New Books, HDT, and Even Some Tatting

First of all, I'd like to mention how much I hate snow and ice. Mostly ice. We had some freezing rain Thursday night, followed by a fair amount of snow, 6-8 inches easily. I made it to work alright, however, I had an incident in the parking lot of my workplace. I was walking up to the building when I found a piece of ice. I slipped a bit, but caught myself. I walked a bit when I remembered something I forgot in my truck. I turned around and "found" the same piece of ice. I found myself on my back a second or two later. I'm fine. Just stiff and sore. Made for an interesting day anyway. A few of you commented about the snow on my last post. It isn't uncommon for us to have snow now. The last few years any that we get now melts away, and the snow that stays comes later and later.

I'll move on to the tatting related stuff now. As I mentioned earlier, I recently purchased a couple new tatting books. Both non English. Yeah, I know. I have two more books that I can't read. Both have diagrammed patterns, however. The first book is Japanese:

There's not much to say about the book. It's called Tatting Lace by Sumi Fujishige. There are a lot of nice patterns so you will probably see some of them. The next book is German:

Again, not much to say here either. This is Spitzen-Kreationen by Suzanne Schwenke. There are a number of nice patterns here too. In a way, some of them remind me of Mary Konior's patterns. There are number of motifs that look simple when by themselves but look much more complex when put together. The large doily on the cover is a good example. The single motifs are triangular. I know you will be seeing some of the patterns from this book

Finally, I'll share the small amount of tatting I've done since my last post.

This is the Ariel Glass Mat from Favorite Crochet & Tatting Designs, Book No. 205. This is the second pattern that I had rewritten. As I'm sure you can see, I made a couple of blatent errors towards the end of the motif. I don't know what happened. I've been working a lot lately, so I'll blame it on working too hard. I had planned on continuing tatting the 2nd and 3rd rounds, but I will have to redo it. I also spilled some Coke Zero all over it too, but I was fortunately using an ecru coloured thread, Lizbeth #603 size 20, so it doesn't really show. I really like the way this looks, though the eight "points" are kinda floppy. This could also work for a snowflake if you only did 6 repeats.

And finally (for reals this time!) I will show you the HDT I recently bought.

These are both from Jess. The top one is Havana, and the bottom one is Blue Ridge, both size 20. I don't really have any plans for them right now. I have Blue Ridge wound onto an Ez Bob, and I do plan on using it soon. Perhaps I'll make something from one of my new books.

That's it for now. I'll be going to bed soon. I have to work tomorrow, so I may miss the latest release of Pop-a-Bobbin shuttles from Jane. I do have the link to her shop on my smartphone so if I remember I'll check them out. I have been working on some chainmaille projects too. I hope to get a few of them listed soon. I am offering free North American shipping from now until Christmas for nearly everything. The Sterling silver jewelry is exempt. Due to my price changes, earrings qualify for free shipping too. Till next time.