Want A Free Tatting Pattern

You'd think after a five day weekend, I'd be ready to just get back to it, but you'd be wrong. I stalled on several projects meaning this morning has already been a whirlwind of tasks and it's not even 6 am yet. Rather than dwell on it however, let's just get to it. To summarize everything, the etsy store now has free worldwide shipping throughout the holidays. If you've a custom order or just a gift that needs purchasing, you might want to do sooner rather than later. I did not place in the Instructables Halloween contest this year and while I'm slightly bummed, the competition was amazing, so no worries there and today I have an early holiday present for you.

The Queens Feet- Barefoot Sandals

Size 10 crochet cotton, size 5 needle, size US7 crochet hook

Center:
4 rings of 5ds, p, 3ds, 9p sep by 3ds, p, 5ds close join each ring together by the 1st and 11th picot.

1st Round:
R 3ds p 3ds p 3ds join to the 3rd free picot before the join of the center ring, 8ds cl do not reverse, *R 8ds join to 3rd free picot of next center ring, 3ds p 3 ds p 3ds cl rw
Ch 6ds p 3ds p 3ds cl rw
R 3ds p 3ds join to 2nd p of last ring, 3ds join to next p of center ring, 3ds p 3ds p 3ds cl rw
Ch 3ds 6 p sep by 3 ds, 3 ds cl rw
R 3ds p 3ds p 3ds, skip next picot and join to the next picot of the center ring, 3ds p 3ds p 3ds cl rw
Ch 3ds p 3ds p 6ds cl rw
R 3ds p 3ds, skip one picot of last ring, join to next picot, 3ds join to next picot of center ring, 8ds cl do not reverse
Repeat from * around.

Corners, make 2 (see photo for joins to motif):
R 6ds join to motif, 3 ds 4 picots sep by 3ds, 3ds cl do not reverse
R 3ds join to last p of previous ring, 3ds 7 p sep by 3ds, 3ds cl do not reverse
R 3ds join to last p of previous ring, 3ds 3 p sep by 3ds, 3 ds join to p of motif, 6ds close, tie and cut

Straps:
R 3ds 8 picots sep by 3ds, 3ds close joining to the corner ring at the center 2 picots, tie, do not cut
Begin crochet chain of approx. 125 - 150 stitches at the close of the ring. Make chain shorter or longer for size or look. At the end of chain make R 3ds 8 p sep by 3ds, 3ds close, tie and cut

Toe Loop:
Make Same as Corner but join the first ring to the 3rd picot of the 6-chain and the third ring to the 5th. Note: this is intentionally uneven.
Ring 3ds, 6 p sep by 3ds, 3ds close, joining to previous ring by center two picots, close rw
Josephine Ring of 140 stitches or as many as needed to make large enough loop, tie and cut

I've been emailing this to anyone who asked for so long, intending to eventually do up an Instructable, but I've not had the chance to take pictures for that. I will get around to it, I'm sure, but until then feel free to make as many of these as you like for personal use and gifts only please, though I could care less if you sell them locally, just not online if you'd be so kind, thanks.

If you have any questions or if I've made any mistakes, please do not hesitate to let me know. I've no illusions of pattern writing perfection. In fact I'm right awful at it which is why I do so few of them.

F.A.Q Update: To make the join for the center motif, first I make the last ring up to the final join, then I pull those stitches off the needle being careful to not pull the thread all the way through. Then I use a crochet hook to make the join and work the last stitches. Pull those stitches through, finish and close the ring.

Turkey Coma

I am slightly less than lucid this morning. There was of course much cleaning, cooking and chaos. The house filled with 18 people and 3 small dogs and shockingly returned to n almost normal state in very little time. The turkey roast far to quickly thanks to out lack of knowledge regarding my new houses convection oven. Though the warming featured allowed us the time to create the rest of the meal before any damage was done. However, I actually had to prepare food and that was not our standing arrangement. I provide house, tables, dishes and workspace...I do not cook, I babysit and baste, but that is the extent of my skill level. Perhaps one day I shall take on these responsibilities from the "real" adults, but not yet man, not yet.

I did manage a little tatting between basting. I got a custom order the other day for one of my slave bracelet designs. I always state that they can be adjusted to other sizes upon request, but I always forget how challenging that can be. Let's face it, a design is created in a certain size. If the adjustment is exactly two motifs large, everything goes swimmingly. If the adjustment is very slight, I usually add a splint ring section to the edge that doesn't disturb the existing design. It's when the adjustment length is in between these sizes, that my brain cells are taxed. It took me seemingly forever to create an appropriate half motif for either side of the bracelet to keep in the design and the function. The saddest part, I will forget what I did next time and have to do this all over again. I know, I could just take a picture of the piece, but yeah...that would make it easy.

