More Hearts and Catherine Wheel Joins

 This is another of the variations of Karey's Heart from the current issue of Tatting Times that I talked about last time.  This is the asymmetric version.  That long coiled floating chain was a bit challenging.  I used a few Catherine Wheel Joins to hold it together.  I've been practicing those lately since I've been writing a pattern that uses them.

Have you noticed that all the tutorials for the CWJ show how to work it from the front side?  I need to work it from the back side on my pattern and adjust it so it blends in with the front side appearance. That should be easy enough, right? Just pull the first loop to the back instead of the front?  Sometimes it worked, and sometimes I had a twisty mess with no idea why.  Finally I decided that I got better results if I was careful to pull only on the thread coming from the previous stitch, instead of on both threads in front when I pulled to pop the loop to the other side.

I was using Frivole's delightful Happy Heart pattern to practice and try different strategies for making the join from the back side.  The turquoise example has mostly good joins, but only because I picked so many of them out and re-did them.  By the end of that one, I had decided how to do them.  On the peach one, the CWJs were easier, and looked better, but I was concentrating so much on the joins that I didn't watch the tension on the chains, so it's all lopsided.  On the screen, it looks better than it does in real life, for a change.  Anyway, I love the little pattern, and I'll be trying it again.