Shoestring Trick

The shoestring trick is named after the first part of tying your shoes. It is used to switch position of your threads. Following is a picture of a situation where this may be used.

I have just finished the gold ring. If I reverse work now to make the next black chain, my chain will be going in the wrong direction. To remedy this I will do a shoestring tie to switch the position of my threads. This can be seen in the next picture.

Cross the threads as shown. It helps to keep the thread crossing on a flat plane such as the table or your knee. Pull the crossing snug, up against the work. Make sure to pull on the threads evenly. If one thread gets pulled faster than the other, the results will become uneven. Now we are ready to continue on with our black chain.

This trick has come in handy for me during a project I was tatting from a visual diagram. It was not easy for me to tell from the diagram that I needed two shuttles. I started the project with a ball and shuttle. I came to a point where I realized I needed 2 shuttles. I couldn't continue on and tat with the ball thread as a shuttle, (actually I did as my ball thread was the little size 80 ball, so it was easy to use as a shuttle). However I could of just as easily did the shoestring trick. Hope this helps.

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