Zombie and Woolly Hugs. Our second thread! Come and find out about Candy's Hugs, all very welcome.

[KnottyAndPistey]

Welcome to our second thread, may it be as vibrantly riotous as the first!

Anyone reading this thinking Shall I? Can I? Yes you can! :) We would love to have you on board, from someone who is keen to learn crochet or knitting to the more experienced, ALL are welcome here. And a lack of funds is no barrier, we have wonderful donors who want to take part and need a crafter, so we can send you yarn, needles and hooks if necessary. It is all about being inclusive and team work.

So let's crack on!

This then a C&P of the crafting info from thread one.

Our lovely Zombie (who has said she doesn’t mind being outed as Candy) has long been a supporter of Woolly Hugs, bless her for it! Recently she made a very kind donation to us, and we would love to start an Ongoing project to honour this remarkable woman, who we have both had the privilege of meeting, dancing and drinking with. wine wine She is utterly fab-u-lous. :)

After a chat with Zombie we have made a plan which she loves. We would like to make comforting cosy blankets with love in every stitch for women going through treatment for breast and other cancers, and at times these may form part of palliative care. They will be called Candy’s Hugs.

Zombie is a bright and beautiful woman so we have chosen a palette to reflect this which we call Vibrant Riot; it is inspired too by a blanket that was made for her to give big hugs as she goes through treatments.

Will you join with us? If you would like to be involved in any way, we’d love to have you on board. Please post on this thread and PM with your offers: crafting, donating, need wool, etc, we can help you with all of it.

The yarn is Stylecraft Special DK. Just this please for consistency, and in these colours...

Vibrant Riot Palette
Boysenberry
Claret
Empire
Fuchsia
Grass
Kelly green
Lavender
Lime
Lipstick
Magenta
Meadow
Petrol
Plum
Pomegranate
Saffron
Sherbet
Shrimp
Spice
Turquoise
Tomato
Violet

Squares to be 12 inch or 6 inch, crochet or knitted equally welcome, please use 4mm hook or needles. No blocking necessary and please sew in ends, and make sure any colour changes are firmly knotted.

All crafting abilities genuinely welcome, squares made by beginner or expert will be equally cherished. Simple, complex, single colour, mixed colour. It really is the love and thought that counts.

If you would like to learn how to knit or crochet in 2017, let's do it! We have help for the complete beginner here…. And are on hand to help talk you through as well. YouTube has lots of tutorials, you WILL find one that suits! smile

If you feel ambitious and would like to make a whole blanket, then that is wonderful, we are aiming for blankets approx 48 inches by 60 inches, certainly no smaller.

Candy’s Hugs will be an ongoing project, our first posting date is to be January 28th. Do message for posting info when ready.

We are on Facebook - Woolly Hugs and Twitter too @Woolly_Hugs both are good ways to keep in touch.

Thank you so much xx

It's got a lot of character picard. Love the blue colour.

Hello all! Okay, I'm trying to teach myself how to crochet. Last night I inadvertently invented a new stitch because I forgot to yarn over first before stitching the two loops together (double stitch).

So today I've started again, using some random yarn I had and this is my attempt at a square of double stitch!!!

I started off with around 30 stitches and now I have, erm, LESS.

Where have I gone wrong?! Thanks in advance for any help/advice!

It's hard to see but are you missing doing a treble into the chain three at the end of the row? You'd lose a stitch every row if so.

Sorry just spotted you're doing doubles. Was using an American pattern earlier. You might not quite be starting the row on the right stitch and ending too early. It's hard to explain without a diagram! Are you using a book or video?

See, Purple, I'm not onto treble yet! This was meant to be double . I'm finding it a bit difficult to know which stitch is the second one, do you think I'm going too far along?

I'm going to start again! I will do this, I will!!!

m.youtube.com/watch?v=GIO83ixyQ9o

Rose Across & Down. Not diagonally 😊

POP 🔥🔥🔥
Not really! It's just such a bright emoticon, I just thought I'd give it an airing. (I realise I'm at risk of getting hounded off MN with my over use of emoticons 😂)

Blankets have been auctioned before, my personal thoughts are that for the amount of yarn, time, effort, love etc that goes into making the blankets they just don't raise enough money to trade that off with the benefits of giving it to a person who really needs a Woolly Hug.

