I recently went to my aunt’s house in Florida to get some much needed sunshine in the middle of winter. In one of her guest bedrooms she has a framed, shadow-boxed piece of unfinished tatting that my grandma was working on before she passed away (in 1963). A year ago I blogged about my paternal grandfather, Grandpa Komm, who was a tailor and who I like to say I got my sewing genes from. But my mom and her mother, my maternal grandmother, gave me some sewing genes too.
According to my mom, Grandma Inez would sit down and tat lace whenever she had a free moment. She could never just sit still; she always had to be doing something, even when she was “relaxing.” She tatted only this particular pattern and used it to edge handkerchiefs and pillow cases that she would give as wedding gifts.
I never met my grandma, so having this beautiful piece of her handiwork makes me feel a special connection with her. And the fact that it’s unfinished, that the pearl cotton is still wrapped around the bobbin in the shuttle, ready for her to pick up the next time she had a spare moment, seems to make it that much more personal. Sometimes the most inspiring works are the ones that never get finished.
Everything She Seams... 