{"id":3919,"date":"2016-01-15T21:46:13","date_gmt":"2016-01-15T21:46:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/?p=3919"},"modified":"2016-01-16T02:21:11","modified_gmt":"2016-01-16T02:21:11","slug":"a-quiet-day-onboard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/?p=3919","title":{"rendered":"A Quiet Day Onboard"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s anything but quiet outside today, which is exactly why I\u2019m hiding down below.\u00a0 We\u2019ve had gale force winds since last night, and squalls bringing horizontal rain.\u00a0 The wind in the palm trees is quite dramatic, reminiscent of Winslow Homer\u2019s paintings of the Bahamas.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know how such tall skinny trees can withstand these winds.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1908\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0We are anchored in a little \u2018teacup\u2019 harbor called Middle River, in Ft. Lauderdale.\u00a0 It is surrounded by elegant, Florida-style mansions, and each house has a dock with a large powerboat tied up to it.\u00a0 There are too many of us cruising sailboats anchored in the middle of this little teacup, and when the winds are this strong no one feels safe.\u00a0 All the boats are on the verge of tangling so no one got any sleep last night\u2014perhaps Bob and me most of all since we dragged rather dramatically in the late evening.\u00a0 It was odd because we\u2019d already been here overnight with no incident.\u00a0 This anchor has surprised us twice now so we did not sleep worrying about dragging yet again.\u00a0 Anyway, no loss of life, and no damage to anyone\u2014but until this front gets through here we will not feel safe.\u00a0 If any of us should drag too far we will be tangled with the large mega yachts on the docks.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1910\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0Knowing this dramatic weather was coming, I had planned to make the warp for my next tapestry today, but it\u2019s a bit too uncomfortable in this much wind to attempt that.\u00a0 It\u2019s better for me to sit still, so I\u2019m trying my hand–for about the 6th<\/sup> time–at tatting.\u00a0 Tatting is such a simple technique!\u00a0 It\u2019s just making slipknots that slide along a loop, which gets closed to make a ring, or slipknots that slide along a straight cord that gets pulled tight to make a chain.\u00a0 Rings and chains are all you need to know, along with a little embellishment called a picot.\u00a0 A picot is a pair of slipknots that are not pulled tightly to the previous slipknots.\u00a0 By leaving a small space between sets of slipknots you get decorative little picots when you pull the foundation ring or cord at the end of each ring or chain.<\/p>\n

Making these little elements is still so awkward to me that it feels like some kind of hand torture!\u00a0 I keep dropping the shuttle, and\/or I keep turning the work the wrong way as I tat.\u00a0 The little picots that occur throughout the rings and chains are not consistent–but I forge ahead.\u00a0 I am going to attach this little bit of frivolity to a V-neck T-shirt I own.\u00a0 I think it will be quite feminine, in spite of its irregularities.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_1911\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0I have to thank my lace guru Mary for showing me the fundamentals of tatting (she\u2019s not the first, but clearly the most successful at getting me to understand!), and I hope she will not take it as a slur against her teaching if she ever sees this pathetic little length of lace.\u00a0 I just know<\/em> that someday it\u2019s going to feel natural to do this.\u00a0 I have a memory of seeing my great aunts\u2019 hands flashing back and forth as their tatting grew while I watched. Surely, it’s in my DNA somewhere.<\/p>\n

And during the breaks I\u2019ve been taking (to give my hands a rest and assuage my rising frustration) I\u2019ve been reading The Paper Garden<\/i> which is about an 18th<\/sup> c. artist who did not make her first truly original artwork until she was 72.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Today being my 60th<\/sup> birthday, this book is resonating with me.\u00a0 Long before Mary Delany made her first unusually constructed botanical image that became known as the precursor to paper collage (she called what she made \u2018mosaiks\u2019), she had spent years painting in watercolors, drawing, and embroidering in cross stitch and other techniques.\u00a0 She was also quite good at the piano.\u00a0 She was no stranger to creativity.\u00a0 She loved fashion and often designed her own gowns (made by others) before embellishing them herself with lavish floral embroidery.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m certain I\u2019d feel quite connected to her even if I weren\u2019t struggling with my novice attempt at tatting.\u00a0 The fact that she surrounded herself and her home with beautiful things made by her own hand, and always had a garden wherever she lived, connects me to her with my own love of filling my home with handwoven and embroidered textiles, and having fresh flowers and greenery in the house from my gardens.\u00a0 But since I am tatting, it\u2019s that particular thing that makes me think of her every time I pick up the shuttle.\u00a0 I\u2019m embellishing a simple little t-shirt that I\u2019ll wear on any given day\u2014she embellished stunning 18th<\/sup> c. gowns that she wore on any given day.\u00a0 What a difference three centuries makes\u2026.yet it still connects us.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s anything but quiet outside today, which is exactly why I\u2019m hiding down below.\u00a0 We\u2019ve had gale force winds since last night, and squalls bringing horizontal rain.\u00a0 The wind in the palm trees is quite dramatic, reminiscent of Winslow Homer\u2019s paintings of the Bahamas.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know how such tall skinny trees can withstand these […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"","site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3919","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-lace"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3919","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3919"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3919\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3929,"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3919\/revisions\/3929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3919"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3919"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.argoknot.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3919"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}