A Tatting Fiasco

Strictly figuratively speaking; today I have turned around and may have flipped my vehicle in so doing.

Some time ago (October of 2007) I started the T.A.T. Tatting Proficiency Program. The first project required size 10 thread and I decided to use the shuttles that appear in my September 20, 2007 post on this blog.

Shortly thereafter I had an allergic reaction to a medication and the swelling caused my tendons to become inflamed so I had to quit tatting for a while.

Recently I have started tatting again and shortly after my return to the art I became involved with an online Design class.

Since I had these shuttles still loaded from the end of 2007 I decided to use them.

I remember how much trouble some of us had with these shuttles. Since the ends did not close very well the shuttles have a tendency to run away should you let one loose. I have watched video of the maker tat so I know that my manipulation and his are very different so I can see how it would not be a concern for him.

In the design class I did a simple second row pattern and was fairly happy with the look. But, I decided to try some simple modifications as an aside. Well today I was making a join and I shredded the thread. Grabbed the wrong hook I think. Well between torn thread and frustration with the shuttles I cut the project (literally) and unscrewed the shuttles (three at this point) and removed the thread.

The shuttles have been packed with my other archived shuttles and I will return to the project I started to take with me on vacation last July. But I will need to decide which shuttles to use with size 10 thread. I have a few clovers that would run away, clicking all the way down, with size 20, but they are small, especially compared with the ones I have retired.

Well I felt I had to rant so as a little gift for your time here is a picture of my design project. All rings are 4-4-4-4 and all chains are either 10 or 5-5. I just ask for fair attribution should you attempt to copy it. I will post a pattern someday.


TTFN
Pat T.

It is hard to believe it was last November when I last made a posting. I knew I was inconsistent but that is a bit much. The name Tattered Musing originally reflected my obsession with tatting. But due to many obstacles I have done little in tatting until recently.

I have been taking a bobbin lace class but since finishing my last project (June 18, 2009) I have had little time for hobbies, sort of.

We did take a vacation mid-July to Great Wolf Lodge in Grapevine Texas. In preparation for vacation I started Mary Konior’s Network in a vivid pink. I was so out of practice that my tension changed so much taht about a quarter of the way through I decided it was not worth continuing.

I bought some of the new Lizbeth thread in a beautiful blue and began Mary Konior’s Spinning wheel (glass mat version). I did do a little on vacation though on the last day at Great Wolf Lodge I had to do a little retro-tatting and there was not enough light. So I waited until I got home.

Since then I have occasionally been able to work on the tatting. I have also been trying to find time to work on a Spanish Bobbin Lace pillow. For my birthday a couple of weekends ago I received some nice Spanish Bobbins and some small square bobbins.


I went to Jo-Ann’s a couple of days ago (Tuesday) and ran into my Lace Teacher (who does not live in Austin). She had just come from the class, which I have not been able to attend all summer. My son shouted “Oh, you’ll be able to go next week,” when school starts. I had not even thought about that. The official start date for the class is September 14, 2009, but we still meet between sessions.

So now I need to start that Bedfordshire project since I won’t have the Spanish Pillow ready by next week for the Torchon piece I want to study.

I guess my main concern right now has to do with scissors. I started working on an online design class and decided to empty some bobbins holding size 10 crochet cotton. I set up a second box to carry my tatting around in.


Unfortunately the only scissors that fit this box are my Gingher Stork embroidery scissors. Cutting the size 10 I started to worry about the scissors, they felt strained. So I wrote Gingher. They think I should be using my W-4 or my W-5s. They do not fit in the box. So I will be real careful and only use the tips when I have to cut a thread sticking out of the double stitches.

With my bobbin lace, I have a bigger box and have a pair of Gingher Lion Tail embroidery scissors for finishing work. I have a pair of detail scissor for most thread cutting.

Well back to tatting, if I have time after the laundry.

Take care!

Fig. 53 Handbuch Der Schiffchenspitze, band 2.

Yesterday (24 Nov 2008) I finished another of the figures related to fig. 51 in Tina Frauberger’s Handbuch Der Schiffchenspitze, band 2. Like fig. 52, fig. 53 encloses fig. 51.

I am for the most part pleased with my work. My tension is still inconsistent but my bridge and split ring are better than in fig. 52. I used a lock stitch at the end of the chain leading to the last ring and at the end of the bridge I brought the last stitch out the bottom of the chain. This results in the threads exiting in the direction of the split ring.

In fig. 52 I did a normal chain and bridge and just brought the thread up towards the split ring. This resulted in some amount of twist and distortion.

The one experiment / questionable practice came at the start of the chain after the split ring. I did not like the looks and I had forgotten my Magic Thread. I did a little retro-tatting and produced an acceptable chain. I few chains later I realized that I had again forgotten my Magic Thread. My original intent was to just sew-in the one thread. In the end I decided to try putting two Magic Threads in a single chain. The technique works but produces a really fat and mis-shaped chain. You can see the bridge, split ring and fat chain just to the right of 12 o’clock.

