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Tinking Turtle Raverly

An Example of a Great Repair Request

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Have you ever wondered what goes on before I take on a project to repair?

Before I accept an item to fix, I like to have a dialogue with clients about the piece, their goals, and my ability. All of this starts with the Repair Request I have on my Contact Me Page.

So what makes a good repair request? I often have to clarify to potential clients what I need to come up with an accurate estimate to repair the item they’d like me to work on. When you, the client, fills out our contact form, it asks you a series of questions such as:

  • How important is matching color or matching fiber content?
  • How important is it to you that the repair be machine washable vs. needing to be washed by hand?
  • How are you intending to use the item?
  • How fragile does the fabric appear?
  • How important to you is cost?
  • How important is it for you to preserve as much of the textile as possible?

When you answer these questions, they help me understand where your priorities lie in the the repair. Some repairs can be functionally stable, but the color or fiber content might not be the best match. Finding a good color match can be time consuming – are you willing to reimburse me as I purchase different yarns to find the best match for the repair? If you are intending to put the item on display vs use it everyday, that may influence how much of the object needs to be repaired – daily use means I should also prioritize areas I see are going thin, because with more use they may easily become holes soon.

One of the best ways I can get a sense of the item (aside from sending it to me) is to take good photographs. Take a look at the photos below as I show what was really helpful about them.

This is a great overall photo of the piece. I can see the pieces of paper that mark the holes, and I know where the holes are in relation to each other. It gives me a sense of the scale of the piece, the overall pattern, and if there are any edgings or other factors I have to take into account while working.

Great photo with a number. The ruler provides a lot of detail for me: I can tell the size of the yarn and how big the hole is. The hole is filling enough of the frame that I can zoom in to look at how the fibers are worn away (ie: frayed, cut, ragged).

Again, the ruler is super helpful. I can also tell the customer had their hands on either side stretching the fabric slightly so I could see everything.

So helpful to have number 3 and 4, which are close together, numbered! In cases where holes are close together, the location of the holes can impact how I approach the repairs, so it’s helpful to see that relational information.

Here the hole was small enough that I couldn’t see it in the overall picture, but can see it here. It was so helpful!

 

One of the other things this client did was mark each hole with a piece of string. This really saves both of us time. While sometimes people don’t realize there is a hole that I catch, the time it takes for me to find holes that the client already knows about is time I could use on doing repairs. Ultimately it saves us both time, and in the end, the client money.

Got a piece you’d like me to look at? Now that you have a sense of what I’m looking for, head over to Let’s Connect, and get the conversation started.

2021 Changes and Prices

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This post is going to be a bit of a tone change, but I hope you’ll bear with me. It’s something I’ve been putting off writing about for the past two weeks, as it’s not the fun part of talking about the pieces I get to work on and posting beautiful pictures.  Instead, this is more the realm of the business side of Tinking Turtle, which is something I honestly prefer to leave to Mr. Turtle most of the time.  But, I’m the owner and face of the business, so this is a decision I need to own up to.

As 2020 draws to a close and we begin a New Year, it’s time for me to take stock of the business and the direction it has been going.  We’ve seen some big changes to Tinking Turtle in the last 2 years, as we’ve added to our family and pivoted away from design work to more repair work.  It’s been a tough thing for me, as I honestly love designing, but the tight deadlines were killing both our family life and my hands.  I’m no longer able to pull an all-nighter to finish a shawl that needs to be sent into the magazine in two days!

Which brings me to the purpose of this post: I’m going to be changing my pricing, and I wanted to share some of the reasons I’ve come to this decision.

What Changed?

  • The type of work I’ve been doing has been shifting.  I’m doing a lot more larger and more complicated and specialized repairs.  I’ve built up relationships with other individuals in the knit/crochet industry, and have been happy to pass comission knitting their way when it’s been more standard.  But I’m doing more specialty art projects and handling more heavily damaged pieces, and I want my pricing to reflect that I’ve shifted to a much more specialized sort of work.
  • I‘ve made investments to be able to take on more damaged pieces. Over the past five years I’ve develped a special space to store and process pieces as they come in.  I’ve invested in specialized equipment, like the ozone generator to treat pieces damaged by odors, smoke, moths, and other materials. I’ve invested in other behind-the-scenes tools to better protect and preserve the heirlooms I’m working on.
  • I’ve also made changes to how we handle pieces from a liabality standpoint; with this I am taking on more risk, and hence, have higher insurance prices and other risk mitigating expenses.
  • My volume of projects has increased! Now, don’t get me wrong – I’m happy about this. BUT! The reality is that knitting, crocheting, seaming, blocking, pinning, etc are all hand and arm heavy activities. I’ve been transparent about how this year I had to have surgery for my wrist.  I’m not saying my career was entirely the reason I had to have the surgery, but I have to be careful and take time to stretch and take care of my hands.
  • I’ve gotten better. As I practice more and learn more, the quality of my finishing and repair has increased, and I believe that my expertise is worth it!

