Sugar Sweet

This heart is Betsy Evans's design and tatted by me. The "chain" is just a bunch of split rings. (I LOVE doing split rings! Now if only I could figure out cplit chains...) The back is tied with a small white ribbon. I made this a child size, and by tying the ribbon in the back tighter or looser, it can fit any size child. The ribbon can be trimmed shorter for a smaller neck.

The photo was taken in my bathroom, so the light is a little dim and off color.

- - - - > On another note, I was approached by a shop owner yesterday. She told me of a jewelry store she is opening in late March. She is going to have a section for local artists and wanted me to put some of mine in her store. Ah.........I wasn't quite sure what to say. She asked for a business card, etc. I told her I was strictly small potatoes, really not much, even in inventory. She said that was okay, gave me her card and told me to call her. Wow! That was pretty cool.

Wha'cha think?

Picture one: Red and yellow shells on silver plated filigree square.

Picture two: Cat's eye beads. Interchangeable drops. One for every day of the week and two for Saturday and Sunday.

Picture three: Swarovski crystals in pastels. Very sparkly.

A Thought to Ponder

Do the potatoes that you buy in the store seem to keep getting smaller? To me it seems so. Now if you want the large potatoes, you have to buy them individually, like they are an exotic item. I lived on a farm, when I was much younger, and our main staple was potatoes. As you can see in this photo, we grew 'em big. The potato on the right was an eatin' tater. The one on the left was used as seed for the next year's crop. And some of the middle ones were cut in half and used as seed also.

So what are they doing these days with the big potatoes? What an awesome baked potato that would make, yea?! Makes you kinda say "Hhmmmmmmmmmmm....." doesn't it? Or maybe, "Mmmm!!!"

A warm day at last

We finally have had a couple of warmer days here. The bulbs and trees are really confused, but it is great to be able to let the kids go outside and run wild. Get out that pent up energy kids have natually. Following is from an older post of mine, but it is still relevant. Just need the wheel to be big enough for a teenager now. (Of course, my genious Dad told me how to do this with an exersice bike quite easily. Then said I should take a turn on it. He's right, again.)

From Dec. 2005:

Here's a thought from the "in" side of sane: You know those little wheels in hamster cages? They go round and round.... I need one or two. But I need someone to build it to specifications. It needs to be big enough for a two year old and/or a four year old. Any takers? Anyone out there like to build things? Here's a project for you! I think it would be great. Give the girls some way to get that last bit of energy out before bed. Maybe then they won't get out of bed (six times tonight) every night. And on those rainy days, great way to let them get their exercise. Hey moms, how 'bout those days when you just don't have the energy to take them out to the park? Sick mom, alergy season again? Flu got you down for the count? Pull out the wheel, they can run all they want. Oooo!!!!! Wait, I got one better!!!! You want to cut down their TV time? Electric bill just getting too high? HOOK THAT WHEEL UP!!! Plug the TV into the wheel. Those kids want to watch that video again for the upteenth time? Then run, children, run. They beg to watch a cartoon on Saturday morning? They pick the show, they run. Dont' want to run? No electricity, no tv, no video. That would be the end of the 'couch potato' generation.

Here's some new pictures

Okay, it's been a while. I have lots of pics to post. Hope they all turn out well. I am having so much fun. I have been working on the 3D flowers from Linda. Don't have pictures of those yet, haven't even put any together, just tatting the pieces. I am very excited to see how those will turn out, but am going to tat alot of the pieces first before trying to put any together. This first picture is a choker and earrings (close up of the earrings to the right) I made for my niece. Just need to add the hardware. I'm thinking of hanging a charm or two to it to give it, especially the earrings, a little bit of weight. I can't remember where I saw this pattern on the web last year. If it is yours, let me know and I will post credit to you.



I tatted the Hearts Entwined pattern by Jon. You can find it on her website at the right.











I had so much fun, I did it twice. I am going to keep one for myself and put the other on a card, probably to my mom. On the right is a scan of my first try with two different shades of pink. I didn't like the way it made the lighter one look dirty, which took away from the darker pink's nice color. So I did it all in the darker pink and it turned out nice.


Here is the lighter pink thread. The picture doesn't do it justice. It is such a sweet light pink. Both threads are DMC, size 30. This heart is from Tatting with Visual Patterns by Mary Konier. (I think I spelled her name right.) I really liked this one. Again, I made two, couldn't help myself. I wanted to keep one just for me. I promptly lost the pattern after making the first one and had to tat the second one by looking at the first. It still turned out well. This pattern tats up very quickly. I finished the first one in one evening watching movies.



With the size 30 thread, the Queen of hearts tatted to 2" x 2.25" and the Hearts Entwined to 2.5" x 2." (That's width by height.)



Now my creative brain cells have been going a mile a minute lately. I have been trying my hand at making some jewelry, mostly earrings. And I am having a blast!!! (Not tatted ones, mind you, but I am wanting to put the two together soon.) I've gotten a little website (that I'll post the address of later) to show these off at and maybe sell some of them. I have been trying to take pictures and they are just not turning out nicely. I either get too much light or the colors don't show up as normal or as sparkly as in real life. Since my scanned tatted pieces turn out well, I thought I might try scanning the jewelry, too. As you can guess, 3D items don't scan well. Ha Ha <-- said sarcastically. This is the scan of a silver bell shaped flower with hanging silver chains that have treble clefs attached. The scan doesn't show how nicely the charms hang and dangle. This is all silver plated, so photos with flash or sunlight are too bright and artificial light has made the particulars not show up well in the picture. Any of you pros with posting photos and scans on your blog have any suggestions for me?

And here is the picture of the last bookmark I did for the round robin. I actually had this done before I received the flowered one (previous post) from Bonnie. I guess we were all on the same page with wanting spring to begin. You might notice that the center is like the black choker at the start of this post. Then around the outside I just free handed it. The thread was a DMC 80 in a verigated yellow. Since I didn't have any green thread that size, I dug into my sewing box and came up with a green cotton sewing thread. As I was just going to be tatting chains and not pulling any rings closed with the green, I wasn't too worried about the thread breaking on me. It turned out tiny and light weight.