Friday, August 11, 2006

The Doily that Didn't Make it


I haven't written much mostly because I picked up a summer cold. I have been working on some tatting though, mostly things to go in the newsletter. I was planning on including this geometrical doily I did some time ago. Years ago I did snowflakes for my siblings which were enclosed in their Christmas cards. I did one design which I loved, but it took a long time to complete and needing 8 snowflakes in a short amount of time I decided against it.

I started over with a much simpler pattern which worked up quickly but wasn't as lovely, so I did another variation. The second was more intricate and took longer to make. So I did a third variation and then I could decide which one to use. I had 3 of 8 variations so I either needed to make 7 more of one of the choices or keep going and make 5 new variations. Time was running out so I opted for 5 new designs.

I have a crochet tablecloth made up of motives that have a filled in wine glass shape the stem of which is created by a diamond shaped area of open work. This open work looks a lot like tatted rings and every time I looked at the table cloth I wondered if I could re-create it in tatting. What does that have to do with the aforementioned snowflakes? I drew out a possible working plan and selected one of the snowflakes as a starting point. Over the years I have taken several of these snowflakes and turned them into doilies which I call my snowflake doilies. This geometric design was one of them.

It isn't going to make it into the newsletter though. After taking several pictures of it so that I had the design recorded, I gave it away. Trouble is the pictures aren't clear enough to draw a complete pattern from. I'm going to have to re-tat it to get the picture written down and some other things have come up which have taken a big chunk of my tatting time. I suppose I will have to re-do it sometime, but it isn't something I'm looking forward to. Having enjoyed the process the first time through I'm not looking forward to repeating it.

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