tatting sphere

I've tatted some spheres, following the video lesson 183 by Karen Cabrera (in YouTube), then I wondered what they would have looked with beads.

Pattern for the sphere starts with a ring, then it is tatted counterclockwise all around with only chains, connected to previous round with lock joins. It is a different pattern but uses the same technique used for tatting the beaded tatted rope designed by Elisabetta (and showed in previous post).

White thread is DMC Diamant, equivalent to a size 50 cotton thread. I put inside a little wooden bead, very lightweight, diameter 1cm.

I loaded all miyuky and rocailles, size 15/0, in the ball thread.

Beads are put "face-up" on picots, I've shared the how-to here: https://ninettacaruso.blogspot.com/2019/10/roberta-was-her-name.html

Like all beading works, it needs a pattern for how to thread beads in the correct order (the ball thread is named SH2 in my hand drawing):

If you're working with 2 shuttles, you'd read it in this way: the right side tells you how to thread your beads in SH2. Then unwind a small amount of thread from the SH2 and load with it another shuttle, named SH1. Start tatting a ring with SH2 (5 picots separated by 1ds), then switch shuttles and from now on use the SH1 as the core shuttle. I worked CTM, only 50cm of thread is needed in SH1 and about 1 meter and half on SH2.
Then, read the diagram horizontally. One bead each chain in first round, 2 beads each chain in second round, etc.

First chain has a mock picot, then 1ds, a bead face-up on picot, then lock join to the last picot of the ring.

Each chain, after a lock join, starts with one ds, then the bead slides in place and it is put face-up on the picot. If a subsequent bead is needed, it slides in place directly without any ds in between.

For example, chains in third round have 3 beads in the diagram:
Lock join to previous round, 1ds, first bead face-up on picot, second bead face-up on picot, third bead face-up on picot, then lock join to next picot in previous round.

I drew 6 patterns, I printed a free seed bead graph paper from artbeads.com:

I finished off all spheres hiding the ends inside. I've not decided how to use them yet, if in a dollhouse room or as jewelry.

They would be lovely, hanging from a thread and I can see 3 or 5 of them as a cluster for funny earrings, too.

🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕🎕
Now a very sad news...
It's with my deep sorrow that I tell you that the tattingsphere has lost one talented tatter.
In memory of Laura (Lalla) Caliò - 1965-2019

Ciao,
Ninetta

a matter of joints

... but nothing related to articulation, here.

After playing for one month with it, I haven't changed my mind about the tatted beaded rope: there isn't only one technique to obtain it and each method can be used to create many different patterns. In fact, it's a type of tatting, it uses tatting techniques, you can obtain many textures and effects just changing the stitches' count or the position of beads, the joint method, the way you tat (clockwise or counterclockwise). Also, the beading pattern needs a diagram, that must be provided besides the stitches' count.

I'm quite sure you didn't miss that I'm not sharing clear&complete patterns, I'm just collecting my personal notes and samples.

Among the many methods that you can choose to join, there's also the Dora Young join (it's showed in her book "All new knotless tatting designs", published in 1974 but recently reprinted - I've the last). Every time I open that book, I find it more interesting than before, that's true!

You can find online how to do it, reading these two pages by Jane Eborall: http://janeeborall.freeservers.com/TipsSplitChain.html (ok, that's for the split chain but the DYJ is quite that)
Or watching this video by Karen Cabrera: Lesson 69 https://youtu.be/aCZ1DRJEL5o

In the following pic, the rope is tatted with only one shuttle, loaded with beads, every each 3 beads I joined with the DYJ. I started with a ring, 3 picots separated by 4ds, then started sliding 3 beads and joining to the first picot. The spiralling effect is created by both the beads and the double stitches in the pattern. I have joined always on the left side of the group of beads. The amazing thing is that it is a one-shuttle's pattern but I tatted only one ring as a starting point, the rest is just a matter of joints. Only Dora Young could have made such thing possible, one shuttle and no rings...