Even if the Blanket Auction reached a bigger audience (which is a hell of a lot of work) I don't know how much more they'd raise, it never seems enough (to me) for hand made items compared to the materials & time involved.

That said, I knit my squares with love, & what K&P choose to with them once they get them, is entirely their choice, I wouldn't mind them going into an auction blanket if that's what they wanted to do with them.

I think you might be missing the first stitch and last stitch of the row. The Bella coco videos are really good. When I was learning I'd pause them and rewind them then do exactly as she does!

I'm using a video on You Tube. It's American, which confused me at first but once I'd learnt the difference in terms, I thought I'd cracked it!

I think I'm going too far along when I'm picking up the next stitch. I'll take some photos of where I'm poking the hook through in my next attempt in the hope someone can tell me if I'm right.

Who knew hooking was so hard?!!!

Can anyone link to any nice simple knit designs that are a bit more interesting than a plain square?

Ooh, I've seen Bella Coco! I'll go and have a look.

Thank you!

Thanks Pop, good to know I can teach my DD to crochet right handed and not mess with her brain too much!

Bella Coco you tube video is what I used yesterday to relearn granny squares, she's very clear and goes nice and slow to start. Although I still needed to rewind, pause and rematch some parts.

This was my second attempt yesterday. I'm feeling much more confident with the granny squares, might even go mad and learn a new pattern if I've got time later. I've also ordered myself a set of hooks as I now have 3 interested children wanting to learn

Omg...

I've just found this

www.pinterest.com/Crochetverse/c2c-crochet-graphghans/

Just ordered some wool to be sent to my mum.

She is trying to knit again after an operation on her hand and is going to have a bash at some squares for Candy's Hugs. Go mum!

Pop that is stunning! Hope you're feeling better now.

I haven't been working on any Candy squares this week, I've started doing some for the Chernobyl blankets but will come back to Candy's. I'm muddling along with crochet, having never tried it before this week, and have almost finished my second double stitch square. I'm really enjoying it!

Red, that is fantastic! Something for me to aspire to!

Madison, so glad to know you're getting on well, it gives me hope!

@steppemum - here's a few I've pinned.

Grid pattern just means you have to pay attention to whether you're Knitting or Purling each stitch. There are websites which will convert images to knit grids but TBH I'd look on Pinterest or Ravelry for tried-and-tested versions.

Heart square.

A few here including lips - just look at the charts, not the words, unless you speak Russian!

Owl (if you can cable).

Bamboo stitch.

Box stitch.

And at www.knitpurlstitches.com/ there's a whole library of nice textured stitches to try - all in combinations of K and P to make it accessible.

Oh Mrs H - fantastic, that Russian site is great. Funnily enough I DO speak Russian, but not enough to follow a knitting pattern! The charts look really easy to follow.

I might even try the owl, I have never cabled, but understand how, just never done it.

Quite excited now!

Thank you Mrs Hathaway - I am definitely going to have a go at the owl especially now I know how many stitches/rows I need. The Russian patterns look interesting too.

Chipping I haven't had a chance to do any today but plan to have a look through my stash to see if I have anything that would work before I frog anything.

MrsH do you have a link to a grid with a fox? I'd love a fox pattern

Thank you, Polter, my Candy's Hugs yarn arrived this afternoon (eek!) and I have started a square using Sherbert. It's much, much easier to see!

It's just double stitch, but I think I'm starting to get the hang of it...

Also DD1 (13) saw me crocheting and asked me about it. She is an avid knitter and when I explained, she asked if she could join in. So she's currently knitting a stray square in Meadow and Tomato!

Well, let me see ...

This one is a 13x9 grid so you'd need to plan a thick border (maybe moss?) according to your normal stitch count, or repeat it or scale up to size.

But here on the same blog is a link to other fox patterns including a divine fox fair isle project among other things.

I haven't tested these, just pinned them, but in my experience grids are pretty foolproof.

Is it too late to join in? I lurk far more than I post & haven't been around that long. Lost SIL to breast cancer 2 years ago, a blanket hug would have been wonderful for her when she was going through treatment.

I have no idea how to crochet, but wool & needle arrived today, & am meeting with a friend at the weekend who is going to show me how. DD is also eager to learn & wants to have a go at making squares, hopefully we can come up with something between us!