He knows my name!

My life verse: "I will give you the treasures of darkness And hidden riches of secret places, That you may know that I, the Lord, Who call you by your name, Am the God of Israel." (Isaiah 45:3). For me, "the treasures of darkness" has been the medically-treated depression that I have suffered off and on with for years. More than anything else in my life, I think this has made me realize how much my Savior loves me and has deepened my relationship with God. The "hidden riches of secret places" are my wonderful family and this fabulous craft--tatting! I thank God for both!
I think it is awesome that God knows my name! Did you know that He knows yours?

Saturday, January 15, 2022

Crochet Hooks and their Caps

It is now 2022.

  I have some very weird feelings about that.

      A) I have been isolated due to my low immune system since August or September of 2019—that means first off that my “social life” consists of the only places I go (medical labs, doctor’s offices and hospitals *yes, I am trying NOT to catch covid in any form.)   

     B)  I am feeling rather sharp and intelligent IF I can tell you what day of the week it is—please don’t ask the date!  C)  When I have to write a date, I must catch and force myself to start the year with a 20 and not 19__  __.

 

I was recently looking at Miranda’s blog     http://tattingfool.blogspot.com/    Back in September of 2015, she was lamenting losing caps to her crochet hooks and possible replacements.  She also was looking for ways to make the lids “stay on” when not in use.  I thought I would share my solution(s) to these problems.  

       I find that oxygen tubing makes great crochet hook covers.  Cut longer than the hook so the hook can never push through to unexpectedly snag other objects (usually bare flesh!).  I am supposed to change my 50 feet of tubing once a month--this is the oxygen tubing that I drag around my house like some kind of house pet that refuses to stay out from under your feet and who you swear makes its own knots in itself overnight -- 50 feet would make a lot of crochet hook covers!! 

       I tat a leash connecting my hook to its cap.  I make the leash long enough that the cap can be taken off (this is an important step!)  This means the leash will have a lot of excess line or “slack” in it. 

        Also, on your tatted leash insert a lobster claw and a place on the leash to attach it, so that the “slack” is taken up.  Now the lid cannot be removed or lost until the lobster claw is undone.

This crochet hook has a metal bell shaped jewelry finding glued onto the cap with e600 glue.  Also, my thread ends are hidden under there.  On the end of the crochet hook, I glued another of these metal bell shapes only I “flattened” it by smashing it with my thumb on the table surface.  The lobster claw hooks into one of the split rings to secure the cap.  This is one of the nice crochet hooks with corian handles that Lisa carries in a variety of colors at Tatting Corner you can see them here 

https://tattingcorner.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=16&referrer=CNWR_30711492117529



This wooden crochet hook’s cap is glued to the flat bottom side of the turtle beads that lie against it.  The ring that the lobster claw catches is a covered metal split ring.  The leash is held onto the wooden crochet hook by closing the beginning rings around the smallest part of the wood.

 

Health-wise—Here is the good news!  In November of 2020 I had my right knee replaced.  In April 2021, I had the left knee replaced.  Which means that I am no longer “one with my recliner!”  I appreciated the walking aids (crutches, walker, cane) that I used during my surgery recoveries, but they have abused my right shoulder to the point where it may be the next surgery.  Although I have fought bronchitis and pneumonia every month since—I have not been hospitalized since May of 2021 (7 months is a record when you consider I have been hospitalized over 100 days in the last 4 years!)  Bad news is I’m not sure my lungs are on board with the let’s stay out of the hospital, let’s get healthy idea.  I have a chronic cough (deep, brassy and rattling) and audible wheezing as I breathe in and out that can clear a waiting room in just a few minutes.  Cold weather’s arriving has brought back one of my favorite games and pastimes—It is called “Keep your oxygen tubing off the floor furnace”  this is a bonus game after you have mastered “Can you get your oxygen tubing unsnarled from under chair legs, people’s feet, recliner handles, etc…before it’s too late to make it to the restroom?”  I have been anemic off and on since college.  In the last fifteen years or so, I have occasionally reached the point of needing blood transfusions   In June, they were able to cauterize some bleeding blood vessels in my small intestine.  I thought “Well, got that one taken care of” Think again!  Apparently, these vessels grow back and are still close enough to the surface that they can develop new leaks.  Getting iron through IV’s as well as gamma globulin once a month ( I think that may be what is keeping me healthy enough to stay home instead of heading to the ER every time I turn around) has been a different kind of blessing.  Blood draws are usually ok…but I am a (VERY) hard stick for an IV….so I now have a port!  (New knees, the port—start the Bionic Woman music). 

My sleep disorder still causes me trouble when I am tatting but my friend Mary Anna has challenged me to complete my T.A.T. Level 2 course.  Currently I am attempting as well to do Jane’s TIAS (Day 1 was 1 ring and 3 split rings…I think it must have taken me about 45 minutes because I kept falling asleep and I “tat” in my sleep.  See those quotation marks around the word “tat”—those are not recognizable double stitches, I have created a few new techniques, most of which the world would not want to learn (and almost all are on the difficult level as far as removing stitches go.

My husband is planning on retiring after 40 years of teaching in May.  Earl and I have two sons.  Our oldest son will soon be celebrating his 15th wedding anniversary to my daughter-in-love.  They have three boys (12, 8 and 6)  Our youngest son just got married, so I have a new daughter-in-love and a granddaughter is coming right around the corner!

2022—you are weird but you are a welcome grand adventure!   


 

 

Tuesday, July 20, 2021

Tiny Wedding Gift

Wow!  I had a dr. look at me today and tell me I haven't looked this good in several years!