Beads are aligned horizontally, any beading loom pattern can be used to create a texture, just load beads on the shuttle's thread, for example using the same beading diagram I used for the Demmer's rope (https://ninettacaruso.blogspot.com/2019/10/roberta-was-her-name.html)

★★★★★★★★★★★★★★

Another way to join is the lock join: another name for this is "shuttle join" and that is how you can find it mentioned in old books, like in Priscilla's. For example, it is used in the classic "snake chain" pattern (even if many tatters join the turns with the ball thread).

When Elisabetta De Napoli shared her tatted beaded rope in Facebook, she was so kind to share her pattern and let me share it here, too. That is what she wrote:
Work with shuttle and ball. All beads are loaded on the ball thread.
Start with a ring of 4 picots separated by 3ds; then continue with chains with the same stitches' count (that is 3ds),  then lock join to picot (same as if you were tatting onion rings with outer as a chain), then slide a bead. Repeat all around, for all 4 picots, then lock join at the base, slide a bead and repeat, joining at beaded picots of previous round.

The effect is different from the method showed in the video by K.Cabrera here: https://youtu.be/QUkPBSaIWTc. In fact, in that method the join was chosen among those that lets the core thread free to slide, like the slop'n'roll.

My samples from Elisabetta's pattern are a little different, because I used different beads, also I tatted 4ds between each bead (instead of 3ds):

((Update: this is the same technique used in this video by Karen Cabrera:

Lesson 183 - Sphere - https://youtu.be/34OzAk6Hecw ))

☘☘☘☘☘☘☘☘☘☘☘☘☘☘☘

Then, I thought to use the same lock join method, but with more beads in picots.

The next is with 6 beads on each picot (loose, in order to lock join in the middle in following row) :

(UPDATE: same method used for the little beaded bag in Priscilla#2 fig.91)

The next is a continuous chain, each round has a different number of beads in their picots, and I also tried a sort of beading pattern, just to see how it would have looked:

Stringing beads for that, it wasn't easy: each picot has beads that can play a role in different rounds of the beading pattern, I had to draw that, to help me to visualise how it goes:

In the next pattern, each blank space is a white bead, for the red dots I used the brown beads. Only the ball thread is loaded (SH2 in the diagram) and only the string for the first and second rows is showed on the right.

Ciao,
Ninetta

Roberta was her name

Roberta (Bobbie) Demmer invented a technique to tat a 3-dimensional shape, using only chains. The same technique has been popularised by Gary and Randy Houtz thanks to one of their pattern's book (https://www.gr-8shuttles.com/tatting_gr8_baubles.shtml). According to what I learned in Jane Eborall's page, the Demmer's bobble (or bauble) was invented in 1996.

I was very confused about the English terminology (the two terms bobble and bauble are both used by tatters), then I had an enlightening comment by J.Connors who cleared that, actually,... they mean the same thing! Phew!

Even though the population of mice kept growing on this site: https://janeeborall.blogspot.com/p/exclusive-tatting-club.html, I wasn't sufficiently attracted to try it, till a couple of weeks ago... In fact, that is when the challenge in "tatting a beaded rope" started.

But first, I needed to learn the basis.
The two primary source that worked for me are:

• http://janeeborall.freeservers.com/TipsBaubleBobble.html
• Karen Cabrera's Lesson 148 (https://youtu.be/1gRbL8Wj95E)

I learned that the technique is one, but the result looks different, depending if you tat with the starting ring away from you or toward you (or, in other words, if you tat the bauble clockwise or counter-clockwise):

The following two samples of mine are tatted with the same stitches' count and the same number of "sbt" (that means "stabilising thread"): 4 double stitches between 4 sbt.
The effect is very different, you see my samples in next pic, the yellow is tatted with the starting ring toward you, the red is tatted with the starting ring away from you:

For trying the "Demmer's" tatting beaded rope, I thought that the red one was the best, more stable and compact.

Sigh! I had trouble getting the beads nicely placed! That was because I wanted them put in column (there's more than one possibility to stack beads! Note to myself: try to vary the stitches' count between beads).

