001. How I started tatting...

001. How I started tatting.


Hello~ fellow tatters over the world~.
I'm Elaine and I've been tatting very slowly over two years. 
I just wanted to share with you how I started tatting, and also help out new tatters to blow away their fear of starting a new crafting hobby.

Tatting is very easy to start crafting.  
All you need to know is how to do double stitch to start with. 
It's not so hard, not so scary either. 

What I like so much about tatting:
1. You only need to purchase few materials to actually start tatting. (very low entry barrier. But of course you will buy more and more..)
2. Tatting shuttles and thread are not big in size so they fit just perfectly even inside your small purse.
3. It makes you concentrate and almost have same effect as meditating. 
4. It's just darn beautiful! Hermosa! とてもきれいだわ!

<This beautiful pattern is designed by Weed from Fireweed >

I was always fond of everything related to lace. I really wanted to learn crocheting but it was too difficult for me to understand. And all those needles and threads just made me dizzy.

One day, as I surfed at Naver I saw something called "Tatting Lace" and it looked very easy to start with.  All I needed was shuttles and Thread! So I joined tatting lace naver community to learn. But I was defeated again since it was just too hard to understand. I just didn't know where to start.  Now I know it but you know when you start learning for the first time it's like "what alien language are you speaking?" Yes, that was my first impression alright.

Then this tatting book got published in Korea.

This was the first Tatting book every published in Korea. The term "first" always makes your heart skip a beat.  This was a Japanese book translated to Korean.
So I bought it., and bought shuttles too.  "Daiso" lace thread was popular at the time in Korea. I bought them too. "Daiso" is like a one dollar shop in Korea.

But for a beginner, Daiso thread was not a good choice. 
It's okay now since I am more used to the thinner thread, but this was thinner than size 20 thread, almost like size 30. Tatting thread size is 10>20>40>80, bigger the size thinner the thread. Since I was a newbie I should have used thicker thread like size 10 or 20. Daiso thread made me defeated since the laces I tat weren't very nice they were wiggly and my hands were in pain. But I didn't give up. I practiced and practiced double stitches, hoping that one day I will be better. I think I practiced it almost a year. It took me very long time to move from Ring to Chain. The clips on Youtube really helped me. Thank you for those clips!!

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=how+to+tatting

I finally decided to buy Lizbeth size 10 and 20 threads. I bought them at Kiss-the-lace size, the only tatting material web shop in Korea at the time. I also bought needle tatting beginner set to try. Needle tatting was faster than shuttle but I liked the shape of the shuttle tatting more. It may be that I am not really skilled but needle tatting results were a but puffy to me. 

Lizbeth!!! Lizbeth was!! Amazing! If you are a beginner you should start with Lizbeth size 20!
Good materials are really important for crafting!
I though I was just born with sloppy hands but I was wrong! Lizbeth is soft and beautiful.


And I started to attend local meeting. I met great people there and I got really better there. When I was tatting alone I wasn't sure what I was doing.  But at the gathering we could discuss about the technique and also got inspired. I improved so much tatting together with others. 

And the god of shopping came along.

I will post about what I have shopped and the tatting materials that Korean tatters use. 
Thank you so much for reading. Have a great day!

If you want to read this in Korean : http://elainetatting.blogspot.kr/2014/04/001.html

[App] Tatting Designer Tutorial

Hello there!

<Tatting Designer>app is created so anyone can easily use, but I made this tutorial just in case.

<Open Tatting Designer>

<Tatting designer screen >

1. Click the ring button on the Tools section and then click anywhere on the Canvas.

2. A ring is created with 3 green dots and a square box. Use the dots and the points on the box to shape the ring. on the top bar you can see the Repeat by.  Repeat by lets you set how many times the shape will repeat it self along the circle.  You can always comeback to change the repeat number so don't worry if you set it wrong.

Inside the ring you can see a small square box with a small line which is called "the pointer" and it allows you to rotate the ring.

