Needle tatted flower

Way back in June I made this needle tatted flower as an entry for the Get Crafty Contest over on Deviant art I had never needle tatted before so it was a challenge to make something using one of the tutorials offered as part A of the competition.

It was supposed to be a flat flower but as I didn't count properly or check to see how things were going as I cheerfully worked on this I eventually discovered that it was anything but flat. This was where the green bit and the wire came as as I decided to just make a more realistic flower from what I'd made so I made a spiral out of florists wire to help hold it up and joined that bit to another bit of florists wire, that I'd covered with more tatting + some wire tatted leaves that I'd fixed in place while tatting the stem, and made a loop of each end to join them so the head of the flower moves independently to the stem. I then fixed the flower to the stem with some green loops and added some yellow stamen in the middle for some more realism.

I'm really proud of this flower, it doesn't live in the garden any more but on my desk in a cleaned jam jar.

I did not win this competition but it was fun joining in!