Tuesday, March 04, 2008

This and that

I'm home sick today; I woke up with a knitting needle stuck in the side of my head and coming out of the back of my neck. No, not really, that's just what it feels like. I'll be fine, but in the interim, I'm home today.

March, according to the American Crochet Guild (or whatever it calls itself), is national crochet month. I used to do a lot of crochet work; rarely with wool. When I crochet, I prefer #10 crochet cotton, or finer. I thought that, since I usually show my knitting on the blog, I'd show you that I really do know how to crochet, too.

Here's a collage of three pieces I did years ago. They've not been blocked since the first time, so they're not looking their best anymore, but it will give you an idea of the work I used to do.

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I remember discovering that I much preferred the Japanese patterns (I have 2 Japanese crochet books); the finished doilies lay much flatter and block out so much better than the patterns I made using the Magic Crochet magazines (which are lovely, but they just don't lay as nicely).

These days, however, my passion is knitting. I've worked on the gloves a little bit.

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It's very interesting how the yarn seems to tell you what it wants to be. I've been at this point in the first glove already, but frogged it back. I've drawn out a pattern I liked for the back of the hand.... and scrapped it. This pattern is what the yarn wanted and so, this is the pattern I'm staying with.

I also found out why the first attempt was too short in the thumb gusset; I did it wrong. I did the increases every other round. The base pattern I'm using (Ann Budd's "Handy Book of Patterns") calls for the increases every third round; that makes all the difference!

Over the weekend, I found a FO in one of my knitting bags that I'm not sure I blogged about before.

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I finished this little beret while we were in Gibsons. The yarn is from Mirasol yarns (I don't have the tag handy), a really nice yarn to work with. Really nice! I used two skeins, that I remember, although I didn't need much from the second skein. Once again, the pattern is from Ann Budd's book. I finally blocked it this weekend.

Oh, I did do one little embellishment, knitting-wise. The brim of this tam is worked in baby cable rib, one of my faves.

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Now, I'm going to see if I can't get that knitting needle out of my skull. It's driving me nuts!

1 comment:

  1. Oh I do hope you're feeling better soon!

    Your crochet is gorgeous - I used to do that kind of work too - and loved it. Now I don't seem to have the patience (or the sharp sight!) for it any more.

    You know, it never occurred to me to crochet with wool until I started knitting. It was either fine cotton or silk or, for bulkier items, acrylic.

    Go figure!

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