Spring

Spring started springing while I was away. The herbs are reviving:

Jack's lettuce seedlings are growing:

Bees are buzzing around the peach tree flowers:

At the moment the little flower bed is overwhelmingly green, but there should soon be flowers to brighten it - sweet peas, violas, daisies and so on.

I'm Back

I didn't get much tatting done on my trip. It was a 13 hour drive each way, so if I was able to tat in a bus I could've done a lot of tatting! But no, I can't tat while in motion. I did enjoy my trip though. It was good to be part of a like-minded group, we had a lot of fun.

My competition articles were not placed. I haven't had them back yet, so I haven't read the judges comments. Aside from the embroidery, I thought the competition articles were a bit on the boring side, but there you go. Here are some pictures:

The beaded bags on the podium were all of the type shown here, with swags of beads, rather than beaded pictures like mine. The embroidered cushion in the bottom picture was the best article in show. 

Tatting To Go

I've started a new curds and whey braid from Mary Konior's Tatting With Visual Patterns to take on a trip. I was tempted to take my knitting, but it's too bulky. I'll be travelling by bus, so I want to limit the number of bags I take along. Tatting will slip into my handbag instead of having to have its own bag. I'm going to Goudini Spa, near Cape Town, for the two day Congress of the Cape Women's Agricultural Association. I'm looking forward to listening to some interesting speakers, and even more to seeing all the handcraft competition articles. After the Congress, I'll be spending a few days with my cousin who lives near there. So it'll be a while before I write my blog again, though I should get the chance to read blogs while I'm away from home. 

No no no

I decided to finish tatting my Root Beer Fudge ice drop yesterday evening. Big mistake. I thought something looked a little off, but I'd check before I sewed in the ends in daylight. I looked at it this morning and thought, oh, I've joined the last chain to the wrong spot, undid it and rejoined. Mmm, still not right. Then I realised I'd made a complete mess of the thing, only the first repeat was correct! And because that first repeat was correct, I couldn't even claim it was meant to be like that.

Scissors came out. I contemplated using the 'snip rings not chains' trick, but decided it was better to cut both off and restart CTM. I just made sure I had long enough ends left to sew in and then then rewound the shuttle and started again with no knot.

Here's how it is supposed to look:

The pattern by Lace lovin' librarian is in the files of the Ice Drop Addicts group on Facebook. The beads are swarovski crystals. They look better in person than on the screen!

Another

Here's another tropical ice drop, pattern by Nicola Bowersox. Here's a picture of the two together:

They do make me think of orchids or some such tropical flower.

Tropical

My stock of ice drops is low, so I thought I'd make some more. This is Tropical Ice Drop by Nicola Bowersox. The pattern is in the files of the Ice Drop Addicts group on Facebook. I like it. I might make another one, now that I have the hang of it. I need to pay attention to the tension of the mock rings. Beyond the first two rounds, it's worked entirely in chains.

Further Than I Expected

The brown yarn is going much further than I expected it to, so I think I can make a stole using Rebekah Yeager's Turkish Tiles chart. I should have some white yarn left over to work an edging on each side.