It's Crochet, Knit & Natter 10: New Year, New Yarn, New Thread!

[QuantumWeatherButterfly]

Time for a new thread for all the lovely yarn crafters!

Old thread here: http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/artsandcrafts/4557189-its-crochet-knit-natter-9-so-many-projects-so-little-time-oh-well-i-almost-made-it-rhymee_

@QuantumWeatherButterfly the fsc row doesn't look the same at the others, but I'm not sure if that's because it's not moss stitch, or because I've done it wrong. I've only done it a few times. I quite like the effect it's given though. I did think my gauge was off because its got narrower but the pattern said its meant to.

I'm using Sirdar Snuggly Replay, at least I think I am
I'm 99% certain that's what it is. It's a cotton acrylic blend, but I think pure cotton would have been better.

This popped up on my social media the other day. I love it. I love the Norfolk coast and I’m hoping to be moving in just over a week (we haven’t exchanged yet so we’ll see). I’ll be moving to Norfolk so it seems fitting to do a Norfolk coast CAL as I move to Norfolk. I think the colours the designer has picked are perfect, especially for Wells.

But… I am hopefully moving in a week and a bit. I have a baby blanket to finish (and some other WIPs, obviously) and I’m needing my mum to make one potentially two baby blankets for babies due in the next 2 months. I don’t really want to do a CAL or a massive blanket. I need to make my mum a replacement blanket for the one the post office lost. And, most importantly, I haven’t bought yarn in 2023 (I’ve been gifted yarn but I haven’t bought any) and I quite like my streak. I don’t need more yarn, I need to do some scrap yarn projects. I can’t really afford to buy yarn, even stylecraft, when in the middle of moving house because that money could be better spent on decorating. Obviously I don’t have scrap yarn in any of those colours.

But I want it…
So do you think it would in scrap yarn and not look shit?

That’s a lovely blanket @WeCanLiveLikeJackAndSally you could definitely do it with different yarns. Good luck with the move!

That's lovely, @WeCanLiveLikeJackAndSally - I'm sure you can do it in scrap yarn!

I'm off to the Cumbrian Wool Gathering this morning - lots of lovely stalls to browse! I'm after some fleece so I can take part in the 2023 Tour de Fleece (spinning every day that the Tour de France cyclists race ). I fancy a spinner's apron too - I always get covered in fluff!

Well the Wool Gathering was nice, though not anything like on the scale of Yarndale. I bought a kilo of undyed Shetland fleece in two natural colours - white and a lovely soft, beigey grey. It's a lot of fleece, but I'm fed up with making only one skein of yarn and not knowing what to use it for! I'm thinking of making a cardigan with this lot. Trouble is, I have no idea what yardage/metreage it will create! The guild I've joined has its own little group doing the Tour de Fleece this year and we'll all be sharing updates on how we're getting on, which will be nice!

Forgot to add a pic of my fleece! Doesn't quite do justice to how big the bundles are!

Oh that’s a lovely idea from your guild about the tour de fleece @Fairislefandango! I like your haul! If it helps, I got much more yardage spinning woollen style long draw than short forward draw for the same thickness of yarn. I’m getting a jumper out of the green woollen spun 500g.

I’m going to be spinning my fleeces, I’m sorting the Jacob into it’s separate colours just because and then I bought the mini pack from Hilltop cloud with 5 x 20g of fibre for a bit of a change.

Tricky one @WeCanLiveLikeJackAndSally! I’ve seen lots of blankets where I prefer the colour palates used by the makers rather than the designers but you do seem to have a lot on your plate. If it wouldn’t add more stress, I’d say go for it. I’m gutted for you that the blanket you made for your mum never turned up

I'm intrigued by spinning long draw, @SpinMeRightRoundBabyRightRound . I've never tried it, but I've watched some videos. I like the idea of spinning loftier, fluffier yarn. I've got some grey Jacob I could practise with!

I fancy making a longline, sleeveless cardigan with it. I guess if I don't have enough I can just order some more online. It was from the Adelaide Walker stall, so easily available. I couldn't find a pattern I like on Ravelry, so I bought Ann Budd's 'The Knitter's Handy Book of Top Down Sweaters' which is a book of basic generic patterns for set types of jumper/cardigans in multiple gauges and sizes, so I'm going to try and design my own <gulp>! Maybe striped or colour blocks or maybe Fairisle, although I'm not sure if there's enough contrast between the two colours.

I've had a little practice at spinning kind-of-long-draw from the fold with a bit of my Shetland top today. I like the lighter, fluffier effect, but I'm not sure how consistent I can get it, and it's a bit dlow with having to join new bits so often!

@Fairislefandango If you have roving, you can spin long draw straight from the roving, it’s not a “true” woollen yarn then but it’s a good compromise and it’s so quick. It’s easier for consistency too than my not perfectly prepared rolags. If I could bribe a child to take a video my hands it would be easier to explain what I mean though. I might work on that

I've had a bit of a push on the Maria top, and I reckon I'm half way down the body. I've set myself a goal to have it finished by 19th July, which is when we will hopefully be seeing MIL. She bought me the yarn so I want to be able to show it off.

I've made a tiny mistake in one of the rounds (4 stitches in the cluster), and my natural inclination is to take it back but I'm making myself not fix it because genuinely I don't think you can see it with the way the clusters are bunched up together. If it was on the front, I might feel different, but it's on the side not far down from the underarm.

