What reminds you of mom?

[lavenderbard]

My son went to the library the other day, and came home with a particular book because “I saw it and I thought of you.”

Which book makes him think of me?

The Big Book of Swashbuckling Adventure: Classic Tales of Dashing Heroes, Dastardly Villains, and Daring Escapes, edited by Lawrence Ellsworth

I would guess that this isn’t what reminds most college students of their moms, but Vive la Difference!

And, in other news, I have been slowly revamping the “Art” area of my website into the “Arts and Crafts” area of my website, so that I would have a place to put my tatting patterns. I also included a link to the instructions for the origami fold from Across a Jade Sea, but it looks kind of lonely as the only “craft design” that isn’t tatting. Clearly I need to figure out what else I’ve invented over the years that is worth posting instructions for. My bead dragons, maybe? Or “How to sew your very own Coral Palace gisgir”?

Mirrored on My Website.

Comments

[yhlee]

TATTING DRAGON.

I am pretty sure I would suck at tatting, but your tatted dragons made me want to learn. Is it very hard to pick up? I'd have to do it from Youtube videos and books...

[lavenderbard]

Tatting has a reputation for being very hard, but I think its undeserved. The results look intricate and complicated, but that's just a matter of being able to follow a pattern: 99% of all tatting is made up of one very basic knot. So once you get the knack of doing that one knot it's no big deal.

Without that knack, on the other hand, it's absolutely impossible to do anything. 'Hard' becomes an understatement.

And yes, there is a bit of a trick to doing that one knot. I needed a video. I couldn't 'get' it from the written instructions. Once I found a good video that made it clear how to do it, though, I didn't have any problems. It's not complicated, it's just... a knack.

The online tutorials I learned from are at http://www.tattedtreasures.com/tutorials/

Since I learned myself, I've tried teach three people, and two of them seemed to have no trouble with it either. My youngest daughter, however, thinks its the hardest thing ever. ::shrug::

The easiest way to find out if it'll work for you, is probably to let me put a "Learn to tat" starter kit together for you that has everything you'll need except a pair of scissors. I never use the shuttles I started out with anymore, and I owe you for a whole bunch of macrame cord, anyway. :) Then you could give it a try without having to fuss with finding the right stuff, and if you decide it's not going to work for you, you can always pass along the starter kit to someone else.

[yhlee]

I'd love to take you up on that! :D The results are so beautiful--after you sent me the dragons I hunted around the internet to look at other examples of tatted things.

[lizvogel]

Awesome son!