Ready to crochet again

Posted on October 16, 2023 by The Little Room of Rachell

The weather has turned much, much cooler after we’ve had a mini heatwave…in October?! Last Sunday we walked in T-shirts and shorts, sat under an oak tree for shade and drank lots of water during our six mile walk along footpaths and bridle ways. Afterwards I laid on a sun lounger in the garden, eating birthday cake, sipping tea and loving the sun. Actually I remember now that I had to go in to get something to shade my face, it was so baking on the patio. I could feel my cheeks burning. Now, a week later, it’s much more typical for the autumn season and is at least ten degrees cooler. (Last night we had our first frost and so I went out and cut the best of the lettuces this morning, just in case they keel over later in the week.) Crochet is suddenly looking really appealing. With something warm and woolly on your lap to keep you cosy, why wouldn’t it? In the last week or so I found I kept stopping at woolly posts on Insta and thinking ‘That crochet lark looks like a good thing. I used to do a lot of that, didn’t I?!’ I always have a hiatus during the summer, because it’s just too warm for wool, especially as I always have hot hands, but it’s been even longer this year…

So, I’ve begun to join my squares to make up my coast blanket. Started in 2020 when we went away on holiday, finally, after months of Lockdown, it really began life as an unplanned project. “Argh! I’ve forgotten to bring anything to do on holiday!” I had to buy a hook and whatever yarn the small local yarn shop had in stock in a town in West Cornwall. I wasn’t sure if it was to be a cowl, scarf or what. I ended up crocheting a basic granny square and was so taken by the look of the colour changes that I made another and another and ….

Do you remember how during Lockdown the urge to be creative and keep busy with crafting took hold of a great many people? I suspect crochet and knitting alleviated anxiety for many as well. I know I found it soothing when I felt caged and lonely at home. Because of the huge demand it became really difficult to get hold of specific yarn. Also when you’re living on an island during a pandemic and post-Brexit, shipments were (are still) often stuck in Europe. I ended up having to chop and change Hayfield Spirit DK colour variations. I just had to hope they would all blend in the end. I do think they work together. Also, the joining colours of the greys and cream should bring together all the others. My original intention was to have a blues and greys colour theme, so that they would match a Dorma grey flower king-size duvet, it’s rather more mixed than that, but this reflects the fact that it came to be during a very topsy turvy time. (I’ve paused to lay and light the log burner. It’s really getting chilly now. Chicken & lentil soup for dinner should help too.)

I really love Hayfield Spirit, it is fine and lightweight for DK, but with even only 20% wool content it’s really warm.

I crocheted eight large granny squares, many done during the subsequent Lockdowns when long calls became a lifeline to friends and family. Then the rest slowly followed over the last few years, in between other makes (remember my bobble cowl obsession?) The squares are made up of 30 rounds, after each round I flipped the square over to avoid tilting. I’m doing a continuous JAYGO (join as you go) method. It’s lush! (I always think of Gavin & Stacy when I say that.) There’s something really satisfying about the way it comes together without fuss. Less breaking and joining of wool while connecting the pieces should make for a stronger blanket too. It’s been a while since I did this method, so I needed to find a diagram to use as a map. Heather of The Patchwork Heart blog has a great photo to use as a guide. (Here, if you think you will need it I suggest that you save a copy of that photo since I’m sorry to write that Heather is struggling with ill health and has stated on Instagram that she’s going to delete her blog and social media accounts. She hasn’t yet, but may do in the future.) I saved and edited it; flipping it to a mirror image. We lefties crochet in the opposite direction and 99.9% of instructions are naturally for the 95% of right handers.

The blanket will probably need to have a good sized border because I want it to be a fairly large size to cover the bed.

I sent this photo to a friend who had helped me decide on the squares layout: “All four top squares are joined!”

As soon as I’d sent it I realised…Uh oh! That the grey block is the wrong side up. I want all the right side foundation rounds to be the right side up, and the yarn tail is on top. How can I have missed that?! Ridiculous as I definitely very carefully checked.

“Here we are! NOW they’re joined.”

