A few of my favorite lace items...

I still have not been able to work on my lace, within the week i should be able to though!
So here are a few pictures of some of my lace toys. Above is a picture of the Lovely roller pillow i bought from the Lacemaker at the Denver IOLI convention 2 years ago. On it is a cute little torchon bookmark and some of my very favorite midlands bobbins, a hodgepodge of antique bone, modern bone and modern fancy turned wood bobbins. Just behind the pillow you can see Normal, my fluffy kitty who would Love to help me make lace :-)

Here are a few of my tatting shuttles, a few antique, celluloid and 'german silver', two from the Shuttle Brothers(one of which is a double bobbin shuttle) an abalone shell shuttle, modern plastic, a david reed smith made of tulip wood , and a few wood ones made for me by an ex boyfriend, and the newest is a ceramic shuttle made for me by my friend Sherry, who can be found at madmadpotter.com
Pretty toys, and only a fraction of my shuttle collection. I intend on photographing my antique bobbin collection, i've a combination of wood and bone east midlands and have only begun collecting antique Honiton bobbins over the last 2 years. It'll be fun to know exactly what i have, and i should start this week! Well....that and plans for what lace i will be working on! My next Honiton sample is a pair of leaves done with a swing pin and division down the center....i'll need to read up and know what i'll be attempting before doing so. My friend Sherry also designed an adorable tatted butterfly i simply must make for my mothers birthday. And.......with the downtime from my crafts, i've decided to learn to spin, so i've spent hours online researching what sort of wheel i should purchase. I've narrowed it down to two possibilities for me to consider for now- the ashford traveller

and the kromski minstrel

i Love the look of the kromski marzuka, but tentatively, prefer the idea of a double treadle

i could always change my mind before i'm done researching. I hope to find a spinning group locally that might have some of these wheels, so i could try them first.(nothing wrong with dreaming, right?!)

Happy lacemaking to all!
~jencie

We are in Buisness!

lets see if this will fetch the picture... (oooh, it worked!)
This is my last Honiton lace sample, i am enrolled in The Lace Resources Honiton Lace course. I felt a bit of trepidation at taking a correspondence course in a lace as fine as Honiton, (well...that and the fact i am only just beginning my bobbin lace studies. I've dabbled in Torchon, but that is the extent!) The correspondence course is Phenomenal! I have truely grown in the few months since embarking on this wonderful journey, and my skills are improving so much. Pleased as a pickle, i am!
Currently i have some down time from lace, and work- which led me to create a blog here on blogger, partially from boredom, and partially as i had decided i wanted to be able to post about my handcrafts in depth. (and i have nothing but time right now, to play and figure out the features, etc.) Once my hand is healed, i'll be back at my lace pillow.

and here it is, my lovely straw filled Honiton pillow.
This shall have to be enough for the first post today.
happy lacemaking!
~jencie