I Can Sing a Rainbow!

The only science lesson I can remember at school was when we were shown a prism and a white light was shone through it and suddenly there was a myriad of amazing colours, otherwise known as a rainbow. A rainbow is caused by sunshine (white light) shining on water droplets that are in the air just after a summer shower and some rainbows are amazing. It is often said that there is a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow!

The necklace was made from the cotton that I won on e.bay, well actually I was the only person that wanted it, no competition! It is hung over a very old reject piece of Waterford Glass which was found buried in undergrowth.

The cotton that I made the necklace with was listed as rainbow cotton, although it does not truly have all the colours of the rainbow in it. Neither for that matter does the song ...........I can sing a rainbow, intended to teach children the colours of the rainbow.

Red and yellow and Pink and Green

Purple and orange and blue

I can sing a rainbow

Sing a rainbow

Sing a rainbow too

Listen with your eyes

Listen with your ears

And sing everything you see

I can sing a rainbow

Sing a rainbow

Sing along with me

The way some of us have learnt the colours of the rainbow is by these letters ROYGBIV

Which turns into this little phrase "Richard Of York Gave Battle In Vain"

I really am sure that I didn't need the five balls of rainbow cotton which I won on e.bay!
Whilst in the attic this week I found the tatted doily, no idea when I made it, or where the pattern comes from, but it was tatted in DMC 80 so it must have been a labour of love!

Since blogging I have been really impressed at the hand dyed threads I have seen. Whilst visiting Tatskool she showed me the very long and complicated process of dying cotton and I had no idea that there was so much work involved. Naively I thought you just dipped the thread in some Dylon and hey presto! But I was so wrong.

On Saturday I purchased this bar of hand made soap

and it is smells of Passion Fruit/Guava.

But look what is trapped inside it?!

I think it belongs to Tatskool's husband!

But did they have to break this poor Gecko's foot?!

Find the colours of your rainbow at spacefem.com.

My rainbow was shaded brown and white and this is what it said about me "You are a contemplative person. You appreciate the roughness of nature. People depend on you to make them feel secure. You feel closer to people when you understand their imperfections."

Please stop me bidding!

I have become a little hooked on e.bay over the last week which has resulted in, so far, three purchases, two of which are shown here. I was the only one to place a bid for this vintage box of Coats cottons below. Accordingly to the seller it was just taking up room in her house, so now its in a new home and being used.

The bookmark is the first thing I made with the vintage cotton. The pattern has been in my file for ages (vintage in itself!) and I've never bothered with it before, but then I thought this will be quick and easy to make, and thankfully it was! It is a design by Ruth Baker and can be adapted to take narrower ribbon.

I was not the only bidder on the set below, but I was really interested in the tatting shuttles. The top one is plastic (Susan Bates) the middle one metal and the last one is an aero shuttle which are my working shuttles. The piece of tatting is not mine it came with the shuttles!

The DMC pamphlet is mainly edgings and small motifs, my eye however, latched on to the section entitled "Church Lace" when it said "Tatting can be used, in many cases, to create beautiful designs for church lace". Sadly though I've found that churches are going for a more modern look and don't want fancy detail on vestments and altar linen these days.

I'm now waiting for the postman to deliver some "retro cottons", well thats what they were listed as being, Coats cottons but in an orange/red colour. If I would stop looking at e.bay I would get more tatting done!

Chunkie Tatting

I find that the ideal size thread for tatting with is 20 although I have worked with all sorts of different thread sizes and even, on occasions, put a couple together to give a different effect. I was given a few balls of Coats white size 10 a few years ago and used it for this particular necklace, it seemed so thick compared with 80 and it felt like working with rope when I first started! I was inspired to make the necklace after seeing Jane's blog. I like the variety of colour and the way the wooden beads add character the necklace. The cotton was given to me by the daughter of someone who had died, her mother had done some crochet work for the church and there were a few balls needing a good home. I did not have the heart to say that I would probably never use them and that they should go to someone else, although I do believe that using thicker cotton is ideal when teaching someone to learn to tat. I am of course so pleased that I did decide to keep the thread, especially after making this necklace. The other thing you may notice is that there is no clasp, this is because it fits around my neck without one and looks neater especially if it should turn whilst wearing it, although so far because of the heaviness of the necklace it has not moved an inch!

I now plan to make more necklaces, well you see I was going to give this one away but I’m so fond of it that I have already worn it! I have also raided my stash of jewellery and even taken one necklace to pieces for the beads, so there is nothing safe at the moment.

After having a little look at the tatting blogs on Sunday evening I thought, for a change I would look on e.bay and in particular search through the crochet/tatting threads. I discovered a box of Coats black size 20 and just had to have it. I love working with black and only have a very small amount of it which I use sparingly. This is the first time I’ve seriously bothered with e.bay and got quite excited. I also wondered about the history of these threads, was the seller the original owner or did they find the cotton lost and lonely and unwanted somewhere else? Or may be they came from a now deceased relations home? Anyway sadly today I lost the bid at the last second but hope that the thread has gone to a loving home.

