Over the past few years, I've fallen in love with Tunisian crochet. It was a long time coming. Honestly I'm surprised this didn't happen sooner. When I was a child, I wanted to learn to knit and couldn't figure it out. My mother couldn't and said it was "too hard" so she hated it. We both knew …
technique
technique tuesday: granny squares (& other motifs)
Happy Granny Square Day! Don’t worry if you didn’t know that was today (15 August); I hadn’t heard about it until earlier this week. May your counting be correct and your ends weave themselves. Granny squares were the next thing I learned to crochet after perfecting miles of chains. When I was 7, …
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3 tips for washing wool
It's my favourite time of year -- I'm no longer the only person wearing and washing woolen items. Today I'll discuss 3 tips for caring for items that are made with wool. While this post is written mostly geared to knit socks, it does apply to other woolen items. A future post will discuss both short …
knitting stripes, a tip to “carry up”
The first time I worked a project in stripes I was confused what it meant to "carry up". How did I do that? My sole reference book at the time simply stated: "Wrap the working yarn around the other yarn(s) every 2-3cm (1in). Make sure the yarns do not pull."[1] Did I twist the yarns together to the …
Fixing Mistakes
If you look closely at my progress on the High Sierra Shawl in my last post, you'll see that the edge looks different from other samples. I read the instructions and intended to follow them, but my fingers did what they wanted. My eyes warned me it wasn't correct, but I was too excited by the …
stitch rhythm
Has this happened to you? You fall in love with a yarn and a stitch pattern and are determined to stay the course even when it's obvious they're not a good match? Perhaps the yarn is too variegated for the stitch, or it doesn't work for the yarn structure, or it's not the right stitch for the maker …