The rounded shape of my beads and the height of the double stitches, at first, didn't get along.

I used rocailles glass beads 9/0 and DMC Cebelia size 10. The beads in columns, put on picots, have their rounded side close to each other and they slip a lot.

In fact, when you put a bead on the picot, the bead has the hole aligned with the picot's thread. That is a problem when stacking beaded chains, tatting it becomes very cumbersome. This is my drawing for a bead on a picot.

So, they always say, new problems lead to new solutions.
Eventually I found a way to "twist" the beads so that they can be easily stacked.

I load beads on the ball thread and slide them on the picot, as usual. But after the first half stitch (picture1), I move the ball thread from right to left, in front of the bead, so that the picot thread is  behind the bead (picture 2). Then I tat the second half stitch (picture3).
That makes the trick:

I'm calling this way: the bead "face-up" on picot. I hope that another drawing can help.

And here it is a picture with the "normal way" (on the right) and the beads "face-up" on picots (on the left):

The beads put in that position make the rope easy to tat, because they are stacked in column on their flat face.

For the tatting beaded rope in the first picture, I used a loom beading pattern, with 12 beads in each round, 4 sbt, the pattern is just a long line of one bead "face-up" on picot, then one double stitch, then repeat forever (or till you fall asleep). Dotted lines in my drawing are where I chose to insert the 4 sbt. All beads are loaded on the ball thread (named SH2 in the drawing).

🧵🧵🧵🧵🧵🧵🧵

Demmer's bobble is a very original and clever technique, the outcome of a nonconformist mind.

Roberta is also the name of a dear friend of mine, we met in our twenties and we are still in touch, even if we live very far from each other. She's been always nonconformist, a free spirit. Now I think the name has something to do with it.

💭💭💭💭💭💭💭

How many other different techniques are there for tatting a beaded rope? I'll tell you in a week...

Ciao,
Ninetta

the contemporary rope by Rhoda

The book "Tatting" by Rhoda Auld might just be the best book I've bought. It's from 1974 but very modern, contemporary, like promised in the subtitle: "the contemporary art of knotting with a shuttle".

Among a galore of techniques, there's "the bobble" that Rhoda Auld invented.

The technique is a clever way to stack rings to create a tube. They are only normal rings, but her original method, that uses two shuttles, makes the technique very interesting. I can see many possibilities to use it in new designs 💡💡💡. At page 40 of the book there's a beautiful butterfly (I absolutely love butterflies 😍) with the body formed by the bobble of rings. (The butterfly is really a piece of art, tatted with different threads: "nylon stitching twine, heavy silk, pearl cotton and copper wire".)

I thought that also the Auld's bobble technique can be used to tat the "tatting beaded rope". And actually, it works!

The technique is well explained in the book, so I hadn't difficulties in reproducing it. Two shuttles are required.

I started with a ring with a short picot in the middle, yellow shuttle. Then I passed the second shuttle's thread (red) through the picot and started the second ring in that point (pics 1 and 2). In the middle of the second ring, I passed the first shuttle's thread between double stitches, no gap (that is no picot), and continued. I closed the red ring, then pulled the yellow thread to put the first ring near to the second. Then I turned the work upside down, switched shuttles and repeated. It turned out a nice coloured rope.

The beaded rope, well, that wasn't easy. The difficult part was recreating the spiral effect with beads, that needed to be shifted in each ring. Moreover, the rings are stacked so that one is upside down from the previous, that is "if we think of rings as fish" (thanks Muskaan!) the tails of two consecutive rings are at opposite ends.
After many trials, eventually I understood two things:

1. beads in each ring have to be an even number, so that the Auld's join between rings falls on the middle and rings are well stacked.
2. it can be used a simple loom beading pattern. I loaded on one shuttle all beads needed for odd rows and on the second shuttle all beads for even rows, but the beads on the second shuttle must be loaded in this way: divide the number of beads of the row in two parts, then load first the second part and then the first part.

