Centiblog? Centipost?

This is it... the moment you've all been waiting for (stop rolling your eyes, you in the back)... my 100th blog post! There should be a word for this, but I don't think that either "centiblog" or "centipost" is it. Also, a couple of weeks ago, Friday October 8 to be exact, my hit counter passed 5000. This means a double celebration!

But, one of the rules I made for myself is I'm not allowed to post a bunch of fluff just for the sake of getting to 100. There has to be a reason for the post. I thought I'd do a tutorial on joining on a new shuttle thread, because I know this is something new tatters have trouble with. There are several reasons why you might have to do this: the thread broke, you ran out of shuttle thread, you found a mistake and the easiest way to undo it was to cut the core thread and pull it out, or you want to change colors.

The first picture shows the cut shuttle thread. If at all possible, I like to join on my new thread before making a ring. Then I can tat one tail into the ring, and the other into the following chain. I think that tatting over two tails at once looks too bulky.

Tie a slipknot in the new shuttle thread, making sure that the thread leading to the shuttle is the end that will slip. This picture shows the knot loosely formed so that you can follow the thread.

Tighten the knot by pulling on the short end, but don't make it too tight.

Pass the old shuttle thread through the loop.

Slide the slipknot up the tail of old thread so that it is flush with the tatting. Tighten the loop by pulling on the shuttle.

Continue pulling on the shuttle until you feel a little "pop". When you feel this, you will have pulled the loop of the slipknot all the way through, and the old thread will now form a knot around the new one. This is a similar concept to flipping the stitch when you tat. You may need to practice this part a few times until you're comfortable with it. Click this photo if you need a larger view of what it should look like.

The knot is now secure and you can resume tatting. The threads will usually align themselves nicely so that one of them will "want" to go with the ring and the other will "want" to go with the chain. Here you see one tail being tatted into the ring.

And the other tail being tatted into the next chain. If you are unfamiliar with tatting over tails, please see Gina's excellent video demonstration.

Here is the completed chain.

And I have created a fabulously beautiful edging.

You can see the slight enlargement of the ring where I have tatted over the tail. In a larger piece of tatting, this would blend in; people don't really notice this kind of thing unless they are looking for it (and I say this as a raging perfectionist myself). In reality, if I were making a piece this small and the thread broke, I would simply start over. The technique is really for when you're too far along to do that.

Not everyone does it the same. Some tatters prefer to simply lay the new thread parallel to the old and skip the knot because they don't like they way it looks. I can definitely understand this argument; however, I am paranoid, and without the knot I would be afraid that the tatting would pull apart in this spot if it got tugged on too hard. In fact, I've seen this happen.

One final perfectionist note. When using a variegated thread, I would normally try to align the color of the new thread to the old as closely as possible. I didn't do that here so that you could see where all the threads were.

Now for the fun! Since I'm celebrating two milestones, I decided to have two giveaways. I think most tatters will like them both.

Giveaway A:

This includes three snowflakes of my own design (for details on the snowflakes, see this post); a 10-yard sample of each of the hand-dyed threads used to make said snowflakes; Lacis crochet hooks in 0.4 mm and 0.5 mm; a Clover crochet hook in size 8 (not pictured due to a backorder issue, but it will definitely be here by the time the giveaway closes; Barbara Foster tells me that, although there is no industry standard for crochet hook numbers, Clover's size 8 is about 0.9 mm); Delica seed beads in three neutral colors that will look nice with any thread; and a pair of Gingher embroidery scissors.

Giveaway B:

This includes a set of five high-quality blank cards to add tatting (or other creative work) to; a skein of LadyShuttleMaker's "Pear Glace" HDT in size 50; a skein of Yarnplayer's "Leafy" HDT in size 40; a gift certificate to Handy Hands; and a 2 1/2 inch David Reed Smith shuttle in East Indian rosewood.

Here's how it works:
1. To enter, leave a comment on this post by Thursday October 28.
2. A single comment qualifies you for both giveways, so only one entry per person.
3. The same person will not be allowed to win both giveaways.
4. Your comment must include a way for me to contact you. If your Google profile includes your e-mail address, or you have a blog that I can leave a comment on, that's fine. If not, you need to give me your e-mail address; you can disguise it from spammers in the form of "yourname at emailprovider dot com".
5. At 5:00 pm Mountain Daylight Time, Thursday October 28, I will use a random number generator to select the winners. I will then e-mail the two winners to get their mailing addresses, and announce their names.

All clear?