Celtic knots

Having just come back from a holiday in Southern Ireland where Celtic Knots were visable in many places from rings to roadsigns I' ve had my fill of knots!

The painting below is on silk and I've often thought I would like to tat the design but a true celtic knot has no beginning and no end, so there is my problem!

The Celtic Knot symbol, is also referred to as the mystic knot, or the endless knot.

One of the attractions to me is the many colourways that can be seen in some of the designs.

The tatted celtic knot design is by Ruth Baker and I've only ever made one (and this is it!) and not sure if it is woven correctly!

Whilst in Ireland we visited a castle and in the herb garden was this hedge design looking very much like a celtic knot.

On the sea voyage returning from Ireland it was my stomach that got into a bit of a knot. The Irish sea was very rough, we were told that it was the tail-end of the American hurricane Bill, thank you to those who live over the pond! The car ferry was the smaller and faster type which makes the journey shorter and it therefore rides the waves, so to speak. It nearly didn't sail because of the weather conditions but before we boarded we were warned that the crossing would be rough. Having put the car on the car deck and left it to go to the passenger area we arrived to find sick bags on all the tables, not a good sign. The ferry started and a steward handed out a small measure of rum (perhaps not as much as a "Tot") to anyone who wanted it! Then about three quarters of an hour later when the sea and the sky were definitely meeting, soda water was handed out in plastic cups. I must say that we were well looked after but I have a feeling that it was in the shipping lines best interests to make sure no one was ill. I am a notorious bad traveller, its one of the things I hate about going anywhere be it in a car, bus, boat or aeroplane. I always take travel sickness tablets and when on a boat just lie down, it doesn't stop me feeling sick but it is crucial that I remain in the horizontal position!

My son thought he would help once on a sea journey by telling me to sniff ginger, now every time I smell ginger it just makes me feel sick!

Goose and a Swan

Everytime I go to Ireland I take my tatting and of course give some away. There is one particular lady who I visit, now in her eighties, with a very large family who are always in her home helping her. Well she loves to receive a tatted gift. A few years ago I took her a goose and a swan, both Jane's patterns. One of her daughters made them into a picture as you can see. This very much reminds me of Carol Lawecki and how she also incorporates some of her tatting into pictures.

Before a few more of you rush to comment that you do the same, I've seen some of them and they look very effective. Just wish I had that talent. This particular picture sits on her large sideboard with all the pictures of her vast family.

Bumble Bees

On the news today here in Britain we were told to encourage bees into our gardens by putting out water flavoured with sugar. The honey bees in the UK need an extra bit of help as 40% of them have been lost in the past four years and the number of species of British bumblebees has halved since the 1950s. The bees have been leaving their hives in droves, resulting in a serious drop in honey production. Apparently this is happening all over the world. We should be alarmed by the bee’s decline – after all, the honeybee account for 80% of all pollination so food production could be seriously damaged.

Now I have a friend who loves bees, she talks to them and when they land on her she even strokes them. She is a church flower arranger so obviously is used to the little critters!

I tatted some "Itty-Bitty Bumble Bees" from Martha Ess's book "New Critters on the Block" although I've had the book for ages this is the first time that I have ever made anything from it. Mainly because I thought I wouldn't understand the patterns - sorry Martha that's no reflection on your designs just that I'm so used to Jane's!

The bumble bees are pinned to a bees wax candle. I then decided to chase the bees around my garden and next doors (who came out to see what I was doing!) and these pictures are the results. You can just about see a bee in the natursiums and a few on the lavender. They were extremely difficult to photograph as they were so busy collecting the pollen.

There is also a picture of the mascot for the local Air Ambulance, they use a Bee because their call sign is "Alpha-Bravo" ABee! He is sitting on a jar of local honey, there is also another bees wax candle which came from Ireland, the smell of the wax is beautiful, I wish you could smell it!

In the Pink!

Now I'm not generally a pink sort of person, I prefer browns, blacks and purples, but somehow I seem to have masses of pink thread at the moment. The necklace attached to this pink heart is made with Jane's technique of attaching beads to SR and I found it an easy and effective method, and plan to enclose more beads this way.

The phrase "In the Pink" was very common during the early 20th century and even up until the 21st century and generally it means being in the best of health. It has though now almost disappeared from our vocabulary, instead we are more likely to say that we are "feeling in good health, or very well thank you." The phrase apparently originally came out of the English fox hunting tradition where a rider was not granted the right to don the scarlet coloured jackets, called "pinks" (a red colour), until he demonstrated superior horsemanship and service to the hunt. Being “in the pink” meant the rider had reached the pinnacle of achievement or status in the hunt.

In England, at the moment, there are many people who are not feeling "in the pink" due to the swine flu epidemic and that's why I thought I would show you this little pink pig on a pink handkerchief, to remind everyone that "coughs and sneezes spread diseases catch your germs in a handkerchief" (also a popular 20th rhyme encouraging people not to cough and sneeze everywhere), however now we are advised to use a paper tissue and then bin it!