When it is done, I am going to make myself finish DD's hexi cardigan (which was going great until I made the sleeves too short), and then either a scrappy basket (which I should do to bust some stash), or a cardigan for me (which I shouldn't, because I'll need to buy the yarn but I probably will because I just want to😀)

@SpinMeRightRoundBabyRightRound my Shetland is top rather than roving. When I was learning to spin on the courses I did, I tried roving, batts and top and found batts the easiest. I seem to have headed towards top now, largely because it seems more widely available and comes in such lovely colours and braids. But actually I'm now wondering if I should go back to preparations more suited to woollen or semi-woollen spinning, as I prefer the loftier, lighter yarns! I'm having some success with my attempts at spinning from the fold though, so I might go with that for this load of Shetland top.

I meant to come back and show you all my fresh start on my top for I can't remember how many days 🙄. It's going much better now I'm not in hospital and have re-gained my ability to count properly 🙈

That yarn's really pretty @lucysmam . I hope you've not been too unwell.

Gorgeous yarn @Fairislefandango and @lucysmam if if very different sorts. I love the colours.

Just hopping on to say Purple Sheep yarns are closing for retirement and have 30% off everything. Lots of Drops!

Thanks @CrochetBug and @MerylSqueak it's very pretty. I'm trying to be very careful with it - I've never spent so much on yarn, so was gutted when I frogged it. It's worked double stranded for this project & I thought it may tangle, or snap, as it was a bit tuggy so I undid each stitch individually 🤣

CrochetBug - I have breast cancer. But it's not all doom and gloom. It's responding well to chemo & I'm managing fine - almost as much as I used to do, but not quite. I'm more tired than usual but other than that no side effects to speak of & I just feel like me with extra appointments.

Oh, I wish you well @lucysmam

I’m sorry to hear that @lucysmam hope you continue to do well with chemo and fingers crossed for you. That yarn is beautiful, it look so shimmery.

The mortgage offer at the bottom of the chain expires on Wednesday and nobody can get hold of the estate agents handling that part of the chain (we’re 3rd in the chain). So it might work but I’m resigning myself to the sale falling through. DH is more optimistic than I am. But I’m fed up, half the house is packed and depending on how optimistic I’m being, different halves of the house stress me in different ways.

My friend also had a late second trimester loss the other day. I feel like I should make something but I don’t really know what, we’ve not been close over the last few years but obviously this is a horrible thing to happen and I want to show I’m thinking of her. Has anyone made something for a bereaved mum? Did you send it right away or leave it a little while? I don’t live close to her so I’ll have to send it through the post. If I should send it straight away, I don’t have the time to make something big or intricate and I feel like it should be in DK as everything else would be too bulky (DK is the smallest yarn I can work with). But maybe that’s silly and she won’t care if it’s aran or chunky.

@WeCanLiveLikeJackAndSally the house sounds stressful. I'm kind of glad i can't afford to buy

Your poor friend. Maybe a little 3D heart might be nice. Maybe with Angel wings or something.

Hi @WeCanLiveLikeJackAndSally i love this blanket. Have you done mosaic crochet before? I haven’t but can crochet to an intermediate level I would say, do you think I would be able to do it before I buy the pattern?

also, I think it would look really good with scrap colours, if you’re anything like me you’ll probably have a big enough stash to almost match the colours anyway.

I've been busily making a blue, sparkly, dick for dd1's friend & he's almost finished (he was an "I don't need to count too much side project). I may go over the surface stitching tomorrow, I think, and dd1 says he needs ears. He looks really squiffy to me but the girls like him 🤣🤷‍♀️

@Georgieporgie29 I’m very, very slowly doing some mosaic crochet now. It’s fairly straight forward. It’s quite easy to count the rows because you only work on the front side, so you can count your ends. The first repetition is taking me a minute or two to work out the graph because some of the stitches are different but other than that it’s fine. The seaside blanket apparently works in 3 rows but there is a YouTube tutorial of how she does this so it doesn’t seem too daunting other than the size of it.

My current attempt at mosaic crochet was leaning left slightly as you just work on the front, so I frogged it and redid it. The second attempt is looking a lot better but I’m not sure what I did differently. You work in the back loops with mosaic crochet and then the pattern sits at the front and is done in the front loops, so I would say it’s taking a fraction longer than normal crochet because I prefer to do the back loop and the third loop to stop the back loop pulling, it’s just a bit fiddlier to get the hook into the back loop. I’m not getting much time to crochet which is why the blanket feels like it’s a lot slower than normal crochet.

@CrochetBug thanks, that’s a nice idea. I’ll try to find a pattern for something like that tomorrow. Do you think it should be a white heart? I don’t think I have any red in. I could do blue (little boy) or maybe yellow?

@lucysmam that’s funny! He looks a bit shocked but he is bright blue and sparkly, so I guess he should look shocked at being a bright blue dick.

@WeCanLiveLikeJackAndSally thank you so much for your detailed response. It sounds like it might be a bit tricky but I think I might buy the pattern and save it for the summer when I have more time and patience. Do you have a million ends to sew in at the end, it look like that might be a nightmare?

Sorry to hear about your breast cancer, @lucysmam, but glad it's responding well to treatment.
@WeCanLiveLikeJackAndSally - how frustrating about your house purchase. Estate agents can be a nightmare! Fingers crossed for you. So sad about your friend too.

Sorry to bang on about spinning when almost none of the rest of you are spinners . I started the Tour de Fleece yesterday - woo hoo! @SpinMeRightRoundBabyRightRound I have already abandoned my plan to spin long-draw from the fold (slow, too many joins and inconsistent aa I'm not used to it). But it turns out that the Shetland spins up with a nice fuzz to it anyway - it's top, but a bit less smooth and organised than others I've used.