The entire Midwest was struck by blizzards of snow and encased in ice this week. As beautiful as it looks from the window, it has been hard for many who are without heat or power for days. If you are stuck in the house, it gives you a perfect excuse to sit and tat.

No tv, no radio, no wireless, just the clicking of the shuttle (needle tatters do it in silence) to set your stitches by. And if you have young people stuck at home, too, this is an excellent opportunity for quality time, so teach them to tat. Cut flat shuttles out of cardboard or plastic and wind them up. You will be surprised at how easily and quickly young people learn to tat.

Teenagers...once the batteries on the cellphones run out... can be shown how to draw tatting patterns. Young male teenagers have proven to be very good at this type of mechanical drawing even if they are forced to use paper and pencil instead or a CAD program.

Take your tatting to the emergency warming centers, too. Teaching others to tat will help them deal with the stress and make friends out of strangers.

For the tatters who has been around a while, here is a brainteaser:

http://www.georgiaseitz.com/2011/superbowltatxword.pdf

NOTABENE: If you don't have electricity and are tatting by candlelight, do not let your lace dangle too close to the flame, the thread is flammable. (Sigh)

Take a moment also to prepare an emergency kit for your family, first aid kit, water, hard candy, playing cards or puzzles, flashlights, candles and matches, and batteries for everything. For yourself, your emergency tatting kit should contain at least 2 shuttles/needles, 2 balls of thread, crochet hook, scissors and a stack of patterns you never had time to try out. Optional: old pair of gloves with the tips cut off to keep your fingers warm while tatting.

Here's the latest article from the Tatting site at BellaOnline.com.

Building a Tatting Library - Standards
A tatting reference library is a wonderful resource for all tatters. Start building your own reference library by acquiring the most influential books of the 20th century.

http://www.bellaonline.com/articles/art70461.asp

Please visit tatting.bellaonline.com for even more great content about Tatting.

To participate in free, fun online discussions, this site has a community forum all about Tatting located here -

http://forums.bellaonline.com/ubbthreads.php?ubb=postlist&Board=39

I hope to hear from you sometime soon, either in the forum or in response to this email message. I thrive on your feedback!

Have fun passing this message along to family and friends, because we all love free knowledge!

Georgia Seitz, Tatting Editor
http://tatting.bellaonline.com

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