Fig. 53 is nice but I mainly worked it up so I could compare it Mary Konior’s Small Cross on pages 88 and 89 of her Tatting with Visual Patterns. After studying Mary Konior’s cross I have found that with the exception of modifications to turn a six arm figure into a four armed figure the patterns match. Many of the knot counts are the same.

I hope to start on the cross as early as tomorrow, well maybe after thanksgiving. I will explain the similarities and the differences in a later posting.

It is nice to be tatting again. Now if I can just get my knots consistent and find a block of time to work on my bobbin lace lesson.

TTFN

Lace books are getting harder to find

I first wrote about Tina Frauberger’s Handbuch Der Schiffchenspitze back in December of 2007 I received inquiries concerning how to get the book. One, in an email, stayed in my inbox for the longest time and now I cannot find it. I did want to reply but I was never sure what to say.

I received a comment yesterday with an interesting statement “Someone on E-tatters gave me a web site address that carries the book, but the site is in German, and I was wondering if you knew of a site selling the book that I could correspond with in English?” In all probability I was the “Someone on E-tatters.”

I still have a copy of the email I sent to the people who sold me the book in which I apologize for not speaking German.

I really wish I could help everyone get access to Tina Frauberger’s work. I remember when I first started struggling with onion-rings having a well know teacher wrote in passing that I should study the work of Tina Frauberger and in one email I got the impression that her work was ubiquitous through-out the tatting community. I did find out differently later when I tried to find these works.

I mentioned the German website to this teacher in a email in March of 2007. It was in August of that year that I wrote my first email to the sellers. I sent a second email in October. I received my first reply in November of 2007. I received the book on December 10, 2007.

I had spent over a year trying to obtain copies of these books and I hope that the German site is still responding to international orders. I received one of their newsletters last June and that is the last I have heard from them.

It is very frustrating trying to get older Lace books. I joke that of Mary Konior’s four known published works I have five. She published a pamphlet for a Women’s organization in the UK and I was able to obtain a copy. It is mainly written instruction with only two patterns but it is a rare treasure and I treat it that way.

But let us consider Mary Konior’s most well known publication, Tatting with Visual Patterns. If I go to Amazon.com a new paperback copy is listed today at $210.64, a used one is more. If I go to Lacis I can order a copy for $20.00. We need to thank Lacis. The edition they sell is their own. So the open market is overpricing B T Batsford’s edition while the wonderful Lacis Publications has taken up producing this work.

Unfortunately they do not have the ability to publish everything. Try to get the wonderful and some would say necessary Practical Skills in Bobbin Lace by Bridget M. Cook for under $100.00. I cannot find one. OK, I bought the last one.

I want to work on lace today, especially to post my finished version of fig. 53 with some comments. I wish I could find a reasonably priced copy of New Braids and Designs in Milanese Lace, currently over $200.00 on Amazon.

I am so spoiled with my books and my crafts. My dream was once that I could find copies of the original publications of Tina Frauberger’s works so I could scan them and put them on the Antique Patterns web site. I have a reproduction so I do not own any rights.

I hope those that want copies can get them, but the German site is the only source I know. Today even the few what once seemed expensive originals are gone. I did see one copy of band 2 for over $90.00 but that’s it. Persistence is what found me mine, I wish you luck.

I cannot work on lace today because I am getting the house ready for Thanksgiving, I shouldn’t be working on this. We are having people over and I already have Turkey from Honey Baked Ham and will be getting Brisket from Rudy’s. My main concern has been how long I will have to stand in line.

I was thinking of these things on my way to drop my children off at school today when I heard an article on Zimbabwe.

I hope I can remember over Thanksgiving to say an extra prayer for those in Zimbabwe and all the other areas of the world where there is so little food that finding a kernel of undigested corn in animal manure is a treasure.

Fig. 52 Handbuch Der Schiffchenspitze, band 2.

I have finished another of the figures related to fig. 51 in Tina Frauberger’s Handbuch Der Schiffchenspitze, band 2.

I completed figure 52 yesterday (12 November 2008) and would like to share it with you. Though this is only my second project since returning to tatting and I am not very pleased with some of my technique I am pleased with the overall piece.

I did force myself to use a bridge and a split ring in this project so this was done CTM. The bridge and split ring are to the left of 10 o'clock. I need to work on those, but these are the first to appear in a finished project by me.

The additional instructions for the additions to fig. 51 are relatively straight forward. You have a picture of the final motif, a couple of statements and the actually notation.

Here is the Babel Fish translation of the text:

The sheet row, which encloses the six arms
beginning on the left of an arm:

The term "sheet row" is crude translation of Bogenreihe. An abbreviation used through out the book is VBBG for “Verbindungsbogen” which Babel Fish translates as “Connecting sheet.”

The best I have been able to determine is that VBBG is used where I would use some version of "Chain" as I think "sheet row" must be.

This could very well be a vestige of Tatting’s development starting with rings and the true chain coming later. Though by 1917 when the first volume of Schiffchenspitze came out chains were certainly more than than connectors between the rings.

You should also know the following:
○ = Zierringchen which best I can guess is a floating ring
< = Anschürzen which other references translate as join.

