I Give Up

I tried tatting the motif from my something's wrong post yesterday.
Same thread but this time I followed the advice from yesterday's post and made much smaller picots.
I ended up with the same problem - too much curling.


















I used the iron to stretch, press and steam the motif into place but it didn't work out very nice.

Left: Tried to steam and press the motif into shape
Right: Removed curled edge from first attempt and pressed

The photo and the pattern diagram seem to match.
I wonder if the issue is the numbers noted on the diagram.
Or, perhaps my tension is too tight?

With smaller picots the piece laid quite nicely until I added the fourth round.

I give up on this one.  I think I'll cut off that last round, block the two motifs, starch them and call the ornaments.