Tat Days! Or What I Did that Weekend

 Palmetto Tat Days was August 18-20 and was in Lake Junaluska, in the Lambuth Inn. Still pretty.

I only took 4 of the scheduled classes. Two were strictly technique; tatting with wire and one on picots (from Kelli Slack's How Well Do You Know Your Picots?). Two were part project and part technique. Karey Solomon's Beaded Celtic Constitutional uses a lot of onion rings and Celtic shuttles, both of which I need to practice. Richard Embry's Pearl Tatting with Graduated Picots Bookmark is lots of pearl tatting plus using a picot comb. I need the pearl tatting practice and I just learned how to use the comb in the picot class.

There was also a notecard class Thursday night. She had kits with the metallic floss already threaded. She brought the pre-printed (she printed them) and pierced cards and all we had to do was sew around the edges, color the flowers, etc if we wanted do and then add flowers and beads with glue. She does them all the time and here's the examples she brought.

(I can't believe I forgot to take a picture of the card I made)

I might send the card I made to Lucille. I think she's appreciate it.

Karey had a tatting class at the same time, involving floating chains. I'm going to have to try the patterns. 

I need to tighten my wire tatting a little bit. It's never going to be as tight as thread of course, but mine is quite loose. I went ahead and bought a pack of assorted wire. I might add a flower or two to a card.

My first attempt at the Celtic piece turned out tight enough Karey said not to bother with the 2nd round. I'm tatting a second one, but with 6 points (in Evergreen size 20 again) to see if that makes a difference because I like the looks of the 2nd round.

Melanie Cervi gave a presentation on vintage tatting/ textiles for the early bird class.She had some lovely examples. 

Alas, I didn't get a picture of it. I only got 1 picture of a slide from her presentation.

I also consulted with Sharren Morgan about her bottle holder. I've gotten to the strap part and couldn't figure out what to do next (and couldn't find my pattern). I just need to end the strap I have in progress, then start a strap from one of the two remaining attachment points, join it to the strap already made, and continue to join to the last attachment point. I'm low on thread though. I might have to substitute some of the size 10 I bought for the bookmark class.

The picot class blew my mind. I learned about 3 I had never heard of, a false picot, and learned the name of one I'd done before. I got Kelli's book (of the same name), plus her book in rings, chains, and joins. She also taught us how to use a picot comb. I'd watched her video on it but I really needed to see someone do it.

Richard's bookmark I did not complete until after I got home. I got to the 1st wing (and messed it up) but did a better job on the 2nd one. It looks like a serpentine dragon to me so I added a breath weapon.

So many pretty tatted things. Here's the show off table. I don't know who made what (though I bet the Wizard of Oz group is by Martha Ess, she just came out with a new book).

Oh, and look at these 3d printed accessories (available for purchase)

 

Look at the pretty shuttle I was unable to resist.

Oopsie, I didn't realize how long it had been

 I'm starting this one the 25th of August. It's going to be long, so I don't know when I'll actually publish it. I may break it down into topics and do a different post for each topic.

Today's topic: family

My dad wanted to come see me and asked that I check the Amtrak site to see if it's possible to take a train for the trip. I found out there are two trains that stop in my hometown and in the large town near him, The Carolinian and The Piedmont. The stops are part of longer routes and they go both ways. So he could take the train to see me and then take it back and with his discounts, it was $18 round trip. 

I took the day off (yay accrued vacation), got him at the train station (on a day when both bathrooms were out, alas). I got there early, because 'how long will this take, will I get lost, etc.' And his train was late. By that point, I was pretty desperate to use the bathroom.

We headed for the local museum, where they have a butterfly house, which dad wanted to visit. However, the main parking lot was full so we drove to breakfast, to give the early arrivals time to finish their visit and leave. 

We had a lovely tour of the butterfly house and looked at the insect exhibits. I wish I'd gotten more butterfly pictures but they move. And when they are still, they're often far enough back, I'd have to shove into the greenery to reach them. 

After that, we headed for lunch. Which we both needed, except it took us off my route so I got lost looking for the Woodcraft store. Finally found it, with enough time for Dad to have a look around, although not a leisurely one. He found some things he wanted and the clerk showed him an attachment (blade?) for his lathe that's really good for turning acrylics. 

Back to the train station, in plenty of time for Dad to catch the train home.

Some good news, Mom's not in Hospice any more. However, that means the hospital bed they provided is removed. Mom's old bed was broken (and we thought she'd never need it again) so it was thrown away. The facility was loaning her a bed (about a step up from a cot) and I contacted a furniture company to deliver a new bed (and mattress, and box spring). Except, they'd had trouble with fraudulent purchases and needed for me to come into the store to make the payment. 

Since I wanted Mom to have a good bed ASAP, I got the time off from my boss and accepted my Dad's offer of being my chauffeur if I took the train to see him or Mom. He was available and I bought a round trip train ticket. I ended up taking a later train because the earlier one was already reserved (possibly by people going to the Beyonce concert, my train was half full of such attendees, lucky people). 

side note: that turned out to have a silver lining. As I was taking a later train, I worked remotely for a couple hours and one of my co-workers had a time sensitive task. 

Train ride was nice, Dad was there to greet me, and off to the furniture store. Paid for the whole shebang and the guy promised it would be delivered the next day (it was, and they put it together). 

Dad and I had lunch and he drove me to see Mom. He kindly offered to go to the grocery store and get me a 6-pack of 16oz Cheerwine Zero while I visited. I gave Mom her birthday present (a colorful scarf) as it was only a few days until her birthday. 

Dad drove me back to the train station and home I came.

Much easier than the 2 and a half hours or so of fighting traffic.

quick update (supposed to be July 12)

 Here's a picture of the Chinese coin, made into a pendant with tatting.

Our 5e game was Thursday. Turns out the fey we met wasn't my PC's lost lost mom. Considering what she was like, that's a relief (she was a hag, and she killed our aunt at the beginning of the game).

Friday, we got together to plan a friend's party. She's having a gaming weekend, kind of a mini-con for her next birthday. It takes a lot of planning, so we're starting now. 

I went to see my parents over the weekend. Surprisingly, traffic was not too bad. I didn't run into any rolling stops or slow and go. My stepmom liked the earrings I gave her. It's getting harder to find neat/unusual red, white, and blue earrings. I gave mom a copy of the photo of me dressed for the wedding.

This is the daisy edging and the hanky. The pattern is from Mastering tatting.