I think I'm going to like this

I don't know what I'll ever do with it but this was a fun, quick project.  I've got a couple more prickings picked out to work.  They're a little more involved than this one but this was really good practice.  It measures about 7 inches tall and 4 inches wide.  Maybe I should do a little grass and frame it.  That would be a very Victorian look, wouldn't it.

Randomness

Random thought #1 - I heard the most ironic statement today from our UPS delivery person.  He was telling someone that he'd been bumped from that particular route but they could just have it, he couldn't wait to get out of it.  This is the UPS guy that continually complains about the number of packages he has to deliver to our office.  Today when he was singing the same song, the irony hit me again.

Dude, you're a UPS delivery guy.  What did you think you were going to do when you were hired by UPS and they gave you a big brown truck?  Plant petunias?  Really?  I laughed all day long about that.

Random thought #2 - During the bobbin lace class a couple of weeks ago, one of the ladies had a book called "Bobbin Lace, A Contemporary Approach" by Brigita Fuhrmann.  I really liked the way it was laid out and the really good close-ups of the steps of each lace she was describing so I found it on Amazon. 

One of the types of lace I've been more and more interested in called Tape Lace.  It's the type of lace very common in Eastern Europe and Russia.  This book had wonderful descriptions of the various techniques used in tape laces. 

Here's the study from the book that puts together all the methods of turning corners and making sewings that she described so far in this section.  I'm really digging it.  I have no idea what I'm going to do with it but I'm digging it.

You can see how you just use a few bobbins (in this case 5 pairs) and you follow the outline of the graphic, joining and turning as you go.  The next thing to go into is the various fillers that are worked when the tapes don't run so close together.

There's just always too much to learn, isn't there?

Spania Dolina

Running away can do wonders for the mental state of a person.  It doesn't hurt when you are running to lace.  At the LACE meeting, the program was on a type of lace that originated in a Slovakian town called Spania Dolina.  The lace is what you would think of when you think of the beautiful folk costumes of Eastern Europe.  Here are some samples the teacher had:

Beautiful, isn't it?

Making the fans on the edge was the trickiest bit but the ladies who were helping us were very good at explaining what to do and we kept them hopping!

I only got a few of the fans finished by the end of the meeting so I had to come home and try to remember what I was doing.  I would work a section, realize it was wrong and take it out.  I won't tell you how many times that happened but let's just say, more than once and less than 105!

But I'm thrilled that I was finally able to get it finished.

I thought the yellow and white would be very springy, but a brighter color would probably looked a little more authentic.

A funny thing happened...

Every once in a while I have to run away from home and such a thing happened this weekend.  After being woken up at 5am for 3 out of 4 mornings to let people in at work because of a faulty piece of software, I told my boss I was taking today off and running away from home. 

OK, well maybe I didn't go into the running away from home thing with him but on the rest of it, I'm solid.  And I'm in Chicago for the LACE group meeting tomorrow.

It gave me time this morning (in between the phone call from work to turn something off) to get my workout done, pack up and run some errands before I hit the road.  Because I wasn't in a rush, I was free to stop at antique malls along the way.  The one I always look forward to on the way to Chicago is the 2nd Time Around Antiques north of Bloomington-Normal.  It's a proper antique shop, not a mall, and they always have beautiful, clean stuff at what I think are really reasonable prices.

Today I stopped by, wandered through and was ready to leave when I happened to look up.  You'll never believe what I saw.

You know I see lots of spinning wheels in places like this.  For some reason most antique mall stall owners way, way over price them.  I've seen broken spinning wheels with missing parts tagged $350-400.  Where I've found them in good shape, I've sometimes been tempted.  But the second I saw this one and reached to take it down off the cabinet it was on, I knew I couldn't pass it up.  Not only was it reasonably priced, if not underpriced, I got it for $50 less than it was tagged for.

It was marked as a "primitive spinning wheel" and that fits it perfectly.  I believe the wood is walnut.  It's chunky and solid with some lovely decorative touches to it without being prissy.  Certainly the person who made it was a top-notch craftsman. 

Everything is there, the wheel is straight and it has a jumbo flyer.  Most of these old spinning wheels have dinky little bobbins.  Not this one, though!

So I'm in love but the problem is that, for once, I came away from home with no spinning fiber!  Yikes, what a day to leave the house without fiber!!!!!!

Fabulous Weekend

I've spent many hours (probably 40-50) since January preparing for my first bobbin lace class so I was a little nervous, although feeling as prepared as I could be.  I've taught a lot of classes on things like knitting and spinning, both crafts that I felt like I had a degree of mastery over.  This was a completely different prospect. 

With bobbin lace, I felt like I at least knew more than people who'd never touched bobbins and that was the basis on which I agreed to do the class.  Of course, the fact that the Tat Man was originally going to teach the class couldn't have added any pressure. (cough, cough).

With 5 students who did an amazing job all weekend and who were are fun as they could be, we ended up have a wonderful weekend.  It wasn't nearly enough time but each student was able to learn the basic stitches, main terms and supplies needed to be successful with bobbin lace.  I always have a hope when I teach a class that there will be people there who will take the craft on and exceed anything I could do - I definitely think that's going to be the case here.  We ran out of time so I didn't get any photos of the samples done in class but those who will be at the Prairie Weavers Guild meeting on Tuesday will be able to see what we did.

Part of the fun for me was the boxes of old bobbin lace equipment, supplies, prickings and books that several students brought to share.  Some of the stuff had been acquired at auctions, others given to them.  There were old pillows that only need to be re-covered and wonderful, beautiful bobbins, old, old, old prickings from which lace had been made for many decades.  So much fun!

I have had a project I've been wanting to do for quite a while and the pricking has been sitting on the pillow for a number of months.  I just never got the wherewithal to figure out the number of bobbins I would need and get them wound with thread.  I got so inspired by what the students did on Saturday that I came home that night and got it going.

I don't know if I've got it right but I'm going to work a strip or it and evaluate whether I need to use a heavier thread.  I'm excited to get it started...finally!

Sample, sample, sample

As I've been putting samples together, I had a brainwave that I thought would help in the planning.  I got a couple of cork boards and hung them on the wall so I could have samples right in view.  It's kind of fun to see everything all together.  Here's a sample of what we're going to do:

Always ready to learn

I tried something new this week, something I've never done before.  I've seen it but never tried it and now I'm enamored. 

This is a tape lace that is laid out in the shape of a pear.  With just 5 pairs of bobbins (9 for the leaf), you work around the shape using a cloth stitch.  Many of the patterns have filler patterns for the middle but since I'd never done this type of work before, I just made the shape with the leaf.  While you're working, what you see is the back of the work.  Once it's done, you take out all the pins, trim all the ends and turn it over.  You get this:

The finish picture isn't very clear but you get the idea.  The thread I used was really too big for this pattern.  I used a 10/2 cotton, which is basically bedspread weight crochet cotton, but even a 20/2 or a 30/2 would have been a little better.  I'm going to try another shape with the 20/2 cotton.

I'm going to do a simple circle with a tally leaf in the middle for the class.  Shouldn't take too much time for them to do it and you end up with a fun little project.  I'm having so much fun with this!

I think we have 5 people for the class, which will be a nice size.  There is a limit of 8 people so if you're in the area, you'll need to get your registration in pretty quick here.