Episode 53 - Rainbows & silver linings

Crochet Circle Podcast

Hello there and welcome to The Crochet Circle Podcast and the show notes for Episode 53 – Rainbows and silver linings.

My name is Fay and this is my audio and video podcast for those that love fibre crafts, particularly crochet. It’s a community for people that like to support their fellow humans regardless of race, gender, sexuality, ability, size or age. I hope you feel the welcome embrace and love of the Crochet Clan. Come on in and stay awhile.

In this episode, I cover General Update; Old Dog New Tricks; Final Destination; Designs on Progress; Quick News Beats and Big Up.

This podcast is sponsored by my online crafting company, Provenance Craft Co.

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1 – General Update

Things are a little strange just now. We are in the middle of the Coronavirus pandemic, UK residents have been told to stay at home and life is more than a little up in the air!

So, I am really hoping that you are all safe and well. I am sending lots of love to you all. Extra love and hugs to those of you that are frontline staff and key workers. You are keeping the country going and we are all hugely appreciative for the hard work and effort you are putting in.

2 – Old Dog New Tricks

This month’s top Crochet Clan tip is from Rachel (thepulledstitch on Ravelry and has a blog on called Pulled Stitch (link)). Rachel’s top tip came via Susan of Peppergoose Design (link).

It’s all about how you set up your slip knot, ready for your starting chain. If you have your tail end to the right and working yarn to the left to make your slip knot, pulling the working yarn will tighten your knot and pulling the tail end will loosen it.

If you reverse this out to that the tail end is on your left when you make your slip knot and the working yarn is on your right, the tail end will tighten the knot and the working yarn will loosen it.

This means that once you have worked into your starting chain or completed your foundation row/round, you can gently pull on the tail end to neaten up your work.

My top tip is to point you towards a blog post I wrote a couple of years back. I have noticed on Instagram that many people are using their ‘Stay at Home/Lockdown’ time to finish up projects.

Whilst the post is called “Ideas on Blocking and Finishing Garments” (link), there is a wealth of information in that post – I really went all out! So, if you are trying to make the most of some enforced home time, grab a cuppa and give the blog post a read.

3 – Final Destination

I have two crocheted FOs and two knitted ones. The first, knitted one is a Hay jumper (link) which is from Laine knitting magazine, Issue 3. I used my precious John Arbon Textiles Yarnadelic in colour Badi Da (link). The yarn was bought in January specifically for this project and I really love it. I think it’s my favourite knitted jumper to date.

Image text: A finished jumper on a dark wooden floor. The jumper is a mixture of a petrol teal and brown/copper melange. There are two lacework panels that go from the rib, up and over the shoulder.

If you want to know more about this yarn, I wrote a review a couple of months back (link).

My second FO is a pair of socks for a friend. I promised her a hand-knitted pair some time ago as a birthday present. Katie is currently quarantined at home because she is on the at-risk list and so I thought that hand-knitted socks would be nice to receive in a parcel – possibly with some chocolate.

The main yarn is a very old skein that was unlabelled and the pink contrast heels and toes are some yarn I had left from crocheting socks in Kathryn’s (Crafternoon Treats) yarn (link).

Image text: A pair of very bright knitted socks with spiraling strips of turquoise, red, purple and slightly more subtle green and orange. The heels and toes are in bright pink.

My third and very bright finished object is a rainbow that I plan to hang from my front door. We have a lot of families that walk up the lane by our house and I thought it would be nice to add a bit of colour and something for them to look for. If time allows, I will keep on adding to it to create a bit of a landscape. The pattern was from adapted from The Cookie Snob (link) and I just followed the four-row increase repeat, changing colour every three rows.

The yarns are all a mixture of cotton in different weights and from different manufacturers.

Image text: A crocheted rainbow on a blue background. The rainbow is on the dirty end of the rainbow shade rather than the unicorn or need sunglasses to look at it end.

My final FO is a version of my Positivity Spiral Cowl, crocheted with a special 4 ply skein from Ishrat at Fruitful Fusion (link). I love how this combination of yarn colour and pattern has worked up together. Ishrat is a crocheter too, and has beautiful yarns!

Image 1 text: A crocheted cowl with obvious spirals of a slanted stitch and filet crochet. It's made using lightly variegated yarn in sea blues, purples and turquoises.

Image 2: The same yarn but shown in an unopened skein to show the subtle colour changes.

Image 3: A blue background with text and an arrow to say that the photo is of Ishrat from Fruitful Fusion. Ishrat is in her garden holding brightly coloured yarn aloft in her left hand. She has a warm smile, is wearing glasses and a light grey hijab.

4 – Designs in Progress

Work continues on my Scrapvent Blanket and I am almost halfway through my little brown bags of yarn scraps. It’s a really lovely, relaxing make that I have been working on in the evenings. I’ll keep on showing it to you every month until it is a FO.