# Warning

Use the Pointer to rotate the ring.  Do not use the points on the square box to rotate, it might get the picots to not properly appear.  

You can also create picots along the ring.  Click the ring (or chain) you want to use then click on the New Picot button to create the picot.  The default picot is always the last picot size you created.  FYI, there is a bug where the work screen kind of freezes when you select multiple picots. So please work on one picot at a time.  I'm sorry for the inconvenience. :(

3. Click on the chain button and then click anywhere on the canvas to create it. A chain consists of 4 green dots, a square box, and an pointer.  Just like the ring, manipulate those to make it as you want.

4. Press ESC key to release any selection. (You can only delete by pressing Delete button.)

5. Save the designed pattern using File - Export as image to save it as <pattern name>.png file. 

Save your work (*.xml) so you can bring it whenever you want to work on it more. 

Here is an example of a pattern I drew. 

There is no text function yet so you will need to use other tool to include ds counts or texts. 

<Others...>

1. This is my first pattern every to be designed which actually was made in rush. In my opinion the major work of the pattern is the double stitch count.  I made a chain with put it on top of the monitor screen to estimate the ds count to start working. (I actually had to make about 4 to finally get what I wanted. 

2. This tool is created to inspire your lace design and help you to easily draw the shape. 

Here is the pattern that I made.  

FYI, I used different tool for the text. 

Spring Snow

If you have any question regarding the pattern, please leave me your comment.

Thank you!

[App] Tatting Designer! - introduction - tatting lace pattern drawing tool

Hello!

My name is Elaine (Rei Lee) and I am a tatter from Korea where Tatting has become quite popular these days. 
Many Korean tatters work hard to spread tatting lace in Korea and I have been tatting for about two years.  Tatting is just great and fun!  It makes my mind relax as I focus on counting double stitches. The outcome is also adorable. 

I am a doodler so one day I wanted to draw a tatting pattern. But even with any painting application it was pain in the you know where.  So I came to think that it will be great to have a tool that helps you to draw the tatting pattern. My hubby happens to be a programmer and I persuaded him to work on the tool. (and what a persuasion!) That is how this tool is born. The best thing about this tool is that it is FREE! and you don't need to install or purchase anything.

Currently <Tatting Designer> tool is on its early stage of development so its functions are very basic.  But I believe one can draw quite decent doilies with rings and chains and picots.  You can manipulate the chains to make creative very patterns.

Basically what it does is that there is an anchor point in the middle and as you make rings and chains the tool automatically copies them along the circle like kaleidoscope.

<Open Tatting Designer Web app>

Click the above link to open the tool~.

This is how the tool looks.  Very simple layout. Isn't it?

When you run the app for the first time, you can see the above screen.

Here are the brief description of the menus.  

<File>

New - Create a new file

Open - Open existing file

Save - Save the file 

Export as image - Save the pattern as .png image. 

<Edit>

Undo - Cancel the last job

Redo - Redo the last job

Copy - copy the selected object

Paste - paste the copied object

<Canvas>

Enlarge x2 - enlarge the canvas size twice

Fit to content - Crop the canvas size according to the pattern

<Tools>

1. Create Chain - Click on the icon and then click on the canvas to create the chain.

2. Create Ring

3. Copy

4. Paste

5. Undo

6. Redo

7. Zoom out

8. Zoom in

9. Background color - this is only shown on the screen.  When you save the image it becomes transparent.

We are planning to add more functions such as text, josephine ring etc but the schedule is not set yet.  Please add your comments below so we can keep them in mind for the future update.

Please enjoy~!

<Open Tatting Designer>

<Notice>

1. This app does not require any installation and it is a web app using internet browser. (We highly recommend using Chrome) 

2. Your pattern that you drew using the tool is only saved at your computer with the extension of *.xml  

3. We don't hold any rights to your pattern.

4. This too is free but don't copy, reverse engineer or anything that would make us feel bad or regret that we ever made this. Oh please! 

5. There is no text tool yet so you will have to use other tool to place text. 

Go to tutorial