Thursday, April 16, 2009

Motifs

Welcome All,

The rain is beating on the tin roof (somewhat more gentle than yesterday morning's storm)...a very welcome sound, (even though I have bucket loads of washing to do :()

Here are a couple more Quanti snowflakes. I have chosen to make 25 of these in one year...actually I would need to aim for more like 40 for my Christmas cards this year, but we will see! I thought the gold on the left on was Butterfly metallic, but I now don't think it is. The blue in the centre is Candlelight metallic and the white is Coats crotchet cotton No 20. The other is Perle 8, the verigated is by Anchor (shade 1344) and the solid colour one is a DMC (shade 211). I have not blocked either - thought I would wait for a few more - so they look a bit off. They will be stored until close to Christmas, and it is important they look great then so I will take more pics of groups of snowflakes - blocked and ready to find new homes :) In the meantime, these count as 5 and 6 towards my challenge.

Just before Easter, Diane (Lace Lovin' Librarian) suggested a thread swap ... you know, foster world wide friendship through lace and blogging. As my access to nice threads is limited to mail order much of the time (we do have a great local shop who will source lots, but the time involved is 3 projects long at times) I decided to send her some tools for her new adventure in bobbin lace in exchange for the threads. This was mutually very pleasing! Here is the first 3 rounds of a doily using the gorgeous Lisbeth No 20 thread in shade 632. Those of you lucky enough to be familiar with this thread will know the colour has not been done a justice in this pic! My parcel also included Lisbeth shades 651 (a lovely pale blue) and 660 (a delicious olde world minty green), 3 reels of size 70/80 tatting thread (white, pale blue and verigated yellow) and a hank of Ladyshuttlemaker's hand dyed rain forest. 2 shuttles from Lacis (1 purple [in use for this little project] and a grassy green one) and the delightful book - Tatting by Myra Piper also tumbled out of this little treasure package. Now I really do need more hands!!

I have not forgotten the bobbin lace readers either! This morning I unpinned my Maltese Tape Lace A. This is the first time I have attempted this lace so although there are glaring mistakes, I am rather pleased with the result. The final leg has the Arches stitch, and although a pain to tension nicely I feel I would love to do some more. The basket weave has not shown up so well in the pic, but gives a neat texture to the straight leg and I simply love the ovals stitch in the cross bar.

I am off to join my Oliver Twists hankie...it has been 'resting' for over a week now so should be ready to remove from the pillow. Tomorrow I am going bushwalking with my Joey Scouts (if the rain stops) so that will test the Physio I have endured this week :) Saturday at lace we have a mainland visitor coming along so that should be fun too!
Enough waffle on my part, but your comments are always welcome here :) Until next time, take lots of care, make lots of lace and as always - have lots and lots of fun :)


3 comments:

Lace-lovin' Librarian ~ Diane said...

The A is lovely! I am so tempted to stay up all night and work on bobbin lace now that my obligations for the week have been fulfilled. However, I think I'll do much better if I get a good night's sleep and work in the daylight! I'm glad you like your tatting goodies. I look forward to seeing what you choose to work on next!

Unknown said...

All of your motifs (both tatting and bobbin lace) are beautiful! That Diane sure is a sweetie, isn't she? I love seeing swaps in blogland especially between tatters/lacers! I think it's sweet.

Jenny said...

I am awe of that "A". Beautiful! And so is the tatting