Well! I was wrong

Hello! Hope you’re all doing ok. Last week I posted about a cal that had started, ‘while we waited’ designed by the crochet project, and how I was gutted that the wrap I had been looking forward to was made out of squares. I hung on, and I was sooooo wrong!!! Clue 2 came out and I knew I had to make it, I thought all of it was going to be squares, but it’s not!

Now that’s more like it!

I love the yarn! Dyed by vicki Brown, and I’m really excited to see what’s coming next.

I’m almost up to date with the fruit Garden cal too, I’m really enjoying it, it’s already been tagged for my sister as she’s been waiting patiently for 4 years for a blanket, so this week I’ve finished the blocks, joined them and now I’m just working on the the border, there’s more blocks to go around the outside yet, and then more borders, but it’s beautiful, the yarn is heaven to work with too, it’s stylecraft cotton bamboo

This week also sees the end of The Pandemonium cal, I can’t believe we’ve almost finished, I also can’t believe that lynda and I designed it together without seeing each other during lockdown, we’re both really proud of it!

And tomorrow is the start of the Knitcraft granny square cal, there are 25 squares designed by 25 designers, it’s a free pattern available Here it was very popular last year, so worth a nosey! Myself and lynda have designed a square for this and our square comes out on 13th July……

Anyway, I’d you’ve gotten this far, and read my last post you might have realised I most definitely have got my crojo back!!!! And I’m so excited as I already have my next project lined up I’m going to start outstanding crochet Corfu bag I am soooooo excited!!! I have my yarn on order and I’ve gone for this colour way

Metal grey and topaz

Have a look at the link because it’s bloody gorgeous!!! Patterns already just waiting on my delivery

Anyway that’s about it from me……waiting patiently to find out when we can start the crochet sanctuary again, and becoming more frustrated by the day! But the less said about that the better, anyway, off to work on my fruit garden cal!

Happy Hooking

Lisa x

Seriously crojo? Where have you gone?!

It’s just disappeared this week, nothing’s exciting me whatsoever!

However, that hasn’t meant we’ve not had some yarny fun, on Saturday last week lynda plopped over time my garden, socially distanced of course, and we dyed yarn!!!! We had so much fun, to keep it socially distanced we took it in turn. I can’t show you what lynda dyed as it’s a gift for a friend, but look what I did!

I’m sooo pleased!! Abby also dyed some too

And Paul dyed some too!

It was so much fun and we rather impressed ourselves.

I also had my new book arrive, crocheted 3D letters, I had this big ambition to crochet each guest at the crochet sanctuary their initial for the seat, I did an A for abby and the idea went straight out the window!!!!

Hard work!!!

I’ve really struggled to get stuck into anything, and was looking forward to Wednesday when The Crochet Project ‘while we waited Mystery crochet among was due to start, but I suppose we all have our own individual styles and I was a bit disappointed with the first ‘clue’ I think I like crochet that isn’t obviously crocheted? For example I hate granny squares (I know, I’m sorry) but I just don’t like traditional looking crochet, I don’t like anything that’s too gappy, and the first clue is

I don’t know if it’s because it’s hand dyed yarn, but I’m frightened to cut it, until the next part is out, because of its gappy all the way through I’m not 100% sure I’ll stick with it, but I should, maybe I’ll like it at the end, it’s just that the yarn is so beautiful I think I want to make sure I’ll like the finished item, however sharon came up with a good point today and that is that this item is supposed to remind us and represent the awful time we’re all going through at the moment, and she is right! Maybe I’ll carry on……..

Anyway, back to missing crojo, lynda said that quite often ill crochet an amigurumi and my crojo comes back, so I did

I crocheted the swan out oit of amigurumi treasures book, I’m pleased with her, but I feel like I still need something to get my teeth into!

I’m keeping up with the fruit garden, which I’ve done quite a bit on today, and actually that’s got me looking forward to Tuesday when the 5th part is out, but I’m thinking because it’s only released every 2 weeks I’m taking my time with it.

Anyway! How exciting I this?! Blacksheep Wools is open!!!!!! Yeahs!!!! I went to a yarn shop! They’ve done such a good job at making everybody feel safe at going into the store, I also had a £50 voucher that had been burning a hole in my pocket for 12 weeks so I bought some Rico creative wool for a cardigan I’m going to make, and I bought crocheted succulents by Emma Varnam and replaced my 2.5mm crochet hook, it felt normal!

Anyway! Pandemonium cal is slowly coming to an end…..I’ll be so sad, but, it’s really filled the void of no crochet sanctuary weekends and lockdown, it really has, plus we’ve still got the border to go.

There has also been some talk today of Boris reducing social distancing from 2m to 1m, this would release sooooo much anxiety for us, our crochet sanctuary weekends have all been postponed due covid, and reducing the distancing just gets us another step closer to being able to start again! So fingers crossed! The day we get the go ahead to start again the day I’ll get a full nights sleep!

Anyway no other crochet news from me…..I hope you’re all keeping well and staying safe!

Happy Hooking

Lisa xx

Lockdown & crochet zoom

Hi!!! How are you? I’m not doing to bad at keeping up with this lately, 🙌🙌 to me!

Well not much to tell you really, it’s been a funny week, I’ve lost my crojo a bit, flitting from one project to another and getting nowhere.

However, Lynda and I have almost finished Pandemonium, just as the lockdown is starting tot lift, all of my rows are complete, and I’m just working on the border, but it’s hot, it’s so heavy! And awkward too but, once colder weather kicks in it’ll be a godsend.

