Getting Ready for IOLI Convention

I am now working on getting the projects that I'm going to teach at IOLI Convention ready and documented. I've never taught these projects before, so I have a lot of work to do to get ready for it. I only hope I can do a decent job and get the ideas across to my students. Here are the projects from which students will choose:

This necklace is made with snake knot. The bead/charm on the necklace on the left is a 'Lampwork Floral' from Kahn-Fagan, who were vendors at our Lace Day, which is held the first Saturday of every November. The picture does not do it justice -- it's actually GORGEOUS, with beautiful greens and purples and opalescence!

This one has snake knots made onto a charm (I guess that's what you'd call it) that I bought at JoAnn's. I have to warn everyone that these necklaces are addictive. Once you start making them, you find you want to make more and more. There are so many wonderful charms and beads out there that just BEG to be made into a snake knot necklace!

These are the front and back (not sure which is which, honestly) of an amulet bag made with square knotting (macrame), with a bit of weaving thrown in. A snake-knot neck chain finishes the project off nicely. There are several other designs from which to choose, and one can mix and match the bag and neck chain styles, all of which are my original designs.

This is a floating key ring. It is made to resemble a boat side fender. The nice thing about a floating key ring is that, if you're on a boat and drop your keys, as long as there are not too many keys on the ring they will float, so that you don't have to go diving to retrieve them, or worse, consider them lost forever!

This is a pink ribbon that I made from square knots. I was asked to make something out of macrame for Breast Cancer Awareness, a couple of years ago, and this is what I came up with. It's very simple to make, once you know square knotting, but there is a little trick to making the ribbon stay crossed without any glue -- I don't DO glue!

This can be made with any color cording, of course, to represent the cause of your choice.

Also, I have permission from the publisher to teach from the books Hemp Masters and Hemp Masters Getting Knotty and I'm happy to announce that I will have a FEW copies of each book for sale at the Convention. Please let me know IN ADVANCE if you would like me to reserve a copy for you! Here are some of the patterns I am considering teaching:

The first one is made with hempcording. It has beads and a single-holebutton incorporated into it, and a VERY clever closure, which I presume is an original design by the author of both books, Max Lunger. The second is a similar pattern made with braided cotton cording, cloisonne beads and a floral button that looks like it was made to go with the beads, but I actually got them all separately. The last one is made with a different pattern. I had the charm and thought I'd like to make the necklace with that. Well, with all the black widows we have around here, when it came time to choose the colors for the necklace, I had to use with black and red. The Josephine knots (Carrick Bends, called Pretzel Knots in the book) in this pattern remind me of the hour-glass marking on a widow's belly.

On the left is the Double Solomon's Bar key fob. There's a trick to making the loops at each end, with no ends showing, when the piece is completed.

On the right is a variation of the Double Solomon's Bar key fob.

It's fun to see what designs people are able to dream up with this technique.

The week-long Convention takes place at the Hilton Los Angeles Airport Hotel (info at the link below), July 25 through August 1, 2009. You DO NOT need be a member of IOLI to attend, and you do not need to go for the entire week! There are a FEW spaces still open in my classes, as well as a few other classes. The classes are filling up quickly, and the registration deadline is approaching very soon, so if you're interested, please go to the Freeway Lace Guild website (hosting the Convention, this year) and get all the information you need to register. I suggest registering QUICKLY, in order to get the class(es) you really want.

Rest In Peace, My Dear Friends

I am deeply saddened by the loss of two of my dearest knot-tying friends.

Gary Sessions, of Dallas, TX, lost his valliant battle against cancer on March 17, 2009. I first met Gary and his lovely wife, Barbara, at the IGKT-NAB AGM, in Charleston, SC, in 2005. I was surprised and delighted to see that they were in Fareham, when I arrived at the IGKT Silver Anniversary meeting there, in 2007.


They had planned to attend the IGKT-PAB Tenth Anniversary meeting, several weeks later, in Long Beach, CA, but Gary was too ill to travel, when the time came. Then, when I got to the NAB meeting in Orlando, FL, that winter, there they were! It was so wonderful to see them again.


Gary was a very generous man and taught many knot-tyers, over the years. He founded the Texas branch of the IGKT, and was a long-time member of the NAB, as well. He will be sorely missed. My love and prayers go out to Barbara and the rest of the family.

C. E. "Bud" Brewer, of Flagler, CO, passed suddenly from a heart attack, also on March 17, 2009. I first began chatting with Bud in the online knot chats. At that time, he lived in New York, but on retiring, he soon moved to Flagler, CO. My best-friend-since-kindergarten, lives in Colorado Springs, and we visit her every few years, on our family vacations. The next time we went to Colorado, I told DH we must go visit Bud, as part of the vacation. On that visit, Bud generously and very patiently, taught me to turn a project on his lathe.


I will treasure forever the fid I made that day!


Bud was able to attend the IGKT-PAB Tenth Anniversary meeting in 2007, and generously donated many of his lovingly-crafted tools. I was fortunate to win a couple of those wonderful pieces, but I treasure the time we were able to spend together even more. It was over far too quickly.

The last time we (DH, our two sons, and I) visited Bud was this past summer. He gave generously of his time and talents while we were there. He took us to visit the farm his friend runs, and we all had a wonderful time.


