Tatting when you're bored

At work the other day I was waiting on decisions to be made and changes to be done by a couple of other people.  I was listening and doing my part in the job but only so many people can fit in one small area at a time.  While standing there I noticed a few thin wires on the floor that had been the tail of some cable or other.  As they hadn’t quite made it to the trash yet I picked them up and started fiddling with them instead of throwing them away.  Noticing the size, color and length I tried tatting with them.

When you’re bored you’ll tat with anything

I made the ring on the right first, then a smaller ring that didn’t close.  With another couple of scrap wires, one green the other white, I made the rings with the chain between.  I even joined the rings though I had not left a picot.  There was still a lot of white wire left which I wound around the wire tails of the first two rings.  I did not try tatting that part, my fingers were already feeling the strain of working with wire.

No, I did not use a shuttle to work with the wire, I finger tatted it.  The shuttle is only for reference to the size of the wire tatting.  The wire is about 24 gauge but due to the stiffness does not tat small.  I made the white chain using direct tatting but the rings I did normally.

I knew that tatting with wire could be done; I’ve tried before but never with coated wire.  It was challenging but fun.  I don’t think I’d want to make any large project out of it though – talk about hard on the hands!

“Nobody is bored when he is trying to make something that is beautiful, or to discover something that is true.” William Ralph Inge                                                       www.brainyquote.com

Finn on the edge

Now comes the hard part - sewing an edging to the material.

At least it is for me.

The fun is in the tatting - and the end result when it's completely on the material.  The actual sewing-on is slow.

'Finn' edging © Wanda Salmans

I had trouble making up my mind which side of the tatting would be 'up', or sewed to the material.  Originally it was supposed to be the other way 'round.  I took a picture of it on my phone both ways  so I could quickly go back and forth to make the decision.

'Finn' edging © Wanda Salman close up

When making the edging the rings with only one picot were going to be attached to the material.  Having decided the other side looked better put me in a bind as to how to sew it on.  Laying the rings on top of the material instead of at the edge looks great but it also means sewing each picot down as well as a stitch right at the edge of the material.

Having to flip to the back-side for every stitch to make sure the backing didn't get caught is a real pain.  It will be worth it but makes the stitching go even slower than usual.

It will be worth it, it will be worth it, it will be worth it.

If said often enough will it make it go easier and faster?

I have a bag with lots of doodles (okay, all over the house I have doodles....) from the tail end of projects, those little bits of thread left on a shuttle that I hate to throw away but isn't enough to do much with except make butterflies and flowers out of. I was trying to come up with different ways and places to use them when I had a thought.  I don't know that it was a good one but I have so many of these doodles that will never get used that I'm not wasting anything except maybe my time.

The idea is to make the tatting look like it is part of the wood or metal. These are wooden pieces but I thought maybe it could work on metal as well.  I have some plain metal picture frames that I thought would look cool to have 'metal' tatting on them.  I'm not there yet but I'm going to try again.  

If nothing else it's a fun experiment.

What do you think?

"I love fools' experiments. I am always making them."

Charles Darwin

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Trying Triangles

The other day I wanted to tat but had no thought about exactly what except something simple that didn't take a lot of thinking.  I had Lizbeth #670 Victorian Red size 20 thread in my bag so wound a shuttle and started tatting.  

It started out as a simple edging then I thought to turn a corner. 

 At one point I thought of making this a square or rectangle and then got the bright idea to do a triangle.  That worked out pretty well but it needed something in the center.  If I had known what I was doing it would have been much easier to start with the center instead of filling it in last.

Several ideas presented themselves but this is what came out of it.  The circle of rings was easy but it didn't quite fill in enough, so I tried stitching it in. I like the corners but I'm not sure I like the way the bare thread goes around the center.  Overall I like how this turned out.
I ended up having to do a lot more thinking than I planned to for this.  It's finished, now what?  Maybe join several together? It could make an interesting doily, couldn't it?

I'm finishing up several projects, and have been for a week or so. They really are almost done, just need a few little things completed and I could share them.  Now, if I can just stay with them long enough to finish them.

"All life is an experiment.  The more experiments you make the better."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
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