What is fascinating to me is how Tina Frauberger notates a floating ring. Here are her instructions for the fig. 52 addition.
“mal” translates as “times”

I was not going to do fig. 53 at this time. I went through all my tatting books and online patterns looking for my next tatting project. I had decided I would like to do a cross by Mary Konior. In trying to choose a cross I noticed that one of the crosses had some elements that reminded me of fig. 53.

So, even though I planned on waiting to do fig 53 and given that particular Mary Konior cross was not one of my first choices the similarity in technique between the two makes me want to do both so I can really understand this design approach.

I hope to start Fig 53 today, my shuttles are wound, but I really have not gotten to say what it was I was really planning on saying today.

A return to tatting

It is hard to believe, but the last time I finished a tatting project of any sort was over a year ago.

Around the time I was working on designs from Tina Frauberger’s Schiffchenspitze and the TAT certification I had an allergic reaction to a medication that due to swelling caused all my tendons to become inflamed. I had to quit tatting.

I have continued to think about tatting and have started a few things only to be very disappointed in my lack of control over the thread.

Last August a friend asked me to join her in a class for the older crowd on bobbin lace. Her daughter even offered to watch my youngest while I went. I have indeed fallen in love with bobbin lace and will have to extend this blog to include that aspect of my life.

All this hand weaving has made me want to again return to tatting and today I actually finished a small project.

In Tina Frauberger’s Schiffchenspitze, band 2, this is figure 51, Sechsteilige Grundform (Six-part basic form). It is the basis of three other figures; though one of those is actually several repetitions of one of the other two.

Since this is such and easy pattern to memorize I do plan on working with the other figures. Hopefully my tension and my technique will come back. Well hopefully not all of my tension. It is late tonight so sometime soon I will relate a story that shows just how tight my tatting is. Sometimes I think my early success was not due to my control but to the resilience of the thread. You can only squeeze it so far.

Though it is not very symmetrical and I see all sorts of issues in my work this is the first tatting I have finished in a long time. Figuring out the German did take some effort but that was almost a year ago.

This book is much abbreviated and what the pattern amounts to is a statement saying something like all rings are 4 – 4 – 4 – 4 and the chains in the middle are 6 – 6 – 6 – 6. I used a magnifying glass to determine that all chain segments are 6 ds and all ring segments are 4 ds.

This should actually be enough information for you to copy this. Thank you.

Christmas book

It was a marvelous Christmas. Even though a health issue put an end to my tatting just before Thanksgiving I have not stopped thinking about tatting and now I think I am ready to start tatting again.

I received the most wonderful tatting book for Christmas, a reprint edition from Germany containing two foundational works by Tina Frauberger. Her Handbuch Der Schiffchenspitze (1917) and her II Band Des Handbuches Der Schiffchenspitze (1921).

I have wanted these books for a long time. Actually I wanted the first one and for a while thought the second one might just be a later printing of the first, but that is not the case.

Though I do not read German using Babel Fish I feel confident in referring to this reprint as containing volumes one and two of the Manual of Tatting. Schiffchenspitze translates as Boat Point which refers to the shape of the shuttle and to lace, thus tatting).

Volume one has two forwards, volume two has one. Volume one also has an introduction. After this both volumes have the following sections:

Geschichtliches is a history of tatting.
Das Werkzeug or The Tool (primarily about the shuttle and I believe a hook for joining).
Das Material obviously The Material which I believe mostly covering thread.

Die Arbeitsart (Technik) on technique (forming the knot, joins, etc) this includes a few simple patterns including some using the onion ring.
Meine Muster or My Samples contains the patterns.

Next volume one has a section called Weiterbidung un Verwendung (Further training and use) while volume two has a section called Verwendung der Arbeit (Use of the work).

Both Volumes end with a section titled Anhang: Das Waschen der Schiffchenspitze (Appendix: Washing the Tatting).

The main section of the book is the patterns (Meine Muster). I have not noticed any repeated patterns in the two volumes.

Both volumes have a few images that do not have patterns, but just a few. My copy came with a supplement (Nachtrag) giving the missing patterns at the beginning and towards the end of the first volume. I love the word for the diagrams Wortbild (word picture).

There are many examples of what I would call edgings, insertions and motifs, but there are also a several doilies or mats. Many of the patterns are built from earlier patterns.

An interesting historical suprise to me is that even though there are no patterns given there are illustrations of tatting with bead, this in 1917.

Overall I find the patterns to be brilliant and especially beautiful. I must put Tina Frauberger amongst the top of my list of designers. The symbols and method of presenting the patterns is very different from anything I have seen elsewhere, and in some ways perhaps a little more intuitive, from my perspective.

Dealing with an unfamiliar language and set of symbols, I had to deal with paragraphs indicating the use of an earlier pattern with additions or exceptions.

I am planning my first project which is square mat (doily) built on what the designer calls Kronen (Crowns).

A Tina Frauberger Crown

This is my first bit of tatting since before Thanksgiving and my first attempt at this motif. I think once I clean up that picot at the top of the onion ring I should have no trouble with the mat (doily).

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

Happy Tatting.