TattingChic's lovely post

I had to chuckle when I read Tatting Chic's post about the goodies I sent her - strickly speaking she is only half right (unknown to her!!!)!! It was "Scottish tatting" as in the fact it was executed in Scotland but if you are adhering closely to the defifition of nationality, it wasn't done by a "true" Scot - I hold dual nationality.

...I'll explain....I am Tasmanian (Australia) by birth and most of my upbringing but born to Aberdonian parents who had emigrated to Tasmania before I arrived. I was always brought up to the fact that I would go to Scotland to finish my education and then go on to a Scottish university so never questioned their reasoning (and I was an only child). My dad thought I was too young to go into boarding school 13000 miles away when I reached 1st year high school level (we are talking about the Australian & UK systems here) at age 11, so it was then decided that I would for my final 2 years of high school at age 16. In retrospect, this was a very good move as my Dad died during my first year in high school. So age 16 I was packed off to boarding school with weekends out with my family here [Mum and Dad's respective families had remained in Scotland - we or I (by myself at age 11!!) had been over on 3 previous occasions for Xmas hol's etc). The plan to be as I previously mentioned until my Mum found out that even though I had only ever held a British passport (got an Australian one later) I would be considered an overseas student at the Universities here and thus, expected to pay overseas fees of thousands of pounds per year. I had such a great time here that I was so upset when Mum told me I was going back to Tassie I hung-up on her!!! To cut a long story short(er) I returned to Tassie got my BSc there but couldn't get a permanent job, so rung my Uncle here a asked about the job situation here - he said great so I came (my Mum had come back to Aberdeen to live after she retired (I was a late child) but had also died very soon afterwards) - I got a job using my degree at the University of Aberdeen very quickly - met my "Scottish-by-birth" but army brat so no-Scottish-accent-either husband and the rest is history..........

As you can imagine though this leaves DS in a house with an "English" sounding father and a weak Australian-tiny-bit-Scottish mother, so needless to say he also doesn't have the local "twang"!! Here I am considered Australian and there I am considered Scottish!! - It's enough to give someone a personality complex, LOL!!

Thank you so much TattingChic & Jane in particular, but all the others as well, for all your lovely comments on their respective blogs - it really is appreciated.

The promised pic's and bookmark exchange

As promised here are all the wonderful goodies that Aileen sent - firstly the tea towel itself.



Then there were packets & packets & packets of beads & sequins & ribbon.


Two wonderful threads.


And candy & chocolate.


This is the whole lot together - Wasn't I an extremely lucky girl!!!



Also I participated in the bookmark exchange on intatters - choosing to send and receive 2 bookmarks. My partners were Jenni in Australia & Kaira in Norway. I am very lucky that I have received both my exchange bookmarks - this very poor picture is of a stunning woven picot bookmark from Jenni (by chance she had done it in my very favourite dicontinued :( Manuela thread & white (I'll scan it later to post a better image). She even sent me the pattern!!!!
Jenni hasn't received mine yet so I won't post it as yet.

The other stunning one was from Kaira in variegated blues & white - isn't it lovely!! The pattern is here.

The ones I sent her was an adaptation of Iris' Eleonora doily as suggested by Marty (see here) and my own version of Ellen Lai's bookmark.

Feeling very virtuous & extremely lucky

As the title says, I am feeling very pleased with myself!! I have finally caught up with everything - the teeny tinsy winners things are packaged up to post tommorrow, so are the two bookmarks for the intatters bookmark exchange, as are a couple of other gifts for other people - 8 different packets going to 4 different countries!!!

I am also extremely grateful to Aileen, after the lost Secret Valentine exchange she has more than made up for the wait I had. The parcel arrived a week ago but with everything else that I have been doing this is the first chance I have had to post about it - her generosity is truly extra-ordinary - I got packets & packets & packets of beads, thread, chocolate, candy & ribbon as well as the tea towel. I have taken photos of all the items in this post and am planning on posting Aileen's gifts tomorrow. I will also add the ones of the tatting I have done after the recipents have received their respective gifts.