From Cardigan to Top

You may remember that some time ago, back at the start of lockdown, I unravelled this cardigan. It was definitely a lockdown project, something that I'd been meaning to do for a long time but never got round to. It was a lovely cardigan but never worn, and so a waste of yarn. 

I thought that the most useful thing I could make at this time of year was a t-shirt or top, so I started my search at Ravelry because you can filter their results by yarn weight, among many other things. I eventually narrowed it down to a few and settled on this pattern because it used the Aran weight yarn I had and was the kind of boxy fit I like in a top. There was something really liberating about re-using balls of yarn for this project, like it didn't matter if I didn't like it, I hadn't already committed to buying £30 of yarn especially for something. 

It's a very simple make - you could definitely make this top if you felt you were a beginner crocheter. You make two squares with a pattern that is mostly trebles with chain spaces to creates the gaps, joining them on the shoulders and side seams. Then you sew a couple more rows of trebles around each arm hole to create small sleeves.

I decided that I wanted the top a little longer than the design intended so I added a few rows of front and back post treble around the hem to add a little length. The pattern is crocheted side to side, so you can adjust the width during making but not the length.

I like the way the ribbing gathers the crochet in a little at the bottom, making is puff out around the top of the hem.

If I make another - which I almost certainly will - I think I would increase the starting chain so that the whole top is a little longer all round, which would save me making this waistband. I had a look on the designer's Etsy page and found this version of the pattern, where the rows are rotated by 90° and I like that too. This is probably the quickest garment I've ever crocheted, taking only a week or so. I used a 5mm hook and the yarn was Shiny Happy Cotton by Wool and the Gang. The colour I have is called "nude pink" but looking at their website I don't think they do that any more - "malibu" would be your closest.

Lockdown Embroidered Sampler

Hello my friends! I hope you are all well. Last weekend I sewed the final letter in my lockdown alphabet sampler and I wanted to show you the final sections. I have enjoyed this project enormously; making an hour to sew every day was a mental health lifesaver, and sharing one motif each day on Instagram made me accountable, so I made sure I did do it each day. I thoroughly enjoyed thinking about and sewing every single picture and keep changing my mind about my favourite. The rainbow for K. No, the books for R. No, the retro-looking sunshine for W which reminds me of vintage toys and childrens' picture books. No, it's the ball of yarn for M....etc...

I believe I had just sewed a sourdough loaf for S when I last shared this with you, so let's continue.

T was very nearly for Teaching (all that homeschooling!) but in the end was Tea, or a satin stitch cup to tea to symbolise the hot, caffeinated drinks that have kept me going through lockdown. When your day involves meals, homeschool, a dog walk, and not a lot else, those moments that punctuate your day become rather special, whether that's a well-made coffee from the machine mid morning or a cup of tea with something sweet late afternoon. I find people tend to be either tea or coffee drinkers whereas I love both. A cup of tea first thing, then coffee throughout the morning (the number of cups is dependent upon where I am and what I'm doing) and tea in the afternoon and evening. I've no idea why but there it is.



U is for utensils (thank you Jo!) to represent all the cooking we've done in this house during lockdown, in particular a satin stitch knife, wooden spoon and fish slice. On a good day, I am living my dream life, pottering around the kitchen all day with the radio on, but on a bad one I feel resentful of every meal I must prepare, serve and clean up, with absolutely no motivation to do anything. Fortunately those bad days are rare and I generally seek solace in our kitchen.

 

V is for Virus. What else could it be? I used French knots to create this version of covid-19 under a microscope.

 

W is for Weather, represented by a chain stitch sun. I am very thankful that the weather this spring has been so warm and dry - the sunniest spring since records began, apparently. It has made everything easier; time in the garden, walks, just my general mood and energy levels. Can you imagine how much harder lockdown would have been if it had rained every day?

 

X was hard but thankfully I have a son (and husband for that matter) who enjoy playing on the Xbox so I sewed a satin stitch controller. Since chatting to his friends online while playing Minecraft is one of Angus's main ways of staying in touch with his friends, I've had to reframe the way I think about his screen time and accept that, during lockdown, it has been more than usual and that is fine.

 

Y is for yoga, so here is someone in tree pose, done in satin stitch and I tried so hard with this one because it had to look like what it was - a person doing yoga. (No she's not a ballerina. I'd have sewn a tutu if she was.) I used to attend a regular weekly yoga class but since my teacher had to move premises the lessons stopped, and I miss it so much. During lockdown both John and I have been working our way through Yoga With Adriene's 30 day yoga programme, and now it's finished we're just trying different videos each day. I cannot recommend it highly enough. I'm much more likely to continue this than HIIT workouts.

 

And finally, Z is for Zoom. Of course, what else could it be, so I sewed an applique laptop. Ten weeks ago I'd never heard of this video conferencing app, but since then I've hosted a birthday party, attended staff meetings with colleagues, drunk cocktails with friends, shared quizzes with family and even "met up" with all my old friends from Leeds, all via Zoom. Thank goodness for technology.

And there we are; twenty six letters and twenty six images to commemorate this strange time in our history. I am going to get it framed as soon as the framing shop opens up. I have been wondering if I should add the date. I think I will, as this embroidery is so much about 2020, I feel that the year needs to be stitched on there too somewhere.

Sensum Sweater

Just one week back at school and work, and it's like we never had half term. The days are rushing by in their usual chaotic fashion but the evenings are lighter all the time which makes the world of difference.