He made me a very nice (TINY) hollow fid with black and red LEATHER knots on it (a square Turk's Head on the end and wider pineapple, just below that). I knew then that I must be special, because he gave of his PRECIOUS red and black stash! ; - )


I often told him how generous he was, and he always told me not to tell anyone else that, because he had a reputation to uphold. He wanted everyone to think of him as a gruff old man -- but I knew better. He was friend, mentor, father-figure, and much more, to so many of us! My prayers are with his daughter, Kim, and the rest of the family.

Sad, tearful hugs, everyone.

Tudor Rose Knot Tutorial posted

Hi, everyone.

For those of you who are patiently awaiting my tutorial for the Tudor Rose Knot, here is the link (it's a .pdf flie). Many thanx to Nils, of KHWW, for posting it!

Tudor Rose Knot Tutorial

The .pdf file does not allow the links to work, for all the knots used, so here they are:

Constrictor Knot

Star Knot

Wall Knot

Crown Knot

I do hope these links help.

This is my first tutorial, so please be gentle with me. ; - )

Enjoy!

I'm saddened to report the death of my friend, Ron Soman, whose company was hosting my website, along with many others on the tatting lists (and many other types of websites). My blog is not effected, however (obviously).

I was just notified by my webmistress that "someone has unplugged the servers" and it appears everyone's website hosted by Ron's company is offline now. The situation being worked on, but there is no telling when/IF we will be able to get these websites and all their contents back and intact.

I was also informed that Ron was only 37 years old. I'm so sorry that he is gone, not only for the websites that we enjoy so much, but even more for my personal relationship with him. We chatted often about personal situations and I will miss him.

My deepest heartfelt sympathies to Ron's family and loved ones...

Lily

Tudor Rose Knot

This knot is from the 100th issue of Knotting Matters, quarterly newsletter for the International Guild of Knot Tyers. It must also be in a book somewhere, but I haven't been able to track it down yet. If anyone knows, please e-mail me.

The first one I made is on the left. The second one I made is on the right.

Then I decided to try making one with smaller stuff. And for those of you who think 'Flowers Are Red' (I sure do miss Harry Chapin), I decided to make it in red. I made it reversible, by tying two knots, back to back. Then I thought I'd try making a snake-knot stem for it. And, of course, if there's a stem, there has to be a leaf or two, so I threw in a couple of Ruth Perry's Hanging Cluny leaves (because the rat tail is so much larger than tatting threa, I had to use the tiny fid in place of the floss threader).

The mat and fid (another masterpiece by the 'Maestro') are from Bud Brewer. Thanx again, Bud -- it works perfectly! : - )

And yes, of course, I'm working on an even smaller one, but that'll have to wait for another entry. I had to get this out there to all of you!

I'll post more as soon as I can, but things have been REALLY weird around here, lately. I guess I say that a lot, but it's been stranger than ever the past couple of weeks!

More Coverings of Macrame

This was inspired by work that Andre showed on his site. The ones he shows are mostly (all?) needle hitched, but we were in the chatroom one afternoon and I mentioned that I might like to try these cork key rings with macrame. He said he'd not seen it done, so of course, I had to try it! I decided to whip the cork (just common whipping) before tying the macrame, so that the winery's name on the cork wouldn't show. I showed it to Bud, when we were at his house, and he said it would probably be easier to just sand the name off the cork. Why didn't I think of that? ROFL!

Anyway, I had fun working on this and hope to make a few more, including some needle-hitched ones. They've become yet another addiction, and I'll probably be teaching them in my class at IOLI Convention in 2009. : - )

Thanx for looking...more macrame to come, as well as other knots ... still catching up after the long vacation. I'll get there eventually...

My First Fully Covered Macrame Bottle!

Well, I'm back from a LOOOONG vacation, so now I can get back to blogging. I've missed it and have quite a bit of catching up to do. Here's a UFO (UnFinished Object) that I finally finished. I began this over a year ago, while in England for the IGKT Silver Anniversary AGM. It's a small bottle -- just a plain old 125-ml 'mixer' bottle from the pub near where the meeting was held. I didn't want to start with a HUGE project, for fear it would take too long to finish. It wasn't all that difficult, really, with pointers from Ken Elliott, and quite a few online Q&A sessions with Gordon Perry -- Thanx, Ken and Gordon!

The problem I had was at the end -- the decreasing part. I wasn't positive about how to go about it, so I sort of had to wing it, and that gave me a terrible case of the '3 P's' (Perfectionism, Procrastination and Paralysis). But I finally decided that I would try it, and just figure it out, without cutting any of the cords until I was certain it was correct. And it worked. I'm very pleased with it and have even begun covering my second bottle -- it's well underway, as a matter of fact. I also have plans for two more projects! Okay, just a little obsessed ... but it's all Ken's fault for getting me started ... that's my story and I'm sticking to it! LOL

Here are the pictures I took -- the first one is the only 'in progress' picture that I can find, but the rest are all of the completed bottle. Those of you who were at Fareham 2007 will probably recognize the cord I used. That's right -- it's from that tangled mass of cord that was so lovingly untangled by devoted members who needed the 'therapy' as Europa referred to it. LOL! Thanx again, everyone, who worked at untangling all that cord. The bottle is even more special to me, because I can still hear the ROAR of cheering that went up when Europa and Mikio met at the middle of that last length (there was so much of it that we had to keep cutting off sections and winding it onto spools)! I may even still have a bit of this cord leftover -- I gave a LOT of the spools of it away at the meeting, so there's not much left, after this project. : - )