What does this mean for you, the Customer?

  1. Coming January 1st, my prices will be increasing on Finishing & Repair work.  My hourly rate will increase from $60 to $70.  Many of the categories in my Finishing line of services will also change – some won’t change as much as my hourly rate, and some won’t change at all.  But most things will be increasing by a little.
  2. Note: for any of you who have been issued a codeword, as long as you have filled out the customer intake form, you are set! Your projects will be charged under the old system. Unable to fill out the form and get your piece in the mail? Drop me a note and we can work with you.

Got questions about the changes?  As always, you can leave me a comment, or drop me an email, and I’ll be happy to answer them!

Thank you so much for being loyal customers!

Mending a Midwest Inspried Crochet Afghan

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This midwest inspried afghan had a lot of damage done to it over the years, and the owner contacted me about doing some repairs and mending to bring it back up to shipshape! This was an interesting piece – each row was done through the back loop (hence the distinct ridges, and each row the yarn was cut on the end, resulting in the creator only ever going from right to left when working on it.  The cut ends became part of the fringe.

It did make the repairs a lot easier to do, as I didn’t need to flip the blanket over for each row. Working through the back loop does mean that the last row invoves a lot of sewing, though.

The two holes right above the the black line were so close together it made more sense to pull out the yarn between them and work them as one large hole. I decided to tackle that first.

To keep track of each stitch, I used locking stitch markers to hold each leg of the single crochet together.  This will help when I reweave the last row. 

Nearly done! After working each of the rows, I’m finishing up by joining together the last row. I had to take out the black row later in the process as it had more damage to it than I realized.

Finally Done!

Now I’ve got everything worked up and the ends woven in. I mark each area of repair with a piece of yarn, so the repairs are easier to find. When the clients get the repaired piece they can take the markers out.

See that the stitches look a little more lively where I’ve done the repairs? This will improve as the piece gets used, and the newer stitches gain some wear.

Now I’m tackling the repair that is further up in the blanket. You’ll notice there’s the larger hole, and to the left, another smaller hole. It made sense in this case to also pull out and combine the holes. The yarn in between the two holes was worn away enough that I was concerned about its stablility.

As in many repairs, this is a slow process of just adding the new yarn to the old, crocheting across the row, and then sewing and reweaving the old to the new.  What you can’t see on the backside is all the ends I still need to weave in.

And now we’re at the end: the hole is closed up and the ends are woven in.  A bit of yarn to mark the spot.  Now it’s time for this afghan to have a quick wash before it leaves to go back to its owner.

Much Beloved Heirloom Crochet Tablecloth Made New

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rectangular lace crochet tablecloth with center border and then outer border made up of flower motifs

rectangular lace crochet tablecloth with center border and then outer border made up of flower motifs

One of my favorite repairs, recently, has been a series of two different crochet lace tablecloths I took on.  These two pieces were both at least 30 or more years old, and were in pretty good condition.  Frank from Textile Restoration Inc in Chicago had sent the client my way.  I’ll highlight the first of the tablecloths today, and I’ll be highlighting the second of them a little later.

The first tablecloth, which I thought of as “Field of Flowers” when I worked on it, was a huge piece, at least 5 1/2 feet by 4 feet.  It was made of a center pannel of 4 x 12 motfs, an inner border of triangles, an outer set of motifs 4 deep, and then larger second outer border.

Most of the holes were areas where motifs that had been joined as the tablecloth was worked had come undone and unraveled – not uncommon, even in pieces where every single end is tightly woven in.  The areas where two motifs join together tend to be an area that recieves more stress.

[Read more…]

On the other Side of the Snowstorm: Repairing Broken Things

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fixing the toaster

Mr. Turtle fixing the toaster

One of the things I love about snowstorms is how they can sometimes function like a home-vacation: a chance to tackle all the things you haven’t quite gotten to yet.  I talked about my plan on Friday of things I wanted to tackle: darning, personal projects, starting the Piecework lace project I’ve got to get off by the end of the week.  And in that regard, it was a lovely weekend.  Little did I realize it at the time, but the theme of the weekend became repairing things: Mr. Turtle and I took turns solving problems and mending what’s broken.  There’s a lovely sort of satisfaction in that.

Saturday morning with the snow still coming down, Mr. Turtle and I got up earlier than expected.  After breakfast (and happy we hadn’t lost power during the night), Mr. Turtle tackled repairing the toaster, which had been failing to latch when you put the lever down.

Darning Socks

Mending socks with a darning needle and yarn.