I am now on 4 liters of oxygen 24/7.  Enlarged lymph nodes in my lung and a hiatel henia are pressing on my airway. COPD + CHF = the worst of the bad news.  The great news is I have had some GI bleeders cauterized (6 unit of blood since November of  '20), both knees have been replaced (the right in November '20 and the left in April of '21 and I've had a port inserted (blood draws are difficult, IV starts are almost impossible) and I am getting infusions of gamaglobulin to help my ailing immune system    I am a walking symptom and have had 17 covid tests (if they are testing for brain cells -- I lost those a long time ago!) and 2 antibody tests--all negative!!  I have stayed as isolated as possible (but my husband is a public school teacher and is in and out of the house multiple times daily) and I have had both my immunizations. Now that I am mobile--it is time to quit being "one with my recliner" and get healthier!!  (The only thing good about over 100 days in the hospital in less than four years is the change of scenery!)  

Some friends have decided they are going to get married--after being together for at least ten years... They don't want a bunch of fuss--are not even inviting family...they just have reached a time in their lives where they want to make things "legal."  My husband is to do the non-ceremony...

Well, I wanted her to have something "bride-like" and remembered something I had seen from a company "Better Than Buttons".  They make a long safety pin  with dips in it which holds four charms for a bride.

I decided to throw something similar together.  I put these all on a lobster claw hook so it can be hooked onto her bra, or onto a necklace or buttonhole.....   There is a silver dime (another wedding tradition) for something OLD, my tatted dime holder for something NEW, a nice blue bead for something BLUE, and a red rose bead that was my mother's for something BORROWED (I will GIVE her this after the wedding in case she wishes to pass it on some day).  

The thread was Iridescent one of the Lizbeth metallic threads.  I have not used these a lot but they are so very, very pretty.  They come in 18 beautiful colors!.   Link to the Lizbeth metallic threads at Tatting Corner    https://tattingcorner.com/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=12_88&referrer=CNWR_30711492117529 

Yellow picots are tiny joining picots.

Red picots are larger picots

Empty blue picot is a temporary picot made with the core thread to aid in closing the ring.  I usually stick a safely pin on these to hold them open until I intentionally close the ring.  I use the method that Jane Eborall has so fantastically taught/described and illustrated here  

http://www.janeeborall.freeservers.com/DimpleRing.pdf

 



Monday, November 16, 2020

Wow! Have you seen these?

I was poking around Ruth Perry's site today and discovered where she has demonstrated something that I thought was impossible!!  She shows how to do a) a single color 6 ring motif thrown off of a chain and then b)  using two colors, a 6 ring motif thrown off of a chain!!  Here is the link to her awesome tutorial

https://rozellalinden.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Six-Ring-Motif-Thrown-Off-from-a-Chain-1.pdf

Ruth is one of the many people I have to thank for so freely sharing of their talent.  I don't know where my tatting would be without Jane Eborall, Georgia Seitz, Kerry Solomon, Marilee Rockley, Mark Myers, Bina Madden, Martha Ess, to name just a very very few of those that teach, design, share of their talent--helping this craft we all love to not just survive but to thrive!

Speaking of our craft....Somewhere back in grade school we learned about the Library of Congress.  I have always wondered how in the world they had storage for their copy of every magazine and book professionally published for sale here in the United States of America.  THEY DON'T (I don't know about the storage part) have a copy of every magazine and book......  It seems craft type magazines and books are not important enough to archive or even keep a list of!!  There is a lovely lady who has made it her passion to take care of that for Tatting books and a few other crafts.  She has a list of over 1,300 tatting books!  I'll let her tell her own story of how she decided to tackle this daunting task.  Check out the list at http://www.somethingunderthebed.com/index.html  If you have any tatting publications not on her list, please contact her!


Someone else trying to help keep tatting going and growing is Brynn at Tatting Digest.  She is publicizing some of the free tatting patterns that she has found on the web.  She would love for you to find a new pattern on her site or to share a pattern with her!    https://tattingdigest.com/

Now -- bragging today on something I have done.  These are
some Dreamlit shuttles that I've decorated.  I really like these mix and match shuttles.  Don't you hate when one of a pair of shuttles is busy and so you don't feel right using the second shuttle?  Well, here I have two big turtles, two small turtles, two pink turtles and two blue turtles.....I think I can have one or more shuttles busy and still find a match! 

In August of 2019, I asked my primary doctor for a referral to an orthopedist because my right knee had been giving me fits on and off for several years.  That very night, I tore the cartilage in the left knee.  Both are bone on bone and need total replacements.  Because of the over 60 days in the last three years that I have spent in the hospital for pneumonia, it took a few tries to find a surgeon who would actually accept me as a patient.  The one that I found is one of the best in the state...he uses a surgery center that the operating rooms are built to his specifications....am I going to his surgery center--no, my pulmonologist and cardiologist both are requiring a full operating room at a larger hospital.  This doctor does operate in a hospital about four times a year.  In  January 2020 I was told that my surgery would be in April.  Enter covid--all elective surgeries are canceled.  In late June, I was told it would be the second week in August--I spent the last week of July and the first week of August in the hospital with pneumonia--missed all the pre-op appointments and lost my clearances from the pulmonologist and cardiologist.  Come join me in an adventure some day--called walking on crutches with an oxygen cord.  If that was boring we can give you a bonus round during the winter--it is called "walking on crutches with an oxygen cord & keep the cord off of the floor furnace so that you don't melt a hole in it!  Well, I am tired of the game, my right shoulder is giving out because of the crutches so.....   I am supposed to be admitted Wednesday, for some respiratory procedures and then Thursday have my first knee replacement. I have no idea how they will rehab when I still have a bad knee!  So please pray for my surgeon, me, the operated knee, the unoperated knee (If I can stay out of the hospital, they will do the second knee in 3-6 months.  Now to get my lungs healthy and lose the O2 cord!!

Huge Thread Selection at TattingCorner.com