For the sample in the first picture, I followed this pattern:

Beads are red, black and white. Blanks are white beads.
Greyed rows are meant to be loaded on shuttle SH1. In the pic I showed only how to load the first six rows, starting from the up. The green bar in even rows is where I started loading beads on SH2, that is for example the second row: 2 red beads, 2 white, then 1 black and 3 white.
Each ring in the first picture has 8 beads. Thread is polyester by Edda Guastalla's "Fili & gioielli chiacchierino" (S.Master 30, AR4 rosso-giallo). Here you are my sample for the beaded rope:

R0, R1, R2, etc.. are normal rings.
- = picot
Θ = Rhoda Auld's method to join stacked rings, as showed in previous collage, pics 2 and 3.
B = bead.
The beginning ring is away from the tatter.

After all beads are loaded on the shuttles, start in this way:

R0 with SH2: 12-12 (small picot)
R1 with SH1: 1 B 2 B 2 B 2 B 1 Θ 1 B 2 B 2 B 2 B 1;  close ring. Turn work upside down.
R2 with SH2 (leave a short bare thread space): same as R1.
R3 with SH1 (leave a short bare thread space): same as R1.
Continue for the desired length, alternating rings with SH1 and SH2.

ΘΘΘΘΘΘΘΘΘΘΘΘΘΘΘΘ

I bought the book last year, but I'm still in the phase of staring at pictures 🤩.
Just looking at the cover you get an idea of the avant-garde tatter who wrote it.

My copy smells naphthalene, it's a second hand lucky find on ebay, hard cover, great conditions, quite cheap, but I must confess that it took me a couple of months before I opened it, for the terrible odour.
But then, wow!!! I always put thumb and index fingers on my nose and leaf through it 😊. There are many techniques, ideas and designs that, during the last decade, since I started looking for the word "tatting" online, I've found in various sites. Still, there's more to try!

I need time to read it, twice for me is not enough, sigh.

Link to the book review by M. Leigh Martin:
http://www.somethingunderthebed.com/CURTAIN/REVIEWStat/AULD1.html

In the next post: more on bobble (or bauble!) tatting.
Ciao,
Ninetta

how to drive me tats

Last week I shared a method for stacking normal rings, with a twisted effect, that is obtained by shifting beads a few double stitches each ring and by the use of the down join.

Sue (God's Kid: http://hiskid66.blogspot.com/) suggested that, adding more beads, we could make tatted versions of bracelets similar to Jane McLellan's crocheted beaded bracelets.
Of course, many trials and errors and many neurons will burn before getting something nearly looking like this: https://janemactats.blogspot.com/2019/10/flowers.html

Well, the title here gives you a rough idea of the current situation here, especially after that I invited my friends in Facebook to play with me the "tatted beaded rope" game!

Muskaan already joined the game (https://tipsaroundthehome.blogspot.com/2019/10/tat-beaded-rope.html), and also Elisabetta De Napoli (she has a Facebook's profile) who shared a picture with her lovely version. I hope there will be someone else! Will you let me drive alone?

At first I tried to play with normal rings, all stacked. I thought I could have used only one joint. But, I had to join in every beaded picot, otherwise the spiral opens, showing the twisted effect of the pattern that is in previous post. (Note to myself: That is another nice effect, to be tried again later.)

Another problem are beads: I shuttle tat, then all beads must be loaded in the only one shuttle required to tat the all-rings pattern. Minimum 4 beads for each ring. They are a lot! (I like having them handy on the thread, instead of putting them on picots.)

Then, because I just wanted to try a version with rings, I switched to mock rings (they're the rings normally tatted by needle tatters): in this case I need to load almost all beads on the ball thread.

The idea  is similar to previous "stacked development" bracelet, but with mock rings.
I loaded some beads in the shuttle, and then put one in the loop needed for the mock ring:

Here you are, quite a pattern:

Start with a normal ring, as in previous pattern: 8ds, bead on picot (hang loose), 8ds, close.

