Stats

You need to clean the kitty litter...

Why haven't you cleaned the kitty litter?   !

Just to let everyone know that I've posted the dagger heart pattern at the side.  Click on the picture at the side to get the pattern.  Lace Loving Librarian pointed out the new feature on blogger that allows you to see the number of visits to you page.  I'm not sure if its all that accurate because it has Threads of a Tatting Goddess as the number one source of all visits.  I've contaminated that count because I use Tatting Goddess's blog list for finding blogs and often use it to find my own.  So I suspect that most of those visits are actually me. 

Completely Missed Valentine's Day

I completely missed Valentine's Day.  It wasn't on purpose, I truly love any day that allows you to wear pink and red together.  Sadly, I was informed in 6th grade by the fashion police that they don't match.  That might be true but sometimes pink and red do go together!  
Cameras and taking pictures is the bane of my blogging.  I have a few pictures to share but they're at home in my camera and not on my computer.  I wanted to share the dagger heart pattern but I don't have a good picture of the heart in progress.  I think pictures will help make the directions clearer. 
I always read the comments on blogs.  Its interesting to see what people say.  Yarnplayer's blog has 161 comments/entries for her latest give-away so far today.   Which means that there's alot of people who are usually quiet.  I have to confess that I've been too lazy to leave any comments lately.  Sometimes its more trouble than its worth but I'm going to get back in the habit.  I like comments because its nice to know that someone visits your blog.  I made the mistake of not putting a visitor counter when I started blogging so I have no clue how many people actually visit. 

Housekeeping

Sunday was a day of cleaning up and finishing stuff.  I cleared out a bunch of pictures from the photo gallery on my computer.  To get one decent picture you take quite a few and there were lots of redundant photos on my computer.  So I erased ones I don't need and hope that I don't regret erasing them.  I also fiddled around a bit and made a few more snails.  Its interesting how different color combinations can completely change a pattern.  I think the snail with the blue body is better than the brown I used in the last post.  I plan on adding another twist to the pattern but haven't tried it out yet. 

I've also spent the last few weeks obsessed with a particular motif in tatting.  In my head I call it a dagger because its made of a series of rings and chains that get smaller until it comes to a point.  I was working on a pattern before Christmas that involved this motif but lost the doily and thread somewhere between Ottawa and Campbellford.  I worry that it fell out of my car.   Last weekend I started playing with it again and ended up with these hearts and a square doily that's slowly forming.  The heart at the top is done in Tat's Kool's mango chocolate.  I love the shading in this thread from brown to yellow, unfortunately that doesn't show up in the picture.  The 2 a the bottom  and the square doily are done in Lady Shuttlemaker's (Sherry Pence) silk thread.   I lucked out this week because Sherry sent some thread as a Thank-you for some thing I sent for Picadilly.  Sherry was too generous and I feel like I should send a thank-you for the thank-you.  

I'm going to use Sherry's thread to continue a few more rounds.  I've had to stop and take a break because I was getting stiff but the doily is currently 61/2 inches.  The nice thing about silk thread is its ability to slide which means decreased friction while tatting.  You don't notice this until you go back to a cotton thread and then you feel the drag.  I can tat more with the silk thread before my hands start to stiffen from overuse.