Zombie and Woolly Hugs. OVER HERE!! Come and find out about her legacy of Candy’s Hugs, newcomers and old hands, all very welcome

[KnottyAndPistey]

Welcome to the most beautiful corner of Mumsnet, here the love and support is boundless, these are the folk you need to be around, come and join us, you'll not regret it :) Our inspiration comes from the wonderful Zombie, a true legend who continues to inspire us.

We knew her time left with us was short, but the news of Zombie’s death on January 30th was still a shock, we send so much love to her family and her many, many friends who love and will miss her greatly, we hold our happy memories of her very dear. Bless her.

Just before Christmas, Zombie donated funds to Woolly Hugs and together we hatched a plan to develop an ongoing project with her, which she loved, 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.

So glad we could establish Candy's Hugs with her and thanks to you wonderful people achieve her ambition of seeing it all well underway before her death. Her legacy of Candy's Hugs will be one of love and strength, of friendship, learning and developing crafting skills, of creativity, of coming together to show compassion, support and give and receive comfort, Such a beautiful inspirational woman. How lucky we were to know her. X

So many blankets with beautiful women going through treatment now because of your love and support. Thank you doesn't even come close. xx

Raising a glass or two to the fabulous Zombie, we go on together

Anyone seeing this project for the first time, wondering about joining in, maybe a bit unsure, make this the day you do! This project is ongoing, and a friendlier more supportive bunch of folk you couldn’t wish to meet. 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.

Our previous threads are the first one here and the second one here..

[[https://www.facebook.com/pg/Woolly-Hugs-349028448480855/photos/?tab=album&album_id=1339798112737212
We are keeping a photo album on our Facebook page.]] All welcome to join us over there too.

Zombie was a bright and beautiful woman so we chose a palette to reflect this which we call Vibrant Riot; it is inspired too by a blanket that was made for her to give hugs and comfort as she went through treatment. She had it with her at the end, we were so glad to know it still gave her love, big woolly hugs and comfort.

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 all on this thread are on hand to help talk you through as well. YouTube has lots of tutorials, you WILL find one that suits! :)

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 next collection date is March 11th, then April 22nd. 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. All welcome over there.

Thank you so much xx

Congrats Spin

Popped these into the post Saturday

Does anyone know why my crochet always curls and looks like too many stitches have been crammed in? I always count and make sure I have the same as the pattern (the ones in the last pic).

Haha Spin - priorities in the right order ! - and a lovely blanket :)

claire those look awesome. Beautiful colours and work there. I can't answer your technical question but they look great tbh.

Spin you are a legend 😂

Claire they're really lovely. Sorry I have no solution, I have the same problem myself at times. I did a spiral lace crochet square yesterday and, unless I stretch it out and pin it down, it's like a bowl! Hopefully the construction crew will be able to manoeuvre it into shape when they come to stitch it into a blanket.

evening
busy doing Kinships at the mo.
Claire - sorry, very new to crotchet so I have no idea.- could you perhaps try a different pattern , see if it works better for you ?

claire they look like they would pull into shape with a bit of gentle persuasion. Some of mine come out a bit curly but they flatten out. Once they're in a nice blanket attached to their neighbours they will look fab. Great colours

I did these today. They both need controlling a bit.

ooh, they are petty Norm
just had a look on fb , and saw the Manchester blanket. Its given both me and DD a bit of a wibbly lip , but a really nice feeling too - we have some of our squares in it, and DD's heart square was on the top showing ready to deliver.

Nice squares Norm. I tried the Waterlily one tonight but mucked it up.

book I had a sniffle when I saw that blanket tonight. I've also got a couple of squares on it.

Speaking as a novice Constructioneer, honestly it's amazing how many interpretations of six inches and square one receives in a Construction pack, and how very little skill is required to tease them into line.

Odd wibbly shapes are usually blamed on tension issues. Sometimes you have to adjust a pattern to your tension - eg I tend to have to remove a chain from corners and other spaces because I chain looser than I hook IYSWIM, so a 3trc ch3 3trc corner I actually hook as 3trc ch2 3trc or even 2trc ch2 2trc if it starts to look peculiar.

Glad to hear that about very little skill to join the sizes up being required MrsH. I've gone through my first construction kit and am amazed at the differences. I had fun laying the squares out to colour balance it, now need to add a coupe of rounds onto the smaller 12". The hardest thing so far has been deciding which colour to join with 😂 Fingers crossed 🤞

The smallest 12" in the kit I'm doing are 8", and the smallest 6" are 3.5". I've gone with making everything up to 6"/12" for this one - in future I might try a bit more persuasion, but I figured this way would be less technically challenging for my first attempt.

Laying out is definitely the hardest part!

Do you think it is possible to get feed back from construction crews if your sizing is really out? Possibly too much work to keep track of squares but i would welcome it as I appreciate I am still learning.

The laying out is definitely hard- I have got my first kit (all 6") - and they vary from 3.5" to 8" ...

I've ended up laying out by size and then I'll try to make the smallest up to size. Most of the ones in this kit are 12" though.

When I do my squares I measure as as I go - I feel like I took the guidelines too seriously

My current dilemma is what to do if I need to make a square up to size and I don't have the right colour. How will the original crocheter recognise it.

Hep we don't know who made the squares though so not sure how feedback could be given. Though my VERY limited experience would say it's easier to make a small square bigger to fit than a too big one.

and book - yay, you've taken the plunge too.

thanks Okki, its what I suspected.

I'm using the joining colour to make mine up to size.

you all sound so competent - I've laid mine out 4 times now , keep changing it , but biting the bullet and starting this evening...

Something just occurred to me. There are quite a few squares in my kit that are around the 8" mark, but not many between 9" and 11". There is no way you measure an 8" square and think 'yep, that's as close to 12" as I can get it'. So do you reckon people are measuring the diagonal? A bit of mental trig tells me that the diagonal of an 8"'square is a bit over 11".

How do we join the construction crew? Are the squares sewn together or crocheted? Do we put an edge on the blanket? I know there is a Facebook group but not on Facebook.

Could be, Spin. I know people ask often but maybe the answer is hidden.

My crochet squares pattern book has 6" square pages so it's very easy for me to measure as I go along. Alternatively there's usually a sheet of A4 kicking about - the long side is approximately 12".

Sorry claire I joined through FB I think but if you PM K&P (eg through the OP on this thread) then they can loop you in.

Morning!

We have quite a few MN crew not on Facebook in the Construction crew, all are welcome, they tend to just message us claire, you'd be very welcome indeed.

Have a kit here waiting, possibly two........