Tatted Doilies

Here are just a few of the tatted doilies I make. There are so many books with good tatted doily patterns available nowadays that I am spoilt for choice. The square one that Ginger is helping to model is one of Mary Konior's lovely designs. The others are mostly Japanese patterns. The Japanese are particularly fond of doilies and their books are easy to follow for any intermediate tatter even without being able to read the text. (Being bilingual in English and Japanese I actually can read the text, but the Japanese are very diagram orientated so there is very little in the text and what there is is not critical.) The square purple mat is my own pattern.

For those who ask, "But what do you do with doilies once you have made them?" I lay them on shelves next to each other, sort of like shelf lining. They look very good like that. I also give them away. They make very good presents, especially if you remember to explain that they are tougher than they look, mine stand up to the worst my cats can do to them, and are easy to wash. I do pin mine out to block them, at least the first time, but after that I just pull them into shape and iron them.

Tatting is the easiest care of all the laces, at least I have always thought so!