Another bobble cowl

Posted on June 14, 2023 by The Little Room of Rachell

The garden is full of roses, they obviously approve of the weather

I finished the coastal cowl, hurray! I really loved this simple pattern when I made the first rainbow bobble cowl and without even really thinking about it, one day I picked up a ball of yarn and started another. I LOVE the texture of crochet bobbles, plus with so many it’s a really warm fabric. I wore the other a lot in the cold weather we had before it finally turned warm in late May. It was a really cool spring. I think the coolest on record, but now it’s pretty hot today we came close to 30 degrees. There had been large cracks appearing in the fields and flowers in the garden have been drooping. Last week, driving through Devon a local radio DJ said the reservoirs there are lower than they should be this time of year.

However, at the weekend we had torrents of rain, thunder and lightning storms. The kind where we had to stop a car journey because there was such a lack of visibility. It was so dramatic that I filmed it. Anyway, now I shall put my cowls away and know that I will appreciate them both in the autumn and winter. (Pattern is from Simply Crochet, issue 128. Designed by Sue Pearson. If you can download Libby or Pressreader, and have a library card, Simply Crochet magazine is there for free, at least here in the UK.)

Next I am going to get out all my half finished (or should I say half started?!) projects and decide what to do next. I don’t think there’s all *that* many actually, I was pretty ruthless at unravelling and donating bits and pieces to charity shops in the winter. I know there is a stripey knitted blanket to complete, a knitted cowl and a glittery shawl / scarf thing, plus crochet circles I was crocheting using up odds and ends of Hayfield Spirit yarn. I can’t wait to get to the point where I have absolutely nothing started and I just work on one thing at a time. It’s how I used to craft and I much prefer it. What do you do? Do you start lots and lots of things and enjoy the variety of picking up something new every time? Or, do you work on one thing until it’s finished and then start something new?

Hey, hey look what I found in a secondhand bookshop. It has an absolute wealth of craft and recipe books, it’s a good job I don’t go there very often. I’m going to be really cagey about where it is as I don’t want to advertise it here and lose a source of treasure! Let’s just hope the locals aren’t too crafty…(but spend lots of money on other genres, to keep the shop afloat.)

What are you making, have you found any charity shop treasure lately?

March

Posted on March 27, 2023 by The Little Room of Rachell

Making: Ummm I’m not sure how this happened, one minute it was a ball of Hayfield Spirit and the next it’s half a cowl! Addicted to bobbles still

Cooking: spicy chicken with tomatoes & peppers, lots of mixed spices

Sipping: water, tonic, lemonade, lime & soda (Dry Lent)

Washing on the line, cyclamen in lots of corners of the garden, mid-March

Reading: Landlines by Raynor Winn. Nearly finished. It’s her third walking book and I’ve loved spending time with her and Moth again

Waiting: for my parcel delivery

Spot the daffodil? A bit invisible and crunched up to the others, but the people coming through on the double deckers will be able to see!

Looking: at all the spring flowers in the garden. So many anemones this year and the heathers are really vibrantly pink

Listening: to Conversations from a Long Marriage (BBC Sounds) Hancock (ditto) my latest Radar playlist on Spotify

Wishing: I planted my chilies, peppers and tomato seeds earlier

The leaves have been munched, but the hellebore flowers are looking good. The garden needs a good spring clean and tidy up

Enjoying: sunny blue sky days which seem slightly more frequent. Today’s one of the best in ages

Appreciating: blossom, daffodils and the smell of flowers’ perfume on the breeze

Eating: an epic goats cheese, onion chutney & rocket sourdough toasty in a cafe on Friday. I earned it!

Liking: my bed, I’ve got into the habit of heading up about 9:30pm to have lots of reading time. Then I wake at 1200/0100/0200 (latest so far: 0215) glasses on and Kindle in sleep mode, bruised side of nose from glasses! A huge D’oh!

Loving: watching Lockwood and Co. On Netflix

I took this photo on the 14th, now the pot is absolutely brimful of viola again. Best autumn purchase I’ve ever made! It’s been a really nice sight from the kitchen window over winter

Buying: local free range eggs (as always.) I’m having another phase of fried and scrambled for lunch

Baking: (this morning) mixed seed sourdough, what a great crust! It’s always a much deeper colour and crunchier, from the oils in the seeds probably

Managing: to get out for more walks lately, dodging the rain storms. It’s been really good to get up to the fields again and not have to wade through ankle-deep mud. It’s a bit slip and slide, but so far I haven’t…

Watching: The latest series of: Unforgotten, Vera and planning to start the new David Attenborough soon

Hoping: for peace, easier financial times for all …so much… positives for the environment, the homeless and disenfranchised …the list seems endless at the moment

Watching: films…Everything, Everywhere, All at Once (or as I called it “A lot of Biff Boff”) Billy Elliot (a modern classic, so worth rewatching!) Brian & Charles (well worth renting via Prime, particularly for those who like quirky British films) Empire of Light (Sam Mendes latest. We really, really enjoyed this at the weekend.)

Saturday. It won’t be long before the trees are in leaf again

Wearing: one of my favourite Seasalt tops. It’s green

Noticing: leaf shadows on the curtain

Forsythia just coming out in flower at the beginning of March

Following: an arrow shaped cloud tracking across the blue sky

Sorting: bits for the charity shop

Getting: a list written for the next groceries order, it’s one of those big order weeks. Why do all the tissues etc all run out at once?

