Liyarra's Tatting Nook

Tonight we lost one of the great dogs of my life. My Alli. Taken too soon at just 8 years of age. We encountered Alli on the way home from a trip to Mt Buller with Susanne (Dantatter) during her trip out here in 2006. A random stop that started an amazing set of events. Susanne had never owned a dog and for an hour or so Alli was actually hers! But once handed over to Jamie it was evident whose dog companion she really was. My heeler was getting on and we convinced Jamie to get her and Susanne and I went over and collected her. Alli went to work with Jamie every day and was his constant companion. When Jamie died, Alli was instrumental (along with Terra and the horses) in keeping me on this earth. A fun, crazy, and sometimes frustrating, but loyal and obedient dog that I adored. She watched over me with sincere patience and concern and licked away my tears or goaded me into action when I was down. Alli was "out of sorts" one morning when I came home from work. Prior to t...

There I was, happily tatting along on a project I started way back in 2011 and feeling pretty darn good about it all when..... CRASH! BANG!!! CRAP CRAP CRAP ( an other assorted naughty words....) TOTALLY messed this one up LOL Not all is lost though. I didn't like the thread anyway so I am restarting this one in Cordonet Special...Stay tuned. The fleet will continue it's journey....

Another Stawasz beauty. This time done in Cordonnet Special...much nicer to tat with although still a bit stiff for my liking. Even this one had it's fair share of lapses in concentration!!

Doing a roaring trade here in UFOs! This is a pattern from Renulek  http://renulek.blogspot.jp/search/label/serwetka%20%C5%9Bnie%C5%BCna%20-%20on%20line Her doilies are just brilliant to tat. Thank you for sharing your vast talent with us Renulek! Will certainly be trying more from this site. This one is the Spring Doily Done in Perfect Quilter. Off to a flying start! Until I wasn't......joined in totally the wrong place! Easy fix! Nearly done without any more hitches! Ta da!!!!!!!! Not going any further with this one because I ran out of thread. Like it at this point anyway! .

Never been so happy to have a project finished..... and that is all I have to say on this matter LOL

Frustrated and mildy pissed off at the moment. I picked a pattern by Jan Stawasz to do a show entry this year and have really been looking forward to tatting something special again. Got to here: Not too bad. One join in the thread so far but luckily I was able to swap shuttles and finish last 3 ring/chains without hitting it. Got this far....... Reasonably happy but a bit annoyed. A few slubs in the thread that I managed to smooth out or bypass before reloading shuttles. Wasted quite a lot of thread in the process and disappointed in the uneven texture of the thread. Starting to regret my decision to do it in Lizbeth 20. THEN........ Well let's just say that I might be off to Hector next year on the contents of the swear jar! Fox you would have been proud of me! 3 knots - 3 pain in the arse stupid messy badly timed and really really annoying knots in the thread. Seriously Handy Hands - how about some quality control for the price of this thread eh? So now I have joins in the ...

Just opened up the second Stawasz book and this pattern on page 59 jumped out at me and screamed TAT ME!!!!!! 7.5 hours.....2 full restarts from the second row and one whole third row cut off...LOTS of regret using Lizbeth 20 (feels like rope and has slubs all over the place)....sworn at and chucked in the bin. ( Gunna miss that fireplace!!) But it is done as far as it is going to get this week at least. Rows from here on hopefully won't be so cruel!....long chains - Always a challenge! I am SOOOO out of practice! (not blocked yet but had to prove I was back!!) lol