Cats, presents and motif #3

Some more birthday presents! a picture that I need to decide where to hang, and a wonderful book with all sorts of cute little critters to crochet! It is going to be hard to decide which creation to work on first.
My cat Banichi with a book.

Banichi checking out a piece of tatting. The blur to the right is Motoko another cat arriving to see what Banichi finds so interesting.

And finally, motif #3 a cross bookmark. I used size 10 cebelia thread. I got the pattern from The Complete book of tatting by Rebecca Jones. She says that all patterns in her book are her own, or are traditional patterns. I'm really not sure which this is. It does still need to be ironed and starched.

Gifts and a little bit of tatting

I tatted this snail before I rejoined the challenge, so I am not counting it as one of my motifs. It is done in Cebelia lavender thread size 20. The pattern is by Nancy Tracy and can be found at Bestitched. It is shuttle tatted, and when I finished with it, I realized that yes I can shuttle tat. I was quite thrilled as I don't believe I have ever successfully shuttle tatted anything before this. The tension isn't awful either.

Below are the books I got for my birthday last month. A very dear friend gave me the Soup Bible and The complete book of Tatting. This book by Rebecca Jones is the book I wish I had when I started learning how to tat.


And here are the books my Mom got me. She told me how much I had to spend, and I went to Amazon. Ms. Cherryh is one of my all time favorite authors, and this book, Deceiver is Book 11 in one of my favorite series. I usually dislike long running series, but this one is pure gold. I don't think I will ever tire of reading about these characters. And my black cat is named after one of the main characters of the series. Banichi, that would be the tallest illustrated character on the cover. I pre-ordered the Cherryh book, then the 3 tatting books were marked as cheaper together, decided I could wait for slower shipping to make that free, and Mom and I have been congratulating ourselves over what a good shopper she is ever since.


It's time for me to get off to work, hopefully by next week I'll have another motif or more to show for the challenge.

Stitch Dictionary Search

I have been making progress on stitching, but I don't have pictures with me to upload today. A little more progress had been made on the coaster set, and with any luck I should almost finish the sixth coaster on my first coaster set later today.

I have been spending most of my stitching time working on the band sampler. I have several stitches added so far. I've checked out a couple of books from the public library and finding all sorts of new stitches. I suspect at some point I will be looking for a new stitch dictionary. My current dictionary has about 230 stitches which will certainly keep my busy for a while, but the library books are showing all sorts of stitches not in my book. This is part of why I am checking books on the subject out of the library. Kind of a drive before you buy kind of deal, which is the best, how can I get the most bang for my buck?

Cross Posted on Zaijovan's This n That

Gate of Souls: a Familiar's Tale

This has nothing to do with fiber arts, but it's my friends book, I think it's great and I want her to do well, so if you like the fantasy genre, please consider this book!

I received my copy of Gate of Souls last night. I am quite excited and cannot wait to read it. Probably will sit down Saturday morning with a pot of tea and some scones and really enjoy it. I was a beta reader for this book when my friend Verna was writing it. It was great then, I loved it and was thrilled when she thought she had it published. That promise fell through, and in retrospect it was a very good thing it did. Since I first read the book, my friends Rick and Verna have moved so I haven't seen the changes in this book. Verna published several short stories in e-zines and in this way was 'noticed' by a book publisher. A Familiar's Tale was dusted off and has been through some serious editing. The title of the original, A Familiar's Tale, has become the series title. The story is told through the eyes of the sorcerer's familiars. The first time through Mellypip was the main character along with his sorceress Runa. I expect this hasn't changed any. As sweet and endearing as these two characters are Belwyn the owl -- and Mellypip's tutor -- was a favorite of mine, and everyone in the writers group. To a person, in our imaginations Belwyn had the voice of Edward Woodward. No one tried to give actors or voices to the other characters, but try giving this book a read and see if any voice other than Woodward's comes through for Belwyn.

I hear the 2nd book in the series is almost done. I wonder how much chocolate I'll have to mail out to Verna in order to see a rough draft of this book ahead of time?