New Threads & Snowman Progress

Hello, my friends. I found lots of wonderful goodies in the mail this week thanks to the Thread Exchange. The first is from crazymomtats; the second image is from Paige Marie. Both ladies were very generous. Crazymomtats sent me some extra thread (the last of her favorite Anchor size 40), and Paige sent me some lovely beads and buttons to play with and a 'spool' to load thread on. I've tatted with those, Paige. They make great emergency shuttles.

I forgot to tell you about the exchange I received last week from umintsuru. All of the threads are on little flower shapes. I would love to show you how they unfold, but I just couldn't get a decent picture.

Lastly, here is my progress on Jane Eborall's Snowman. Let me say that all of the problems I've had with this pattern are entirely of my own making and have nothing to do with Jane's design or pattern-writing skills. My tatting has been done when I'm tired and in very short spurts. You might be able to see that I missed a couple of joins under the head. I failed to read Jane's instructions and just glanced at the diagram before surging forward. I think it will still work out fine though.

I want to thank all of you who blog or participate at InTatters or The Tatting Forums. I've really enjoyed keeping up with what the rest of you are doing when I'm just too tired to work on my own projects. Keep them coming!

Zoo Flakes Challenge Progress

I took another step today in Isdihara's Zoo Flakes Challenge. I have a design drawn up, with stitch counts, ready to be tested. You must wait to see the design when it is finished. Anyone else joining the challenge? The ideas in the back of the book for creating a paper snowflake can be a great way to get your design started.

The Weekend Check-In

The first full week of fall classes has ended and I survived! I'm taking the evening for family time and then tomorrow it is back to the books. I'd at least like to start class Tuesday feeling organized.

I did a little tatting therapy this week. It's just a good thing that I'm more process oriented than product oriented! I decided to tat Jane Eborall's Snowman in size 3 perle cotton. Effort #1 is on the right side. I was almost half done with his body when I realized I had no place to join the next row! I had started the body in the wrong place! I could have salvaged his head, but family opinion was that I had used beads which were too small for this thread. So I cut out the beads to save for another project, dug out some bigger beads and started again. As I was completing this 2nd head with fingertatting (running out of thread on the shuttle), I suddenly realized I had omitted a picot from the last ring. While this would not normally be a big issue, I don't think I have enough thread to go back, add those double stitches, and still finish without having to add in some additional thread. And I'm soooo close to the end! Ah well. I will do what needs to be done, but probably not today.

The other picture is my gift to self which finally arrived in the mail. The 'finally' is more an indication of my impatience for its arrival than a comment on slow delivery. I've thoroughly enjoyed browsing its pages and look forward to tatting up some of Lyn's patterns. It is a beautiful book. I'm thrilled with the quality of the publication as well as the many lovely patterns.

Well, gotta run. My daughters will be showing up any minute for our little party.