Baby Bugs

Another tired morning. I have no idea what could possibly be making me more tired than usual, so I'll blame the odd weather. I did manage to get done all that I wanted to yesterday. In fact I managed to go all the way through to the back up plans.

I finished all the pieces that I needed to tat up a little after lunch time because schooling was short and
because the odd weather kept us inside. Then I proceeded to read a little followed more crochet.

Oh, but I forgot what happened around lunchtime. We've kept mantids as pets for years now. It started as a catch and keep, but we long ago graduated to mating them and waiting for the egg cases to hatch out the next Spring. Some years we've bought oothecas and some we just wait patiently to see what last years cases bring. This year we bought some and one just exploded with nymphs. If you've never seen this, it's quite a sight. Most of these have been released to the yard, but we'll keep and attempt to raise a few.

I woke up this morning to a rather large and unexpected order. It contains at least one piece that needs making and a couple I was sure I was never going to sell at this point. So over the next couple of days I'll need to get one piece made and try to make sure I have good enough pictures of the sold pieces so that I can get them remade properly. It's easy to remake things that sell often. Their patterns are actually fairly well committed to memory, but the ones that sit in the shop for months or years before selling are quite another matter. I'll need really clear photos since I never wrote out the patterns. I guess I have my work cut out for me today.

Weekend Recap

I'm actually having a little trouble getting focused this morning. I've had yet another odd, meandering weekend where absolutely no tatting got done. On Friday I was determined to complete my crochet project and I did.It fits nicely, so I went digging through my yarn stash to see if I had anymore suitable yarn and I found some black alpaca in the right thickness. It probably won't hang as nicely as this one which was done with the pattern requested cotton, but I figured it was worth a shot. And because I was asked, the pattern is just the outside tank from a Patons Yarn pattern that was in their most recent newsletter. You do need to sign up to get the free pattern though.

The rest of the weekend was diversions that took longer than we thought they would. On Saturday we went out for an early lunch then a matinee of Iron Man 3, which was a wonderful time, followed by a trip to the comic book shop for free comic book day. That last bit is where our Saturday went off the rail a bit. A short trip stretched to a couple of hours and by the time we left it was time for dinner and then a whole lot of nothing.

Sunday started out normal, but then I got a text from my sister telling me her washing machine was broken and I of course offered the use of ours. This meant a house full of my nieces and nephews and the entire afternoon was given over to chatting and I never once picked up a tatting needle. Luckily Friday night also brought a couple of sales in the store so I do have a few things that need remaking today. Yes, I'm aware that I could have worked on them over the weekend, but I didn't. Lately I've managed to claim back my weekends from tatting unless I have orders that need making. As much as I really do love tatting, it's nice to do a little something different with the weekend whether it be adventuring with the family, more reading or just a different fiber art. I think the change lets my brain relax a bit.

So today I'll get back to work and remake what needs it. Maybe more tatting tasks will come to me later, or maybe I'll go back to crochet, or Sherlock Holmes. I now have a plan for the day, a backup plan and another backup plan. At least I won't be bored.

Work To Do

The stars must have aligned because while I was doing schooling yesterday morning I got a message asking for a necklace in a custom length. It was just what I needed, something that actually needed to get done.

After schooling I put my head down and got to work. Normally this necklace takes at least a full day to make, but I think I was just so ready to get to work I knocked the whole thing out by late afternoon. It still needs it's hardware and a good pressing so it won't go out to its new owner until tomorrow morning, but the bulk of the work is done. It felt good to be tatting with purpose again instead of just doodling with no direction at all.

I even had time to get back to the crochet piece. It is coming along nicely as well. I think I may be working too quickly though because the finger I wrap the working yarn over was getting a little rope burned. Of course it looks fine this morning, so I suppose it was just rope irritation and I'm just not used to it anymore.

Personally I'm hoping for the same sort of day to occur today. A tatting task to be handed to me followed by some time to crochet. I think I should be able to knock out this project before the weekend is out either way.

Before I forget, if you happen to be in the Chapel Hill, North Carolina area, my work is part of the Steamworks: Art, Stories, and Adornments show at the Ackland Museum store starting May 10th. I am of course nowhere near there so I can't tell you much else about it, except that I know several of the other artisans from my various Internet adventures and they are all incredibly talented. I guess that's the end of this week. Here's hoping the next one is more adventurous.

Different Direction

Unfortunately May did not begin with a bang as I'd hoped. There was no orders or requests. I didn't suddenly have a great idea that I went straight to work on. No, none of that. I did put forth the effort to list the new motif as a pendant, so at least that's done.

At lunch time I was requested to run errands. I decided that since I was going to be out anyway that I would stop by the craft store and pick up the yarn I would need for a free pattern I got in my email. I get a ton of craft emails as you might image and they are largely ignored. This time I was in possession of the rare combination of liking a pattern i could actually use as well as having a bit of extra time on my hands. Even better, the required yarn turned out to be on clearance.

Upon retuning home, I closed my computer, determined not to dwell on the slow nature of the shop and started crocheting. It's a neat spider web kind of pattern so it's working up quite quickly. That is exactly what I needed. Something to not only keep me busy, but also to give me a sense of accomplishment with visible progress.

I'm just going to keep working on this project today. Sure, I'll stop if the shop suddenly springs back to life, but otherwise, I'm enjoying the small change of pace. I guess sometimes you have to stop walking into a wall and just walk in a different direction until you find a better way around.

More Motifs

I was not granted any new tasks yesterday, so once schooling and the morning walk were out of the way, it was a whole lot of nothing around here. Okay, that's not entirely true. There was laundry and dishes and after staring at the motif from yesterday for a while, I tried a few more iterations of it. A few were tossed right in the waste basket as they were compete failures, but there couple were interesting enough to share.

The top one is the version that I think will actually make it into the shop whenever I get around to it. The only real change there was the outside chains are now zig-zag chains. I find that they are stiffer and hold their shape better which works well for a longer chain. The bottom one I did because someone on Facebook noted that the original motif was reminiscent of a Celtic cross so I thought I'd expand on that and see if I could get even closer. I'm not in love with it, but perhaps with a few tweaks it too may make it to the shop.

I didn't do much else with it that's worth sharing. In fact I didn't do much else at all yesterday. I mostly played catch up with recorded shows. In fact I only managed to read one Sherlock Holmes story and that was during schooling while the oldest read her novel. It was a completely lazy end to the month. Here we are at the start of a new one though and I sure hope it begins well and stays busy.