It was one of those moments that made me glad that Mr. Turtle and I have different interests and things we’re good at: when a small electrical appliance breaks, it’s “broken” to me, beyond repairing.  Similarly, when Mr. Turtle’s got a hole in his socks or some textile wears out, he wouldn’t have a clue about how to fix it.

But to Mr. Turtle, the toaster was (nearly) an open book.  Meanwhile, I was busy tackling a pile of darned socks that had been building (and building and building).  Many of them didn’t need much repairing – we’ve both gotten better about “watching” our handknits for thin spots.  Much of the work was just working duplicate stitch over areas worn thin.

So while Michael tackled the toaster, I tackled the socks.  Then, it was out to do the first of two shovel efforts, a quick walk, and then a retreat indoors as the storm picked up again.

hat, mittens, gloves and scarf hanging from an unused shovel in a pile of snow.

Loosing the hats and mittens as we warm up

Sunday dawned with the news that church was canceled (not surprising), and nearly another 8″ of snow spread over our cars, yard, driveway and sidewalks.  It was not going to be a fun job to shovel – our one real snow-shovel (with a metal edge along the blade!) was out of commision.  The day before I’d bent the handle – a combination of it being an “ergonomic” handle and me being a mite bit too enthusiastic.  I was not looking forward to shoveling the driveway, sidewalks and other areas with a garden shovel.  Not only are the blades on these shovels small (so small!), but it just hurt my New England pride.

This is, again, where Mr. Turtle comes to the rescue – off he vanishes with the broken shovel, to return with the blade on a new wooden handle.  Our yard edge-trimmer (which we never use), valiantly gave up its handle to be installed on the snow shovel.  Soon we were warming up, the hats and mittens, jackets and scarves coming off as we polished off the driveway.

And because it hurt my pride not to do it, we are the sole people on the street that also cleared off our sidewalks and storm drain.  Again, raised in New England (and later upstate New York), I’m fairly certain it’s a law that you have to shovel off your portion of the sidewalks and clear out storm drains in your yard.  If it isn’t a law, then it was at least a family law in our household: you dug out the mailbox, you dug out the storm drain, and, gosh darnit, you dug out the sidewalks to ensure safe passage from the house in case of a fire.

So even as we’re living in Ashland, we did the same.

Then, it was time for another walk, this one along some of the more parklike areas of Ashland, to take pretty, artsy snow photography and enjoy the evening sun.

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4 Warning Signs Your Handmade Afghan is Falling Apart

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My business has many arms – my teaching, pattern writing, and more recently, finishing.  Normally finishing involves piecing together sweaters or blocking shawls, but sometimes I get another type of request.  Sometimes I get requests to do repairs on well loved a
fghans and blankets that are lovingly knitted or crochet.  Many times I’m able to fix things before they get too bad, but sometimes I have to be the person saying, “I’m sorry, but there is no way to fix your family heirloom.”  This is a terrible thing to say, and so I have a list of things to look for to know when your afghan is in need of repair, before it gets irreparable.

  • At the First Sign of Trouble, seek help.  There’s an old adage that says, “A stitch in time saves 9.”  And it is so true – making repairs before they happen is the best way to prevent tears, rips and holes.  Look for weak spots in your knitting or crochet – where the thread is getting thin or wispy.  These are places where holes will form.  Find someone to help you retrace the stitches and reinforce the work.
  • Pulls or loose threads.  Sometimes yarn that has been carefully woven in works its way loose, or gets caught and creates a pull or snag.  Don’t panic! If the thread is not broken, just stretched and out of the weave of the fabric, carefully pull it in different directions, and see if you can ease it back into place.  If not, see if you can find someone (like a finisher or a more experienced knitter or crocheter, that can help you work the yarn back into the stitch.

  • Seams coming undone. So many crochet (and even knit) afghans have their seams come undone.  One of my very first repairs to a blanket was my father’s well-loved afghan, made in long strips of knitting and seamed together.  If a seam comes undone, don’t panic.  Take a bit of matching yarn or thread, and carefully seam the edges back together, using a ladder stitch or running stitch.
  • The center of motifs are a common place I see in need of repair.  Either because the original creator didn’t secure the ends enough, or just because of stress, this can be a common cause for problems.  If you can, try to pick up as many of the loose loops and put them on a stitch older or locking stitch marker, to prevent further unraveling. This is one repair I’d say, if you can, to get a professional to do, as it takes a deft touch and a good understanding of how stitches work to get it back to matching the others.
The key to all of these problems is if they are caught early, they can be fairly painless repairs.  If you let the problem go, the worse things get, and the more likely that the afghan will need to be reconstructed or have more extensive repairs.Have you ever had to repair a project?  Tell me about it on twitter or facebook.  Looking to have your own repaired?  Get in touch with me through my finishing form!

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