Drat and Tat

It's been a pretty difficult few weeks. My health has set me back to about where I was this time last year. Hopefully it won't take me that long to get back on the right track again. But enough about that. If you are interested, you can read more on my other blog.

Because I'm trying very hard to be positive right now (despite everything being so blah) something good did come out being in hospital. My room mate taught me how to Tat.

And, because tatting is something I can do with yarn that does not bother my arthritis, I'v quickly become obsessed with it.

It's absolutely amazing. You make this knot, and then with a slight flick of the wrist, you make the knot jump from one thread to the other. In that way, you can make knots with your working yarn, send them jumping to the other yarn and pull the working yarn though the knots it made. Sounds complicated. But I tell you, it wasn't difficult for me to understand once I saw it done. The moment I saw that first knot jump from one thread to the other, I knew this is what I wanted to do.

It's funny when you think about it - I'm not a big fan of lace. But I love tatting.

After playing around with some of the patterns in Mrs Beeton's needlework book (which are really easy to understand, not like modern day patterns) I decided that I wanted to make this (pdf).

To acquire the skills I need to make a TARDIS, I've been working my way though these AMAZING tatting lessons. Once I've perfected the split ring, I'll have to head down to my local yarn/needle work shops in search of some dark blue cotton (or silk) and probably more tatting paraphernalia.