Tatting

I know I made a promise of Tatting post that I missed my deadline for but this has been a crazy week.  I might of made some bad choices in how I spent my evenings adding to my already exhausting schedule.  This caused me to have delirious dreams like being married to Thor (the hot recent movie version Thor) but lost in a strange mad Carnival just like the series Carnivale.

Anyways.... The point is I was sick with exhaustion Wednesday and called in sick at work.  Then I had to muster the strength to be able to teach double classes in the afternoon and evening.
Enough excuses and eye candy we move onto my experience teaching myself tatting with a Book and some bad you tube tutorials.

This is the book I used.  I got it from my Library.  It had very high rating on Amazon so I thought it must be worth it.  I opened it up to see the drawings below and the words WTF immediately slipped through my lips.  I knew it would be a bit painful and certainly repetitive and cramped fingers with many curse words and hours.

I was able to decipher being able to do the first know and what I thought was the second knot.  Oh how I was wrong.  I attempted to watch some you tube videos showing it but I was left with more WTF's wondering who these people were and how unexciting they were, lot's of heavy breathing and strange background noises as well. 

This was my first bloody attempt and you can see the shuttle I am using.  Below is how twisted and mangled it was because I thought I was doing it right but really I wasn't.

It took me something like 3 hours to do this tiny piece.

This one below is when I had my AH HA moment and got it right.  Then of course I jumped right into a much bigger and more complicated pattern.

Ta Dah!  I got this in the bag!  My nearly finished larger flower tatting.  That only took me perhaps an hour to do the entire piece.  I am getting better and faster.

When done right it looks beautiful.  I can easily see how this could occupy a lot of your time back in the Victorian days before TV and lot's of parlor sitting.  How it shows a lady's grace is beyond me.  I am very happy to add this new talent to the things I can do however I am not sure I can use it as I had originally intended for pieces in my design work.  We shall see.

Tatting like a lot of fiber arts is a series of knots or loops arranged into a pattern.  I feel that bobbin lace and tatting are like cousins to each other where tatting is the more simple process.  These are words that should of probably been at the top of the blog instead of my eye candy Thor, but isn't eye candy Thor better?