Design Name Change

Hi all! Just a quick post to let you know that I've decided to change the name of the snowflake from my design tutorial from Isis, to "Design Tutorial Snowflake." As many of you know, the terrorist group ISIS has been in the news for the past few months. I had named my snowflake right before all of this happened, thinking of Isis as the Egyptian goddess. Just a few days after I posted my pattern, I heard about ISIS on the news. For the past few months I have been going back and forth trying to decide if I should change the name. After some email feedback I decided to go ahead with the change.

I didn't want anyone to be upset by the name, or to avoid tatting this snowflake. I also didn't want to look at my pattern anymore and be reminded of something which it does not represent. Right now, the current pattern override is 19.7 MB when it should only be 2 MB. I will take a closer look at that later. I will also go through my posts and make sure any relevant information has been corrected. Thank you for your understanding!

Slow Progress

I haven't been tatting much lately, so although Round VI is a very easy one, it has taken me a few weeks to complete. Here is my latest progress on the Stawasz Doily Tat-along:

I like to use a folding chair as a foot rest while I tat, which also doubles as a resting place for the doily when I am not working on it. It looks very small on the chair, but my eyes have gotten used to looking at size 100, so anything larger would look really big by comparison:

I still haven't made it through my first ball of thread yet. I wonder how much of the doily I can complete before running out. I have one more full ball of size 100, which I got for free because Handy Hands mistakenly sent me white instead of ecru on a previous order. They have great customer service and let me keep the ball of white thread as well as sending me the correct color. So, if I can finish the project with two balls of thread, that will be a total cost of $3.75, which is kind of funny to think about for such a massive project. I also wonder how long I can keep it on the folding chair before it gets to be too big and starts to spill over...

Stawasz Tat-along: Round V

I finally completed Round V of the Stawasz Mega Doily last night, dampened it with a wet paper towel, and let it dry overnight.

Don't get me wrong, I really do like using size 100 thread. I found, however, that because the thread is so small and highly twisted, it has a tendency to form into a knot while I am trying to close rings. I have to be very careful each time I close a ring, repeatedly straightening the thread to make sure it doesn't knot up on itself. It is a real pain when it does, because even the small picks on my Clover shuttles are too large to undo it. I have to use a size 10 sharp needle (the one I use to sew in ends) and stab at the knot until it comes undone. I have pretty good eyesight but I cannot actually see how the thread is knotted because it is so small.

Anyhow, here is another photo to give a better idea of the size of the doily so far. It is pictured with two antique bone tatting shuttles, the kind that have a simple design etched into them:

According to Heidi Nakayama, these bone shuttles were often mailed out as a gift for obtaining one new subscriber to Needlecraft magazine. This promotion ran from 1916 until 1923. Her book, Tatting Shuttles of American Collectors, is a great read if you like antiques or have a tatting shuttle collection of your own.