Mice!

HA! That got you all worried and stuff, right? No? Oh, well, not everyone is that concerned about mice. These are really too cute to be concerned about, anyway. They are Wanda Salmans' "Morgan Mouse" pattern. I added some little round ears (because my niece insisted!) but I don't know that they improve the look of the mouse. Morgan Mouse is made around an eight petaled flower doodad, but I did them on a button because I wanted to add color. I'm giving these to someone who's doing a fundraiser and wanted them to be Christmas mice. 

The first one is a bit of a stretch as a mouse -- it's green. How many green mice have you seen? I accidentally picked up the ball of size 40 thread to make this one, and it's a bit wimpy around that big button. Besides that, the eyes want to slide down over the stitches. It was only after I was about halfway around thinking, "what is wrong with this thread?" that I realized it was not the size 20. The tail is made of double double-stitches (or balanced double stitches), then tied in a knot with a little frayed end.  That avoids having to sew in any ends (always a plus).

The next two mice are little white mice. The thread is size 20 and works better with both the buttons and the beads. I changed where I joined the rings in the button on these two. They look more balanced and the tails join in the right place for Morgan Mouse. Their tails are pearl tatted very tightly without making long side loops. The no-ends-to-sew in was too attractive, so these also end with little frayed brushes. I took the option of cutting open the whisker picots because I didn't use a gauge and they were so terribly uneven. The one on the green button has blue eyes because I couldn't find two more of those big black beads. There are in the house somewhere, but at 1:30 in the morning, who wants to hunt for beads?  {update: Now I've realized that so late at night I'm much less clever than I think I am. The pattern numbers the rings. The nose is ring 8. Yup. I used 8 as the stitch count instead of 3. I guess this is Morgan Mouse's cousin Reginald Rat.}

County Fair

Last Sunday we took the long trek out to the county fair grounds and entered our ...er... stuff (can't think of a more elegant word).  We had a dozen things which meant we could purchase a parking pass for all four nights of the fair for the price of parking for one night of the fair.  That was good. We used it tonight -- just to see how we did.  Though we looked through the whole fair building we did not venture outside except to go home.  We'll save the animals, food vendors and carnival for the weekend.  There were some pretty interesting things at the fair, and some really strange ones.  I liked the little beings and bugs made out of vegetables. 

All the tatting is in the glass display cases, so my pictures aren't very good.  That's why I made scans or took pictures before entering the stuff in the fair.  In the category "other" (so descriptive!) I entered this pink Heart's Desire bookmark designed by Wanda.  She did such a good job, I got a blue ribbon.  Now, that's a mark of a great design!  Anyway, here it is as displayed in the case (under somebody's ID card) and the scan before it was entered.  I made it with pink Lizbeth size 20.  It needed minimal blocking -- another mark of a good pattern for me.  Thanks, Wanda!