Tatted Fern and Senior Pics

I finished this long wavy tatted fern yesterday. This one has taken me quite some time to accomplish, being sick and not much tatting time in the evenings. So I suppose this fern would have taken me maybe 8 hours or more to do rather than two weeks! The length of it is 10.5cm(4 inches) long. Nice a delicate looking and will add some weight to the lace depending on where we put it. Could be part of the bodice. Not sure I want to make too many of these. Takes a long time to get it done. I rather go for faster results and stitch them together. But you gotta do what looks and works best for the lace. Time may be a factor even though the wedding is a year away….it will come at me fast!

Two weekends ago I did a senior picture package for one of our HS kids. The pics turned out quite well in my opinion. I guess I am getting better. I still have reservations on my abilities. Of course I am dreaming of the day I can purchase an SLR Digital camera(Nikon D700 to be exact) and get some lighting and background accessories for indoor shots. But this all cost way too much for any budget I could fathom. So guess it will be a dream and I deal with my SLR film camera. Below is a couple of my favorite shots I took of the senior.

And I just got another client to do family pictures this Sunday and possibly another client for Senior Pics. Hopefully all will go well

For what it is worth…..

Many of the heritage events we demonstrate at pay us(via the state funds) to demonstrate. These are ones we enjoy the most. We educate the public, get to sell our wares and demonstrate. YEAH FUN! Profitable for us and the event is usually an enjoyable one for even the event holders. But there are a couple of events that require us to pay a percentage of sales and do not pay us to attend. Fine and dandy. We still enjoy doing those events.

We received a letter a couple of days ago from one of the select few coordinators of heritage events we do in our area. The letter stated that we forgot to leave our 15% from our sales after the event closed. We both had a good laugh at the letter, because it was not a good event this year(failing from previous years) and we only made one sale for the two day event. Plus the crowd was way down this year. Below is our letter to them.

Dear ******,

I received your letter on requesting the 15% of our sales that we neglected to give to you at the end of the 2008 ***** Folk Festival this past September. Sorry we forgot. It wasn’t a productive weekend for us and we only made a $6.00 sale for the entire weekend. So 15% of that is 90 cents. That is enclosed with this letter. It cost you 42 cents to send your reminder and with me sending the 90 cents in coins in the envelope, it cost me 59 cents to send. That is a combined effort of 91 cents. Hardly worth the postage going back and forth, you think?

For what it is worth….

*********

I didn’t mind sending the 90 cents and paying the postage. It is quite hilarious AND ridiculous! Just wanted to let them know we didn’t enjoy the event and how petty it seemed to us. Of course they had no idea we only sold one item for so little money. But I think every vendor at the event was hit hard this year. What do you expect??!!

Bobbin Lace(Kloppelei) at Deutsche Country Days

My senior photoshoot on Saturday with a high school senior went really well. I believe I won’t have to doctor up the pictures too much(to my surprise!). Just need to select the best ones, crop where I need to and write to a CD for them. The family takes care of getting the prints. I don’t have that cost included. Less hassle on me and the family seems to like it that way. Gives them more freedom.

On Sunday we made a last minute decision to take a trip to Deutsch Country Days in Marthasville, MO. We have heard about this event from several vendors that we run around with at the heritage shows. We also were trying to go leaf peeping and figured that Missouri might have better color than our area. They got more rain. Actually they are at the same stage we are. You could see some trees here and there with color. But I think this fall is going to be a dud.

We didn’t know what to expect from the Deutsch Country Days other than it is expensive if you get your ticket at the entrance instead of advanced online or mail($15/each). And even advanced tickets are expensive(IMHO)($11/each). Luxenhaus farms is a little log cabin town situated on steep hills and winding roads. So plan on putting your best walking shoes on and expect a good workout. There were a few people with strollers, but I am glad I didn’t have to push the load The atmosphere was supposed to be German, but I would say that there is the same German feel and German food as when we do any other heritage event in MO or IL. We did see a lot of demonstrators, but it was Sunday afternoon and most seemed more intent on selling their wares. Luckily I knew how most period crafts work. I think the advertising hype is a bit exagerated for what it costs. I guess they need that fee in order to keep up the place. I ran across another visitor that blogged about this event. You can read her post HERE

I knew one vendor who was to be there and I expected to visit with. The bobbinlacers(they like the term Kloppelei)!!! Christa Robinson was that main attraction and her daughter always was demonstrating with her. Christa used to do the Faust Folk Festival until her health went bad. She has sinced passed away 2 years ago, but her daughter and friend still keep on the tradition and they are enjoyed by the public at this event. Christy(my BL teacher) knew Christa from long ago. So I have that connection. It was quite a hike to get up to where they were demonstrating above the general store. Their display was worth it and we had a good time visiting.

Below is a slide show of the pictures I took. ENJOY!!!

Tudor Rose and Fall Pictures

Finished this tudor style rose Weds night. Still a real small flower. I need to come up with some larger versions to have a good mixure. Right now I am working on a curled fern leaf that will be much larger than the other curly leaf.

Below are some pics of our fall decorations we made and have used for the past five years. While we were decorating for fall we let the cats roam free….keeping a watchful eye on them. They were intrigued by all the koi fish in the pond.

PHEW!!!!

This has been a gruelly 7 days.  From last Thursday(10-9-08) I was teaching a Photoshop workshop at a company salesmeeting.  That went well and I had fun at the sales convention and cocktail party and other outings.  I was pretty much wasted(physically) for the weekend.  So vegged out.  Come Monday I find that a dear friend and webhost IT guy(Ron Soman) had passed away on Saturday.  AND….the server connection was dead and nonretrievable.  So for most of this week I have had to gain control of my tat-man.net domain and since I am webmaster of IOLI, gain control of their domain: internationaloldlacers.org.  Now for the legaleze of gaining control of the files that were on the server.  I do have some of the files on back up to transfer to other webhosting, but not most of the recent stuff! Basically I have had to learn quite a lot about how servers work and who has control over what. :-\

If you go to Maus’ post about what is going on with those issues rather than repeat them here. Several were hosted by Ron and are dealing with the same issues. So until further notice and until I can get my files back in order and find a new webhost, I am sitting idle.

BUT!!!……Erin my friend is such a generous soul!!! She is lending me some webspace to put a temporary website so you can visit your favorite haunts on my site. Just click on the link on the right called “Tatman’s Lace Pages” and it will take you there. But be advised it is just basic and not all the images and files will load. I am in the process of getting them uploaded. So please don’t email me saying that you can’t get a pattern or can’t find a certain image like you used to. BE PATIENT!!! All this takes time.

On an UP note………..

Over the weekend I did do some tatting on the lace for my niece’s wedding dress. Below are some more motifs I came up with.

I have lots of pics to show and other things to post. So bare with me.