Under an African Sky, Part 2

I am enjoying this doiley.  It has made me learn techniques that I was to nervous to try.  Here I am up to row 5.  Row 5 was an easy and quick row to do.  The harder part was to make sure that I had not twisted the chains when I was joining the ends.  I put each three ring section into the blue chain to make sure all was OK and then joined the ends together.  It worked.

Row 6

 

I had to be careful when adding this row.  I kept the yellow in place and only once did I have to un-tat as one set of rings had slipped out of place and, once again, I was not paying attention.

 

My thread order has come in, so, back to Renulek's 2018 Doiley.  I will also be working on this one.  I begin my trees, Interlocking Self Closing Mock Rings, 16 of them.  I will be very comfortable making them when I am done.

Jane, Thank You for this pattern!  Mine will be called Berkshire Spring.  We still have eight inches of snow on the ground but it should be gone soon.  Our weather is to go into the 40s next week.  I am so looking forward to spring.   

What?!

I have finished 10 rows of Renulek's 2018 Doiley.  Ten rows took one ball of thread.  I wound up six bobbins to begin row 11.  I had part of one bobbin left over from row 10.  As I did three repeats it just wasn't looking correct.  I looked harder and noticed that my bobbin thread sizes didn't match.  I had a size 20 thread in one shuttle and a size 40 thread in the second shuttle.  I went to fix it and realized that I had run out of size 20 thread.  I wasn't paying attention.  I had two balls of size 40 and one of size 20 in this color when I began.  I started with the wrong size thread!  I was going to make this Doiley in size 40 thread.  Again I say, I wasn't paying attention!    I now wait until more thread comes in in size 20.  Sigh.

I need to work on something.  

I have been watching Renulek's 2018 Doiley tatted by others and it fascinates me that people use multiple thread colors.  I am not a good thread color designer.  What was I to do.  I had to wait, I needed an idea and I really wanted to use more that one thread color in my doiley.  I decided to start Under an African Sky by Jane McLellan.  I have had the pattern for awhile but the beginning looked to hard.

I thank Tatting Lace in Grace and Umi & Tsuru for showing me how to do the Interlocking Self Closing Mock Ring.  Their Blog instructions were wonderful.  This is something I don't know that I would have figured out so quickly without their help.  Try #1 and #2 are pictured above.  This it try #3 below.  It is almost good, one of the rings wasn't put in properly.

Here is my fourth try and not so bad if I may say so myself.

I have added the sky to my sun. 

This is a fun pattern to do, now that I am doing it.  I shall keep with this until my threads come in and then will finish both of them.  I am paying more attention now.

Thank you for visiting and enjoy tatting.  May you pay better attention than I.

Pincushions

I was picking up yesterday and kept running across pincushions.  I love pincushions!  I decided to put them all in one place to see what I had, two of them are missing.  They are with some project and I will come across them eventually.  Here is the group.

These are my store bought tomato pincushions.  The pink holds little and fancy straight pins.  The yellow holds different size sewing machine needles that have not been used 10 times for embroidery projects or for 6 hours of machine sewing.  (After that I replace them.)  The little red one holds different size hand sewing needles.  I have tried to label it but I keep getting them mixed up.

The one on the left belonged to Mom.  When she was a nursing student, a nurse crocheted it for her.  She made me, my sisters and her sisters each one.  She used the pincushion for the pattern.  Hers is well worn and well loved.  I remember as a kid rearranging the straight pins into certain patterns or pin top color groupings.  I use mine to keep my nursing school pins, the first pin from my husband and the two pins that I would use on my neck stock when showing or fox hunting (oh so long ago).

My mother volunteered at Hancock Shaker Village in the gift shop.  She also made Shaker pincushions to sell there.  She did not accept any money for them, it was her gift to the village.  She made all three of these.  The grey velvet one is one of her first.  It is stuffed with sheep wool as that is what the Shakers originally used.  The one on the Shaker Pincushion stand was a gift to me from her.  She made the pincushion and put together the stand.  The blue one was hers and she put the pin on it.  I have left it there.  One that I don't have to show is one that she made as a rattle.  It has a bell deep in the center of it that makes a great noise.  Sweet Thing #3 has it, the first of her pincushion collection.

The little one on the left was embroidered for me by Sweet Thing #3, a Christmas gift two years ago.  The two log cabin block pincushions are from a bunch that I made two Christmas' ago and gave away.  These are the two that I kept.  They are filled with ground walnut shells.  The little blue one in the basket is another that came from my Mother.

 

These are my two magnetic ones.  I guess I have to call them a pin holder since I cannot push a pin into them.  They each hold a different size quilting/sewing straight pin.  The black one is wonderful to use to pick up dropped pins from the floor.  They just zip onto it so quickly.

 

I love pincushions, love using them and love making them.  Have a grand day and thanks for visiting.