Mock rings: 1ds, bead on picot (hang loose), 1ds, down join in previous ring, 1ds (((... repeat 1ds, join,1ds, after each bead... ))); end with a down join and 1ds, plus one first half stitch.

Each mock ring in my example in the picture has 8 beads in the ball thread and one in the shuttle loop.

When closing the mock ring, pay attention to the position of the bead in the loop, that need to be positioned on the outside part of the rope.

When joining, turn previous ring counterclockwise, on the back of current ring (the beginning ring is away from the tatter). I used the down join showed in the video shared last week, for stacked rings.

Actually, I'm sharing the method that is the application of a technique, not a real pattern. Be creative and tat your own version! 🥰👍

🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹

My general thoughts about tatted beaded rope:

- there isn't only one technique to obtain the rope;
- stacked rings (or chains) are not a "new thing" in tatting;
- each method can lead to many different patterns (just change stitches' count, number of beads, position of beads,...);
- how to join, it counts;
- how you tat, it can change how you join (if you take your tatting with the beginning away from you or toward you);
- how you load beads will change the pattern (on the ball thread, on the shuttle, over picot), take you to different patterns.

That's not all folks and that is sufficient to drive every tatter "nuts"!

In next posts I will show the rest of my journey, that has been leading me to learn old and new techniques, and that really is making me crazy!

Ciao,
Ninetta

stacked development

They're just stacked rings, one ring above the previous, but I've used "down joins".

If you think that a join is just a join, that's the moment to read Muskaan's blog post (but don't forget to come back here, lol!): https://tipsaroundthehome.blogspot.com/2016/03/demystifying-joins.html

This is a one-shuttle pattern, only rings. Basically, all rings are 8, bead, 3+8.

I always feel concerned when I come up with such simple effects, worrying about having re-invented that famous wheel, that one already invented by another tatter. (A very similar spiralling effect is in the trunk pattern by Muskaan, but tatted with split rings, here: https://tipsaroundthehome.blogspot.com/2016/12/miniature-conifer.html) (Another very similar by MiKyeong Ha, but tatted with chains, here:  https://entrelanzaderas.blogspot.com/2013/12/anillos-navidenos-christmas-rings.html)

In any case, I found this pattern by myself, not fast though. Now I need to find a fast way to recover beads.

I tatted a length sufficient for a bracelet. The spiral development emerged only when I loaded beads in two colours.

Thread is dmc Diamant 100% polyester, D5200. I've tried with cotton, with Finca gold (two strands) and with Combi 0.4 and Penny 20 by "Fili & Gioielli a chiacchierino", they're all good, too.

Pattern (only one shuttle and beads):
Beads are all pre-loaded, I've used a mix of 11/0 and 9/0, but I've lost the brand's label.
For the spiral effect, load beads alternating colours and finish with 2 beads of the same colour.

ds = double stitch.
B = bead on picot
vsp = very small picot
down join = pull a loop through the picot, down from front to back
Rings are numbered, that is R1 is the first ring, R2 the second, etc.

Important: beads should hang loose on picots, then when putting any bead on picot, the picot is wider than the bead size.

Ring1 : put 1 bead in the loop around the hand;  8ds, B, 8ds. Close ring.

Ring2 : put 2 beads in the loop around the hand;  8ds, B, 3ds, turn previous ring counterclockwise, on the back of current ring, then make a down join (to the beaded picot, previous ring), then 8ds. Finish with an additional first half stitch. Close ring (the second bead is trapped at the base).

Ring3 and every next rings : equal to Ring2
Repeat rings for the entire length of the bracelet.

End with a curled ring:
Curled Ring : 8ds, vsp, 8ds. Fold around previous ring, from back to front, normal join.

I tatted about 70 rings, then tatted the curled ring.

I've shared a video in my YouTube channel. This is the link: https://youtu.be/a8VQxyJ0NrI
Thank you for watching.

Have I discovered the wheel again? Maybe, but I enjoy the game!

Ciao,
Ninetta