I will be posting some things under this heading, that I find while surfing the net or hanging out in bead,yarn,craft,or hardware stores, that I think others may find interesting. The inclusion of these items don't necessarily mean I've tried or endorse them. It just means I've noticed the item and felt they might be useful in the pursuit of our tatting craft.
The first item is called New Metallics thread. It is beautiful,comes in many colors, is strong and 2 ply. It is available in 100 meter spools and 25 yard cards. I found mine at a bead show and I have tatted a few knots with it. The thread seems suitable for tatting and is made for beading and reviews of it state that the thread can be used for lacemaking,tatting,crochet,knitting and beading.
Here is a link to a provider.http://www.7beads.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=MT
Again I haven't used this provider and only post it here for the curious. If you have tatted any of Nina L.'s jewelry and would like to tat with colors of metallic thread without splitting the dmc metallic floss skeins, this thread will accommodate size 15 delicas through it twice.
The second item for your consideration is this spiral eye needle.
A what? you say. Well if you sew your ends in a la Jennifer Williams' illustration on Jane E.'s site, you need to have a needle that will accommodate a large thread without having a large eye. How do you get large thread to pass through a slender eye you say?
Well without divine intervention you don't. You use a french or calyx needle otherwise known as a self threading needle. Pam Turner the inventor of the spiral eye needle has a web site here
http://www.spiraleyeneedles.com/ and she just may have built a better mouse trap. The author of this site has reviewed them for us http://www.needlenthread.com/2008/10/spiral-eye-needles-for-embroidery-and.html
I plan to get me some. Oh Yes,I forgot to mention, these needles do not have a nickel coating so if you have metal allergies this may be something that interests you.
My original patterns are not AI
6 days ago
Nice color change!
ReplyDeleteI might try those metallics at some point and that spiral needle? When I saw that I wondered why no one had thought of it before! I have a few of the self-threading ones from years ago and as long as you don't have to tug too hard when you're sewing, it's okay but otherwise, it's kind of useless. LOL! I just can't get over it that no one thought of putting the opening lower before now.
Just a note to say thank you for this wonderful information!
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