I mentioned in my last post, that I was TRYING to finish my latest tatting book titled Block Alphabets in Split Ring Tatting but the truth is, I’m not that inspired to go the final stretch right now.  The problem is that the ‘fun’ part is is done—the designing and tatting, and what is left to be done is the computer work.   Plus, in the meantime I have been given the ‘excuse’ to go in a totally new tatting direction….one that I really have been having fun with!!!! 

The new design concept is Quilt-Inspired Split Ring Tatting. 

This (& another tatting technique concept that I will introduce at a later point in time) is what I will be working on for the next year because I have been contracted to teach at the 2015 IOLI Convention in Iowa!!!  I am soooooo excited!!!  I have been having soo much fun turning quilt-inspired designs into tatting in the last couple of weeks.  Now I am starting to tat them up.

The photo in this post is ‘a work in progress’.  I have one motif to go and thread ends to finish but I decided to post it anyway.  I seem to never have tatted pieces in the right (finished) stage to include in my blog posts, so I decided to just post what I have, where I’m at in the process.

This design is based upon diamonds, a common ‘block’ in quilted designs.  I have a whole bunch of designs created in my ‘Diamonds’ category.  This is just one.

Right now, I have 4 different ‘styles’ of Quilt-Inspired Split Ring Tatting designs worked up (many still on paper).  In the next couple of weeks, I will be striving to tat up at least one example of each style for inclusion in the IOLI website advertising the classes for next August’s convention.  Unless I get criticism from the IOLI Convention Committee, I will give you peeks at what I’m doing here on this blog.

In the meantime, I’m having alot of fun designing and tatting up my new creations.   I love order in my life and the repetition of tatting and of quilt blocks has been very soothing to me.

A note about my work-in-progress:  I have one more motif to tat.  You can see thread ends woven through the finished motifs and exiting out of the the left side of the piece….my working ‘strategy’ is to work a row (in this case top to bottom) and then finish threads ends either at the end of a row or when the piece is completely finished.  To keep the ends from annoying me all the time while tatting the piece, I ‘weave’ the ends through the body towards a side away from where I am still working.