I had some happy post last Saturday! How I didn’t know this lovely lady existed I don’t know, Siobhan crafts is a local indie yarn dyer that lives in Warrington, she started dyeing during the school holidays whilst she was at college and from what I know she hasn’t stopped, she has the most fabulous colourways! Anyway I bought this

How lovely is it?! I’ve no clue what I’m going to do with it, but I will say this won’t be the last I buy from Siobhan, beautiful yarn and super speedy delivery!

I’ve finished a couple of designs for the crochet sanctuary, we’re itching to get these going again, we had to postpone April weekend, May crochet day and right now, myself and lynda would be getting ready to go and meet our guests for breakfast, I so want to be there, but we do have new dates, and we just need to wait for Boris so we can announce them. What I can say is we will be making the postponed ones that extra special! To be fair they will be anyway, I think just seeing everyone again will make it special. But lynda and I will be ‘cooking’ something special up today!!! Socially distanced of course!

One thing about this lockdown is that even though we’ve not been able to see each other we really have taken advantage of zoom, every Wednesday night our lovely friend sharon hosts a zoom call for the ‘hookers on tour’ it’s so nice as we have a laugh, crochet, and just catch up, it really breaks up a week. Then every Saturday Kitey from The Yarn Whisperer (my yarn dealer 😂) hosts a 40 minute catch up from 14:00, then at 15:00 we have another zoom with the hookers on tour until 17:00!!! We’ve even had a spa night!!! And an 80’s theme, it’s been invaluable and I’m not sure I’d have Gotten through lockdown as sane as I have without them!

In fact last Tuesday was the first time I saw lynda! In my garden 2 metres apart, we hadn’t seen each other since 21st March, even though we speak everyday it’s not quite the same. But today we have some fun in the garden planned!!

I’ve also started a new Jenny’s Mandala from Little box of crochet it was one of my favourite lbc projects, I do love a mandala, but this one was special, it was released just as jenny has passed away from a brain tumour, for those that don’t know, Amanda Bloom and Jenny founded little box of crochet, I have the finished original version framed in my craft room, but I wanted to make one in other colours, so I’ve made a start and I’m loving it! I do have plans to turn it into something useable but it’s one of those projects I’ll keep picking up and putting down, you can buy the pattern in the book pictured below from their website and it’s full of some other favourites too.

I’m also waiting on a book delivery from Amazon, it’s a crocheted letters book, ideally lynda and I would like to make all of our guests a cushion for their chair using their first initial, how cute would that be?! Or a display of cushions spelling out THE CROCHET SANCTUARY, a big task though right?!

How cool are these?!

Anyway, I’m still working on Janie Crows fruit garden, I’ve not taken any pics recently but I will do.

I think that’s about it for now, I’d best get sorted for lynda popping over and getting the garden set up for today’s yarny antics!!!

Have a great weekend and happy hooking!

Lisa xx

Pandemonium

Hello! How are you? So far we’ve spent the majority of 2020 in lockdown, bizarre, who’d have thought it?

And for me it’s pretty much been about a pandemonium, Lynda and I decided on the morning of 21st of March, 2 days prior to UK lockdown that we wanted to run a stash busting crochet along, we were both feeling quite anxious about the whole COVID-19 issue, and with shops closing, and everything shutting down, we decided to run the cal, with virtually zero planning and zero designing! Our thoughts were that if we released a small amount of rows twice a week, it wouldn’t be too overwhelming for people to keep up with, along with their other projects and coping with lockdown. And it would give us time each week to plan, design and test before releasing.

It’s been an absolute blessing for us to keep busy, and feel like we’re making a teeny difference.

We’ve now got 6,825 members, and people taking part all over the world, it’s amazing! We’re all now starting to see the lockdown lifting and we’re also coming towards the end of the cal, we released part 20 of 28 on Wednesday, so only another 4 weeks to go, and there are some stunning blankets!

Aren’t they fabulous?! The colours are just beautiful, I am literally stash busting mine, and I will admit, I’ve put very little thought process into my colourway. So far we have loved it, but I am starting to feel a little sad that it’ll be over very soon! It isn’t too late to join if you fancy, and the patterns won’t be going anywhere, if you’d like to take part head over to our Facebook page All Things Crochet Sancruary

Whilst working on Pandemonium, we’ve also been designing for the up and coming Crochet sanctuary days and weekends, obviously 3 of these have been postponed until our venue re-opens but we are positive that this will hopefully be in July! Fingers crossed!

I’ve recently finished this beautiful cushion by Esme Crick from Red sparrow Crochet, I loved every minute of it, it’s called canal houses and it reminded me of our trip to Amsterdam last year, the design is bought from scheepjes and comes as an after party booklet and can be found on ravelry

I also finished some socks! The pattern came from Vicky Browns sock club with some beautiful yarn, but I already had a skein of Woolly mama yarns in hi ho silver that I wanted to use, so used that instead, they’re fab, and snuggly!

And finally!!! Another CAL or MAL to look forward too!! The crochet project and Vicky browns designs are launching a new MAL on 17th June, 12 days to go! And it’s called ‘while we waited’ uses 3 skeins of hand dyed yarn, I chose ‘yoga in the living room’ I’m so excited for this, I’ve never taken part in a cal using hand dyed yarn, I’ve gone for the wrap option

Stunning colours!

That’s about it really, not many finished wips none that I can share yet anyway!

Keep well and keep hooking

Lisa xx