This month is National Crochet Month and this year's theme is glamping. It's not too late to take part in all the fun....
Crochetville are currently hosting their 5th annual NatCroMo Blog tour featuring 80 designers, crochet-friendly local yarn stores, indie dyers and spinners. There are free patterns and tutorials and daily giveaways too! Here's the link to general information on the CrochetVille website. You can see what's going on each day on the CrochetVille blog and their National Crochet Month Facebook group.
The designers are my absolutely favorite thing about the Crochetville tour. I was delighted to see the inspiring Marie Segares kicking off the blog tour. Of course I had to make the camping trivet (her free pattern for the tour) being a big fan of camping (and Marie!) Being the thrifty Brit I made my own tshirt yarn out of my daughter's old choir t-shirt. It's amazing to see how simply pulling the cotton tight rolls it into functional yarn. Here's the fab video on How to make t-shirt yarn that I found on YouTube by Trisha at Upcycled Stuff.
I loved the projects by new-to-me designer Yuliya Tkacheva and figured out that she works in tandem at Cup of Stitches with Lena Fedotova, designer of the wonderful Entrelac Tunisian yoga top that I've just completed. I also discovered fellow Brit Amanda Perkins for the first time who designs the most beautiful crochet blankets. And the month is barely half way through!
The CrochetSpot blog are keeping things simple by celebrating National Crochet Month with a series of cute crochet applique patterns for us to make. I'm very taken with the cherry. CrochetSpot also mentions an International Crochet Month over on Ravelry. Their party runs for another week until March 19th.....
Have a wonderful week y'all! You'll find me in between weekly blog posts on Twitter and Instagram as @craftyescapism
I've decided that this year is going to be the year of the crochet garment. I have made a fair few knitted and crochet garments and designed a couple too but I can definitely finesse my skills. I plan to buy Top Down Crochet Sweaters by Dora Ohrenstein after reading a review by Susan Lowman on her Crochet Architect website.
I learned Tunisian Entrelac Crochet last year making a bright blanket for charity and wrote about it here. I enjoyed the technique so much and since this year is the year of the crochet garment I decided to tackle the Yoga Top by Elena Fedotova. I found out about Elena from Marie Segares in her Instagram #undergroundcraftertakeover. Here's the roundup on Marie's blog. Elena's geometric designs look so fresh and modern. I favorited the Yoga Top straightaway and I really love what she has done here with a traditional crochet granny squares on her Granny Fish Top.
I am now underway. The yoga top is bottom up and mostly seamless (yay for not having to sew sides together).I just love making these tiny squares because they are join as you go, and they just look so unbelievably cute. There are a few color combo suggestions and a blank chart in each size for you to colorize with your own color choices. I did have to restart after making a silly gauge calculation. Usually, I find one row is sufficient to measure horizontal gauge but with Tunisian Entrelac stitch the gauge reduces after adding a second and third row. My top was going to be a tight squeeze so I had to rip it all back and add additional squares. My husband likes to see me ripping items back. He says I'm getting more enjoyment out of the yarn and he's probably right.
Are you tackling something new this year? I'd love to hear.
I'm always trying out new crochet techniques. It's one of my favorite things. And last week I decided to have a go at Tunisian Simple Entrelac stitch. There is a written description and a chart in my favorite crochet bible: The Complete Photo Guide to Crochet by Margaret Hubert I am usually pretty good at reading written patterns and charts don't freak me out either but this stitch had me totally flummoxed. After an hour or so of trying to figure it out I went to google for a video. Mikey of the Crochet Crowd has a extremely good one on this technique: How to Tunsian Crochet - Entrelac Blankets in Rows and this did the trick. I was once more diving into my donated yarn stash and here's my rather seasonal charity blanket. It's all about the pumpkins right now in Texas.
I found making these cute little textured squares incredibly absorbing. I've had a little go at Tunisian before but I didn't fall in love with the technique. It was one of the required swatches when I took my second Craft Yarn Council certificate back in late 2014/early 2015. I recall taking the longest time to figure out what to do with the edges of my swatch. I'm not quite sure what I was doing. I just wasn't happy and ripped it out half a dozen times. I did like the texture of the completed swatch a lot though when I finally got there.
Three things that I now know about Tunisian Simple Entrelac stitch are:
- You can use a standard crochet hook rather than a Tunisian hook for entrelac since you only have at most 7 loops on your hook (well for a six stitch wide square).
- You must chain the number of stitches you want for the whole width of your blanket before you get started.
- You use a crochet hook two sizes larger for Tunisian crochet than a standard crochet hook because the resulting fabric is extremely dense.
There is an amazingly gorgeous top I might try now I that have mastered entrelac technique: Yoga Top by Elena Fedotova Take a look at it. I'm sure you may well be tempted too!