Luckily I had the dulcet tones of Miriam Margoyles reading her new book Oh Miriam! To ease the pain of going around again. If you’re a Premium subscriber Spotify now includes 15 hours a month of audiobooks. (In the UK at least.) I’m so pleased! I’ve already listened to all of And Away by Bob Mortimer and a bit of something else, so I won’t be able to listen to much more of Miriam’s until the beginning of my new membership month, unless I can access to a copy on the library apps Libby or BorrowBox. But it doesn’t seem to be available on those yet. We went to see Miriam recently on her theatre tour. She’s absolutely fab, so quick and funny. But I’m warning you; the woman and the book won’t be for the faint-hearted. The faint-hearted will be missing out.

I’m deliberating whether to leave you with a photo of my Romaine lettuce pickings from this morning. It’s the first time I’ve grown them and I am VERY pleased with their crunch and flavour, but I think I should keep this a woolly post and you can see them later. Sorry to disappoint the lettuce fans!

How are you? What have you been making? Are you listening to any audiobooks at the moment?

Bobble cowl – finished!

Posted on February 26, 2023 by The Little Room of Rachell

I’ve enjoyed crocheting this bobbly cowl. It’s definitely been a slow project as rows of mostly double crochet do not grow at all fast, but there was absolutely no rush to complete it. I took my time, I have to do that these days anyway.

I saw this pattern in Simply Crochet magazine issue 128, it was one of those challenges where they give two designers the same yarn and set them to make a blanket, an accessory, or a toy. And Sue Pearson’s bobble cowl jumped out at me. I’ve long enjoyed making bobbles, as I love the texture that they give to accessories in particular. Long-term readers might remember the bobble mitts (see here) which I made years ago. Cor, they were featured in Simply Crochet issue 10. I’ve read the mag since the beginning. (Nowadays through Press Reader or Libby library apps for FREE.) It made my day that those mitts later sold in a Cats Protection charity craft sale.

I’ve never done reverse double crochet before, also known as crab stitch. Have you? It’s perfect for a firm, attractive edging. That’s definitely going on my do-again list. If you wanted a simple edging for a blanket, it would work well.

For some reason it was taking me far too long to translate the instructions into leftie crochet terms. I realised part of the problem was I couldn’t think through how I do double crochet, going in the usual direction, let alone in reverse. Without actually doing some double crochet my brain couldn’t grasp it. If you get what I mean? So, I undid a few switches of the previous row, double crocheted them again and straight away it clicked. I realised what I had to do, only of course going backwards, from right to left as a left hander.

Happily I have quite a bit of Hayfield Spirit, autumn, leftover, so I can make some more granny circles (see my last post, here.) First I need to carry on crocheting my little flowery contribution to a spring yarn bomb. I’ll show you those very soon, as they need to be with the organiser by Wednesday the first. Next I’m off to make some stamens. (It’s not everyday I find myself typing that!)

Have you just, or nearly, finished making something? Or are you surrounded by too many half started projects?

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Post could also be titled ‘Reverse double crochet for a left handed custard brain’

Left handed crochet for Red Heart Yarn

Posted on February 23, 2016 by The Little Room of Rachell

At the end of last month I was contacted by Kathryn Vercillo of Crochet Concupiscence blog, asking if I would be interested in undertaking some paid photography work. I would need to illustrate how to crochet each step of the basic stitches as a left hander. These photos would be used in an article Kathryn was writing for the American company Red Heart Yarn. The only special requirement was that I use Red Heart yarn and a Susan Bates hook, but if I didn’t have those they could be sent. I wondered how things were going to go as the work needed to be emailed by the Tuesday, but we were to be away Friday to Monday. This meant there were only two working days for them to be delivered. Plus the weather’s track record at the beginning of February meant I might be trying to get the best photographs on a very grey day. I needn’t have worried; the yarn and hook were delivered by Fed Ex when we arrived home, and on Tuesday morning I awoke to bright sun.

I spent an enjoyable morning taking photographs of each step of the basic crochet stitches and writing notes in repsonse to Kathryn’s draft article. The article is now here on the Red Heart Yarn Heart Strings blog.

And do you know what? I couldn’t think of any yarn or craft materials I need so I’ve saved my earnings. I must make more woolly things; so I have a yarn deficit when I visit Heather’s new shop (so excited for her!) next month with my crafty friend Rachel aka Mrs Pip.

