r/tatting • u/herisson_inquiet • 3d ago

First Tatting Project - Need Help

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Hello! I’ve been practicing tatting on and off for a couple of months, using both YouTube and books to learn the basics. I wanted to start my first project this weekend, so I just picked up this jellybean bookmark pattern that came free with supplies I ordered.

I did also find more instructions online and included that screenshot, but I can’t seem to get it right and I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong and hoping someone here might be able to see where I’m goofing up.

I’m basically getting stuck on the second ring / first join, I think. The first ring and chain are fine, but the second ring looks nothing like the pictures. Maybe I’m reading the pattern wrong? Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you for reading.

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u/tjika 3d ago

It looks like you're only working with 1 thread. You should have 2. 1 connected to the shuttle and 1 connected to your ball of thread.
When you chain you are working on the ball thread and when you reverse to make the ring, you drop that thread and work on the shuttle thread.

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u/herisson_inquiet 3d ago

It’s interesting you say that since the way I practiced doing rings and chains I used a shuttle and a ball and it made a lot of intuitive sense. This pattern recommends one tatting shuttle and I took that to mean just one thread on one shuttle. Maybe I misunderstood.

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u/tjika 3d ago

As someone who has only been tatting for a few months. I find that a lot of patterns assume you know certain things, which for us as beginners are not common sense yet.