are cupping a bit, but I suppose it will flatten after pressing.  If I were to do this again, I must remember to put a few extra turns of the thread on the shuttle

Six years of blogging about tatting

Next week will be six years from the date I posted my first entry in this tatting blog.  That entry was to mark my participation in the 25-motifs challenge organised by Sharon Briggs. They have been wonderful six years. I am very thankful for the comments made about my entries through the years.  The comments are what made me continue tatting and blogging, sharing what I know and continue to learn from what I read and see from others.

What better way to celebrate than to have a giveaway, and I know everyone loves giveaways.

This will be a part-blind giveaway.  I am not going to show you what I will be giving away (read as: I am still working on it).  I will be drawing two winners in this giveaway.  Besides getting whatever-it-is-that-I-am-working-on, from the two names drawn, I will flip a coin to determine who will get this,

 Mat no. 34 from the DMC Book of Charted Tatting Designs 

To enter the draw is so easy, just leave a comment, one only, in this blog post only. 
You may read about this giveaway in other places but only comments left in this post will be included in the draw.  I have removed any comments restrictions for the duration of the giveaway.

There is no need to for you be a follower of my blog nor do you need to post about this in your blog/website.

The two names will be picked on 23rd August, which is the date of my first post six years ago, and the winners will be announced soon after. Hopefully, by then I will be able to show what the other gifts are.

I will be announcing the winners through this blog so, please remember to check in here from 23rd August onwards.

Added at 8:45am, 23rd August (my timezone is GMT+8)
Today is the last day to enter your name for the drawing.  I will be making the random selection later today. 

Updated on 23rd August, 8:42pm (GMT+8)
The participation in this giveaway is now closed.  Any comments made after this will not be included in the drawing which I will be making soon.  The two names picked will be announced in my next post.

Mat N0. 34 - complete .. almost

This is Mat #34 from DMC Book of Charted Tatting Designs all finished.

well ... almost complete.

As you can see, the tails are all over the place, in fact five pairs of ends to hide.  It does look like there are more than that but they are the ones that I have tatted over.  I usually leave the tatted-over ends as they are until I complete my piece and will trim them off after blocking.

The doily is not properly blocked yet.  There was a little ruffling effect as I finished the outer round made up of all chains, and I laid it out on the board to see how much I need to stretch out the doily to get it to lay flat.  As it turned out, not much.

This is the one that I wrote earlier where I had run out of the HDT that I started with and I continued with a different thread to finish it.  The was a slight variation of the yellow in the solid compared to the yellow in the HDT, but overall I think it turned out quite nice.

I will be taking it off the board, hide the ends and after giving it a rinse, do a proper blocking.

I am very happy with this project.