If you're looking for my black Friday/Cyber Monday deal...I'm afraid you won't really find one. I have given the entire store free worldwide shipping through the holiday shopping season and that's it for me. I may still put up the occasional one day facebook sale, but honestly it gets tiring maintaining those as well. I'd rather put my efforts into creating pieces as quickly as possible. Once the holidays have past, I'm looking forward to more designing and creating more tutorials for Instructables and maybe I'll actually submit something to the new Stampington publication on string. I really wanted to do that for their first issue, but I just don't seem to have the patience to do the step out photos and get all the instructions together for anything. It's just such a hassle to photograph everything one step at a time, when I've so many other things and people demanding my attention, but I digress. This babble fest is over for the week. I'll be back Monday, hopefully fresh and revived.

And Here We Go Again

Oh my dear friends and anonymous readers, I have been informed that I am in point of fact, mentally unstable...yes, it's true. I can be...wait for it, defensive when attacked, self conscious and even occasionally proud of my hard earned skills. I have also been informed that many of the people I have been fortunate to call friends are actually a childish mob who defend me even when they are not actually emailed to do so.

Apparently after I finished venting and letting the issues of the weekend go, someone else chose to pick a fight. Perhaps they have far too much time on theirs hands, perhaps they haven't found the right video game on which to unleash their aggression. I really couldn't say. In fact, they could be a perfectly reasonable human being in real life. Who's to say If you have no idea why I'm being so odd this morning, please feel free to read the comments of Mondays post, but don't bother feeding the troll. I have sadly had to enable comment moderation to avoid having a public argument with someone I don't even know.

I don't even really know what else to say about the whole thing. It just seems ridiculous at this point. What kind of person goes to a new blog and then almost immediately attacks the writer? It just seems like a waste of time. Look around, you don't like it, you leave and never bother again, right? Oh, look at me I'm being all mentally unstable again. My initial problem has been handle in the way I chose to handle it. I'd like to again say thank you to all the members of my "childish" or "kiddie" mob. You make me feel all safe and warm...kind of like friends. For all of you bothered or made uncomfortable by all this business, I truly apologize. I didn't like to engage in playground battles as a child and it's a shame I was dragged into one here where all I really like to do is create, share and occasionally vent to a sympathetic ear.

I'm going to go back to tatting now and spending the day with my family and living a contented and fulfilled life.

One Up

As you might imagine, I was in a mood yesterday. Of course, this did not stop the world from turning and my days seem to be getting busier by the hour. I wish I could think that things will settle down after this weekend, but I know better. I imagine that I won't get a good breath until after all the holidays have come and gone. Please don't take that as a complaint however. I am absolutely grateful for each and every sale I'm getting that keeps my needles perpetually threaded.

To add to my already down note of a day, I'm still waiting on several orders of random stuff I need. Seriously, at this point I have so many different things on order, I've almost lost track of it all, but I know that I need it now. I wish I had a random picture to perk up the blog post today, but I've got nothing. I would like to throw out a thank you for all the support I was given yesterday everywhere. I've been working at remaking things as soon as they sell so that I can immediately relist them. I'm just now finishing up a pair of slave bracelets that I sold yesterday.

Wait, I have something nice I can share. A few months back there a call for donations to contributor gift bags for the online magazine VivaLaModa. I offered up some pendants and was promised reviews int he magazine. The issue is out now and if you flip to page 69 you'll find the gift reviews. Each one contains one of my pendants and thus is reviews on every one of those review pages. I've no idea if this will help out as far as advertising, but it seemed an inexpensive way to get a little bit of exposure, plus I was in one of those strange, overly generous moods. I can't really post a picture as it is a magazine format, but it's free and an enjoyable magazine, so you can go have a look see if you're so inclined.

On that higher note, I shall stop writing now.

What The?

Oh, weekend...so full of drama both good and confusing. My household was abuzz with preparations for the coming holiday week. All cleaning and the children uncleaning. We had dental appointments and shopping for table wares. We had playtime with the cousins and delivery of the dining set we'd waiting over two months to receive. I finished knitting up a gift and tatting all weekend long. We bought one set of dishes and acquired another which all needed washing as well. It was mostly ups, but there was one very odd down.

I awoke rather early on Saturday and did a random google search for ankle corsets. I often do this sort of thing to see if anything has been featured anywhere, when what to my wondering eyes should appear, but a pair of my corsets for sale elsewhere. I was shocked and annoyed that I had not been informed that a pair I had sold would be for sale. I had been asked about wholesaling to the site, which I have never really done anywhere. Why let someone pay you less for something & then charge the customer the same amount, particularly when it is online as well. Not to mention that I can't make enough stock for that sort of deal. I suppose it would have been fine had I known, but the other weird detail was the renaming of the piece to something I find silly. The full and initial rant is located on my facebook fan page. I have calmed and I think that it might just fade into the sunset, but yeah, that was my weekend, 'what the...?' moment.

This week should be full of more tatting, the start of the free shipping season and hopefully the arrival of my belly dancing piece supplies, so I can get that made in time. There of course will be eating and whatnot and my posting here and at the wunderkammer mat be interrupted, but I don't know how busy I will actually be yet. Just don't be shocked if I seem to disappear for a bit, like I'm going to do right now.