Luckily it's still cold enough to wear the finished crochet project I have to share with you today: the Sensum Sweater by Eleven Handmade, who's Goldenrod Sweater I crocheted last year. I love her patterns. I think she has a clever designer's eye for crochet garments, and uses colours and shapes that appeal to me and are the kind of clothes I like to wear. 

This was a challenging pattern, with a repeat of treble and puff stitches that increases and decreases across the jumper, creating a sort of zigzag pattern.

Counting is involved and at times it was hard to visualise quite where it was all going but  - and I found this with the Goldenrod jumper - the pattern is good and you just have to read carefully and do what it says.  

I especially love the way the pattern works on the sleeves, and how they gather and puff out at the cuff.

The cuffs and hem are all worked by crocheting into the back loop only of a htc stitch, giving a gentle ribbed effect.

I couldn't easily find the suggested yarn (Lion Brand Scarfie) so used Rico Essentials Mega Chunky Wool in colourway 001, using 10 balls which I bought with a birthday gift voucher. I did a swatch test and decided to use the hook both yarn and pattern specified, 6 mm, which in hindsight I think was a mistake.

In terms of sizing, the pattern gives you four options which I took to be small, medium, large and extra large. I'm 5'11" and wear a UK size 14 so chose large. The jumper is absolutely enormous, as you can see. I worried for a while that it was just too big to actually be wearable, so what I did was gather up the side seams and secure them with running stitch, making the sides a couple of inches shorter than the front and back.

This makes a big difference to how it looks and feels when I'm wearing it. The sweater still hangs down a little at the front and back but I find it easier to wear, and it works with skinny jeans and leggings. On the plus side, the pattern is just gorgeous, it's incredibly warm, the yarn washes really well with no issues (important for such an impractical colour!) and I have received many compliments when wearing it. Most people seem to think the oversized shape is deliberate, and it is, but maybe not quite so oversized. When I make another - and I will definitely make another - I will go down a hook size and possibly make myself a medium rather than a large. 

It's tricky isn't it, making sure the clothes you crochet and knit fit you properly? I'm still learning so much about this but it's a learning curve that I'm happy to climb. I suspect that my crochet tension is quite loose so I think going down a hook size or more is always going to be a good idea for me. But I'm not put off, if anything I want to crochet even more clothes, especially while I'm not buying any new. Some summer tops would be nice, perhaps in cotton.

Right now I am making myself a pair of wrist warmers. I've just finished one and am happy to report that it's a perfect fit. :-)

The "It's Still Winter" Cowl

A quick post for a quick project. I bought this yarn on a bit of a whim one rainy weekend (when is it not raining lately?) and decided quite impulsively to make the Fennel Cowl from Emma Mitchell's book Making Winter, which I really recommend by the way. Lots of wonderful, seasonal craft and baking ideas inside. 

It promised to be the perfect in-between project, ideal for when I didn't have the energy for anything that required concentration or wanted a break from something I'd been working on for a while, like the jumper. Quick and easy, only one ball of yarn needed, and warm too.

I was drawn to the yarn (Sirdar Aura in shade 0139) because the speckled appearance reminded me of feathers and I liked the colour palate. I often find variegated yarns a bit of a gamble; it's hard to visualise how they're going to look worked up in a finished piece.

Luckily I love this. The pinks, greys and creams are cool enough to feel like winter colours, reminding me of bare trees and sunsets, but the smallest pops of deep pink/red and brown add warmth.

If I made another I'd go down a hook size, or decrease the pattern by one or two repeats, as it's a little on the loose side and would be warmer if it was a tighter fit. But it's loose enough to drape nicely and can be wrapped around the neck and tucked inside a coat to keep you toasty when the weather is wet, windy and utterly horrible, as it has been most days lately.

I hope you're all staying warm and dry and have not been affected by this dreadful weather. Here, we are a little fed up - a rainy half term holiday is hard work - and wishing for a little sunshine, but fine. 

DIY Christmas Jumper

Well, if you're struggling to get into the Christmas spirit, I can highly recommend wearing fairy lights to work for the day. It's the biggest mood booster you'll find.

Christmas jumper day is a big thing at the school I work in, for both staff and children. I've never owned a Christmas jumper, but have a couple of nice wool sweaters (one with a pheasant, one with a star) that I usually wear when something seasonal is required. 

But this year I had a change of heart. I saw a lovely tutorial in Mollie Makes a while back for a DIY Christmas jumper, where a sweatshirt was decorated with sequins in the shape of oranges. I wanted to make something similar and couldn't face sewing on hundreds of sequins by hand, but it did give me an idea of how I could use an old grey sweatshirt that I hardly wear to make something fun and unique.

I found a brilliant free online tutorial for crochet fairy lights and set to work making lots. Thirty, in fact, in ten different colours using scrap cotton yarn from my stash. When I had enough, I laid them out across the front and back of the sweatshirt and drew lines across with fading pen where I wanted the "wire" to go.

I sewed this on using embroidery thread in chain stitch, to create the impression of an old fashioned cable.

I was pretty happy with the jumper like that, but I had bought a little battery operated pack of white fairy lights the week before, and had an idea that I could somehow incorporate this into the crocheted lights.

It just about works. I've managed to tuck the fairy lights into the embroidery thread, and the cable goes down the inside of the jumper into my jeans pocket.

I absolutely love it. I feel like, if you're going to make yourself a Christmas jumper covered in crochet fairy lights, then you might as well go all out and make it as ridiculous as possible.

I'm no further on with my gift wrapping, but I am starting to feel Christmassy.