Got shuttle...or needle????

Well, it’s been a busy few days. I got to help demonstrate tatting on Saturday. Then later that day, I was able to help a group host an organ crawl. I’m such a geek about the organ…..it’s just a way cool technology that’s been around for hundreds of years! More on that when I get the pictures back and the article for the newsletter is published.

First a question:  How did the opinion that tatting is a lost art get started????

It always amazes me how many people will say “oh, that’s a lost art” as I sit and demonstrate tatting. I’ve begun impishly saying “I’m not lost!” or “I found it!” or words that I hope folk hear as good humor. I don't like being grumpy. It’s just that it happens so often. I always figured a skill was lost when no one knew how to preform it and all documentation as to how to perform it was no longer available. That’s not the case here. There is a huge amount of information freely available on the Internet, there’s people teaching all over the world, there’s even a great deal of readily available books published on tatting. So, how is that a lost art???? Is it that people have wished to learn and found it too difficult? It’s not that difficult…..compared to learning to type on a QWERTY keyboard; or learning to make a good omelet. Is it that fewer people tat now than did in olden days? You often hear of Victorian pieces of tatting…..but when you read descriptions of domestic activity during that period of history, tatting isn’t mentioned that often. A lost art???????

Well, someone somewhere decided it was “lost” and I think they just had too many people listening to them for our own good. Not that they were a bully, but I can’t imagine that it’s the only skill we’ve “lost” that this person treasured. Maybe they didn’t smile much and felt smiling was “lost” along with maybe the “proper” way of greeting a good friend? Mmmmm. Well, I’m not lost and I will continue to tat and teach others to tat. Got shuttle or needle?