Judy Gibson's lace balls have intrigued me since I started to relearn to knit. After taking the Shetland Lace workshop, I decided to look at the patterns again, and hey presto! Now I get it! It's a wonderful feeling, this feeling of your brain opening up to a whole new fiber world. So many cool possibilities!

Anyway, I have four repeats done on the Mexican Lace ball, using J & P Coats size 10 Royale crochet thread in (what else?) the "Mexicana" color! This one is on US size 2 needles. I think I could go up to size 3 for a lacier effect.

Here is a net bag I'm working on in the same thread. The netting shuttle is one my brother made for me out of a piece of brass welding rod. He hammered the ends flat, cut a slit in each end, and smoothed them out for me. I am going to keep working on this bag until the shuttle empties, then my plan is to fingerloop-braid a pair of drawstrings.

This is my netted tatting bag crammed with some of my tatting things. I have a pattern in there, thread, business cards for the West Michigan Lace Group, and various tins with tatting shuttles, works in progress, scissors, crochet hook, needle threaders, and you name it! I've been using this net for at least six years, and only recently had to repair a couple of broken meshes at the bottom. Nets are tough and they hold a lot more than you would think to look at them. The only thing you can't keep in a net bag is netting shuttles -- they fall right out the holes!