Left-Handed Crochet

Posted on December 19, 2013 by The Little Room of Rachell

I’ve been meaning to put my post on Left Handed Crochet here for ages. I originally wrote it for Kat Goldin’s Crochet Camp on her Slugs on the Refrigerator blog way back in the Summer but wanted to put a copy here also for any fellow lefties who might be passing.

Leftie crochet

After a quick Google of the percentage of left handed people globally I’ve found that figures vary between 10-15%. This illustrates a fact that I’ve always known – there really aren’t very many of us around.

It’s interesting that there seem to be slightly more men than women who are lefties, fewer who crochet though no doubt. I’ve also read statements that say left-handed people produce an above-average quota of high achievers. Bring it on! Alexander the Great, John McEnroe and Billy the Kid are listed as notable lefties in one article, which discusses how left handers are better in a fight because of the element of surprise (!) but perhaps we’d better stick to crochet for now shall we?!

When I’ve crocheted in public I’ve had sometimes comments about looking “cack-handed”, been told it “looks really odd like that” and I’ve also been asked “Don’t you find it hard – doing it like that?” The last one just makes me laugh. Actually I like being different to the majority, although when I was learning to crochet it was a different story as I grappled with instructions and illustrations where the hook was always shown held in the right hand. I tried to squint and imagine it all reversed, but this wasn’t very successful at the beginning.

I have heard that you can learn from or teach, a right hander by sitting opposite them and copying their actions as if they are a mirror image. I haven’t tried this approach yet. I need a willing victim to try this experiment.

Useful resources

In the end I found a small range of teaching aids. The best one was a smallish booklet I found on Amazon called Crochet Unravelled by Claire Bojczuk, which is for complete beginners and uses illustrations for left and right handers. I can’t tell you how good I found this simple straightforward guide. To be honest I credit Claire Bojczuk with teaching me to crochet. I don’t know her, we’ve never met or corresponded but I think I’d give her a bunch of flowers if we ever did!

YouTube videos showing left handed demos can be really useful as they’ll show you ways of holding the hook and how to scoop the yarn in a clockwise direction (as opposed to the righties who scoop it up anticlockwise.) When I was learning I watched sometimes, just for the pleasure and encouragement of seeing another leftie. I don’t know any other left handed crocheters and sometimes just watching for a few minutes can set you on your way; especially if you’re having problems visualising what to do, don’t know where to go into a stitch or are just feeling a little fed up of instructions written for a right hander.

Simply Crochet magazine has a how-to section at the back every issue which includes a photo tutorial for some stitches for left and right handers. This approach seems to be pretty rare compared to most crochet and craft magazines.

There are several Ravelry groups for left-handed crocheters, where I’m sure you would be welcome to ask questions and seek advice.

Equipment

Although I do use left-handed scissors when cutting lots of paper or fabric, I haven’t found that I’ve needed any different tools for crochet. If you do know of something crochet related for lefties I’d love to know about it, please.

Crocheting in rows

If you’re left handed you’ll be crocheting rows from left to right. When you begin your first row (called the foundation row) you’ll be working along the chains from the left to the right.

When a pattern tells you that the foundation row is the right side of the work remember that’s the side where the cut tail of the yarn will be hanging down on the right hand-side. If the foundation row is the wrong side of the work the cut tail of yarn should be on the left. Just so that I remember I usually don’t darn this in until the end as it reminds me which side I need to darn into and which to leave.

Crocheting in rounds

As a leftie you’ll be crocheting around to the right, or clockwise. This is worth remembering when you are more experienced and start using symbol patterns. These types of patterns show the stitches going to the left for right handers, but you will be doing the same stitches in the same order but going around to the right. Are you beginning to see why the moral support of YouTube videos, books and tutorials for lefties can be so encouraging at times?

Final thoughts

It’s just a case of remembering that the pattern will be written assuming that you’re right-handed 99% of the time. Most of the time this doesn’t matter at all, but just pause and think about the instructions before you begin. For example: if you’re going to try some colourwork you might need to reverse the instructions, unless the design is symmetrical. So, if you’re told to follow the chart with odd numbered rows going from right to left, just remember that your rows are going to be from the left to the right.

Is all this confusing? As clear as mud? Don’t worry – once you’ve got the hang of crochet as a leftie everything will become second nature and you won’t think about it too much, apart from sometimes when you might find yourself saying ‘Oh these crazy right-handers….!’

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How about you?