Color of Thistle

 Nature walks in the area around the ballpark (Miller Park in Milwaukee) is one of the best places to avoid crowds these days, as strange as that may seem. There's abundant plant life including thistle, which is beautiful in its own way. 

I tried to dye colors like what I saw in the thistle flowers. Nature is much more vibrant than I can capture with a camera or dye, but the results are pretty, and have been listed in my Etsy shop.

Hand dyed Interpretation of TotusMel's Bracelet

 Many thanks to TotusMel for generously sharing her beautiful Corsage pattern. I chose to use my hand dyed thread in size 5 and followed her pattern using a shuttle. The gauge seems to work up about the same as the needle tatted original in size 10, but with less stretch. Of course results will vary according to the thread tension of the individual, and I tat very tightly.

 Instead of the hook and eye closure used in the pattern, I added an extra ring to each side piece, attached nylon cord and finished with a sliding macrame knot.

 This unique tatting shuttle from Rita Richmond's Shuttle by Design has a picture of "Our Lady of Guadalupe". The image of the saint gave me a feeling of peace, and I needed that. 

Double Flower Celtic

My video demo of this tatted flower is now on YouTube https://youtu.be/gn5G3aeHesg 

There's a left handed video there too, but I am not ambidextrous! I simply use an app to flip the video mirror image. Here's the left handed link: https://youtu.be/A8SWcA0BCMQ

The written pattern is a free download: https://www.keepandshare.com/doc/8252024/double-flower-celtic-pdf-465k?da=y 

This simple design originally appeared in 2013 in this blog post: https://yarnplayertats.blogspot.com/2013/07/double-flower-using-celtic-shuttle.html 

The Celtic shuttle that I used is this kind: https://hhtatting.com/product-category/shuttles/special-celtic-shuttles/?v=7516fd43adaa

By the way, since I sometimes get asked: 

No, there will NOT be a needle tatted version, since needle tatting really isn't my thing. But needle tatters can absolutely tat this pattern using the tatting techniques that correspond to your tool.

Have fun tatting and stay safe!

Hand Dyed and Good News

"Garden Afternoon" hand dyed thread

If you have purchased classes from Bluprint/Craftsy or had a subscription there, the good news is that the classes will live on! Bluprint has been acquired by TN Marketing, more information here: https://www.mybluprint.com/

It is quite a relief to me that this amazing video library of knowledge will not simply disappear. TN Marketing will be launching a new website (with a new name to be announced later) for the Bluprint classes in September 2020. Existing subscribers to Bluprint, and past buyers of individual "own forever" classes will continue to have access to their content on the Bluprint site through August 2020, after that they'll be hosted on the new website.

So far, the communications I've received from the new owners have been friendly and encouraging.

In other news, fresh batch of hand dyed "Garden Afternoon" has been added to my Etsy shop!

Update 2021: it's back to being Craftsy! https://www.craftsy.com/