Why not head to your stash and see if you have 24 x 20g leftovers or minis in 4 ply and 100g for a border? Get them bagged up and put away for 1st December 2020.

Image text: A close up if the crocheted Scrapvent Blanket. It has 12 colours in it from soft pastel pinks and creams to dar green and sprout type greens. Each colour is in a block of six rows.

5 – Feeding the Habit

Just in case we go into a higher level of lockdown in the UK, I wanted to purchase the next set of design yarns I needed. So, I went straight to John Arbon Textiles and got all the weights and colours I needed.

Here’s what I got for the laceweight (grrr), 4ply and worsted versions of my Positivity Spiral Pattern.

I also got some Yarnadelic mini skeins in a range of four colours. I have plans to give myself a knitted design challenge next week. I want to knit a colourwork hat and if possible, get the pattern written up, tech edited and published inside of seven days. The plan is to show the thinking and process that goes into creating a pattern. It will all be documented over on Instagram under @faydhdesigns if you fancy following me over there.

Image text: A blu/grey background with three skeins of yarn. Centre is a folded over skein of Merino laceweight in warm white. To the left is a rusty orange skein that is a light ran weight and resting on top of that is a skein of 4 ply that is in a soft sea green/ aquamarine colour.

Laceweight Organically Farmed Merino, 50g/650m, natural white (link).

Exmoor Sock 4 ply, 50g/200m, Mackerel Sky (link).

Harvest Hues light aran/worsted, 100g/200m, Bracken (link).

Image 1: Four mini skeins of Yarnadelic yarn are lined up. L-R they go from a dark teal blue to a turquoise teal, to aquamarine blue, to warm cream.

Image 2: A blue background with text and an arrow to say that the photo is of John and Juliet fo John Arbon Textiles. They are sat beside each other in the mill. Juliet to the left has her trademark curly hair tied back in a plait, a checked dress and cardi on. John has a navy t-shirt and mill-standard brown dungarees on. They are both smiling at the camera.

Yarnadelic mini skeins (link) 25g/83m, in shades Indigo Dust, Of My Hands, Woman in Blue and Ordinary Joe.

Before I came out to record, I also dunked into a wood whittling rabbit hole. I’m not joking. Let’s see what that brings to next month’s podcast!

6 – Quick News Beats

1 - Global Hook Up – The April hookups are on:

Saturday 25th at 8pm BST and Sunday 26th at 9am BST.

There will also be some more impromptu ones which will be posted up in advance on Instagram Stories @crochet_circle_podcast

The meeting ID number is 475-047-5819 and you will need to join via Zoom which you can do here: https://www.zoom.us/join

If you are joining on your phone or tablet you will likely need to download the software in advance. If you are joining from a PC or Mac, you can join via the link above. Everyone needs to use the same ID number to get into the session.

2 – You raised £385 for ROTA by purchasing my Positivity Spiral cowl. I am blown away by the response to this and it feels really good to be raising this money for such a great initiative.

3 – Inside Crochet (link to be able to buy digital and hard copies of the mag) – I have a pattern and an article in Issue 124 of Inside Crochet this month. The pattern is called Omni and can be worked in laceweight up to aran/worsted as a one skein shawl.

4 – JAT Annual Issue 2 (link) – has a crochet pattern by me called Broad Oak Hill. The Annual is now out on pre-order and also has three knitting patterns and all sorts of other goodies in it.

Image 1: Three copies of The Annual Issue 2 are open on wooden floorboards. They show the front page, yarns and one of the knitting patterns. Text on the image says that the Annual is coming soon and available for pre-order.

Image 2: Frankie and Juliet are up on Exmoor with brown bracken behind them. Frankie is to the left wearing a black top and the grey ombre version of the Broad Oak Hill crocheted cowl. Juliet is on the right wearing green top and the green ombre version doubled over to make a snuggly cowl.

5 – Fun Things to do online – here’s a load of suggestions that the #CrochetClan has been sending in (link). It is also available as a thread on Ravelry within the Crochet Circle Podcast Group. That’s the best place to add suggestions.

6 - How to set up a Zoom Meeting – here’s a blog and PDF I pulled together to help you (link).

7 – BluePrint (previously known as Craftsy) have listed all of their classes as free until the 9th of April 2020 (link). So, if you want to learn a new skill and are lacking funds just now, head there to see what you can learn. There are 53 different crochet classes you could access.

I have my eye on the Geometry Embroidery class by Natalie Chanin, Fixing Crochet Mistakes and Sew the Fremont Bag. Hmm, zero housework is being done this weekend!

7 – Big Up

There can only be one this month and it has to go out to all of the key and frontline workers out there that are helping to keep our healthcare systems and supply chains running.

I’ll be back on 1st of May.

Fay x

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