Coveting: Spotify premium, mine’s just run-out

Feeling: the need to move again shortly

Hearing: the clock tick, the birds chirp, someone on a call, the fridge click off

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The clocks went forward this weekend, that loss of an hour can be so discombobulating! I woke up Sunday morning, asked what the time was and when I heard 9 o’clock, I nearly fell out of bed! And then of course I realised that really it was eight. Or, so my body still thought. I wish we didn’t have to change the clocks, although I suppose the extra long hours of daylight until October are good. I’d like to have a year where we try not moving them, just to see what it’s like. I was going to ask if anyone remembered before British summertime began. Then googled it, thank goodness, otherwise I would’ve looked a right idiot! It began in 1916.

To save energy and help the war effort, the Summer Time Act 1916 advanced the clocks in the UK for 1 hour from May 21 until October 1 in the same year. Summer time, or DST, proved so popular that it was named British Summer Time (BST) and the seasonal practice kept

From TimeandDate.com this has some good nuggets of information, although I admit ‘Time Zone History of the United Kingdom’ isn’t exactly a catchy title.

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Tell us a few things, what have you been up to during March? What are you making, enjoying eating, reading or watching on TV?

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’

Rainbowy

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

I was merrily bobbling along the other day and paused to check everything over, because occasionally one bobble will be out of step If I’ve lost concentration at any point listening to a podcast. Then while pausing I realised that it was probably long enough. A quick measure and it was over 60 cm. Suddenly it was done! Well, nearly. I’ve crocheted one row of doubles along the top edge and then I have to do a row of reverse doubles, aka crab stitch, to finish off. And then repeat on the other edge. I’m really pleased with this, mainly because of the beautiful Hayfield Spirit autumn yarn. But also because I love bobbles. It’s been so cool to see the lovely colours appear. Works really well with the pattern doesn’t it?

I’ve also been making granny circles out of some spare yarn, just when I fancy doing a little crochet, but nothing too tricky.

Very rainbowy aren’t they?

Time to read a little more of Ian Rankin’s Rebus (#22) before I seize the day.

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What are you making, listening to and reading?

Crochet! Crochet! Crochet!

Posted on November 16, 2022 by The Little Room of Rachell

Here’s the eye catching postbox topper that my friend’s WI (Women’s Institute) put together for Remembrance Sunday.

Can you spot any of the crochet poppies that I sent her?

Offering to make some poppies was the best thing for me really. We had such a hot summer. I don’t usually do much crochet when it’s warm and even less so this year, as England had some of the highest temperatures since records began. But since I made some poppies I’ve got my crojo back again, with a vengeance. It’s probably the darker evenings and the cooler weather too.

I’ve been buzzing. I’ve looked through my crochet books, read the latest issues of Simply Crochet mag on the e-library site PressReader (it’s free! Great app. Really, really good) and dived into my storage cube to see what was in my yarn stash.

Making a resolution not to start anything new, but to finish off projects I’m already halfway through this year has not been that exciting. I’ve made some headway, but felt bored, so then ended up doing little.

I checked to see what yarn I already have, but of course I didn’t actually use any of it! I mean we don’t, do we?! That’s why we build up stashes in the first place. Mine’s modest because I’ve sent a friend some and donated other bits to a charity shop, so I reckoned I could buy a little something. I chose some brand-new Hayfield Spirit DK. I really like it. When there’s even 20% wool content it’s much nicer to work with than pure acrylic, and looks better as well. It should be warmer too. I never usually make wearables with 100% acrylic, but of course it’s far more affordable for big projects, such as blankets.

I started a virus shawl. Here’s a quick snap that I sent to a friend when we were sharing what we were making one night. It’s not a great photo, but it was enough for her to see what I was doing.

This is the autumn colour way, the people at Hayfield (Sirdar) must have been thinking of autumn flowers, such as dahlias and asters, because the colours don’t say autumn leaves to me.

Then although I was happy with how it looked, I realised I would probably never wear it. I’m more a scarf or cowl wearer. I unravelled it and started a virus blanket. I bought the pattern from Jonna Martinez. Here. There are lots of You Tubers whom you can crochet along with (fun thing to do) as you start your own Virus shawl or blanket. I did that to begin.

Jonna brought the Virus pattern back to the fore and made it famous – go viral. I have read that the Virus design is actually based on an old pattern from Rumania or Russia. This wouldn’t be a surprise; I don’t think there’s really much that’s original in crochet, we’re all replicating stitches and patterns that have been done over decades, maybe centuries.

Pretty colours, aren’t they? But you see the problem? You see what’s really, really, REALLY annoying me, that means I’m going to have to unravel it?

All I will say is that I am looking into the standing stitch and checking out various ways to do it. One crocheter made a video to demonstrate one and it really made me laugh, because she can hardly get her hook through the loop. I’m not sure about doing that version. Might give it a swerve and find another!

And then when I was reading Simply Crochet, issue 128, I found a Bobble Cowl design by Sue Pearson, that I really fancied making. Pattern available here too.

I remember how much I like crocheting bobbles. I started the cowl without really checking what size I would prefer, but happily it’s exactly the height of my favourite knitted Edenvale cowl. Here it is, I wear it all the time in the winter.

And that is what I’ve been making, making and unravelling, making and measuring, then sighing with relief when it’s right.

What about you? What are you making? Any unravelling going on? Any new yarn purchases?

I’ll be back soon with a new books post.