3KCBWDAY6 - Improving Your Skillset

Improving Your Skillset
How far down the road to learning your craft do you believe yourself to be? Are you comfortable with what you know or are you always striving to learn new skills and add to your knowledge base? Take a look at a few knitting or crochet books and have a look at some of the skills mentioned in the patterns. Can you start your amigurumi pieces with a magic circle, have you ever tried double knitting, how's your intarsia? If you are feeling brave, make a list of some of the skills which you have not yet tried but would like to have a go at, and perhaps even set yourself a deadline of when you'd like to have tried them by.

Despite the fact that I've only been crocheting about 2 years, I honestly feel like I'm a fairly advanced crocheter.  I've definitely worked patterns classified as such.  I love learning new things and challenging myself, so once I got hooked I jumped in with both feet.  If I see a pattern with stitches I've never tried or that looks really complicated, I get excited. 

I picked up the language of crochet pretty quickly.  When I first picked up a pattern, I was just baffled by the abbreviations and terminology.  Charts are still a bit tricky for me, I prefer my directions written out.  With amigurumi, unless there is something unique about a row, all I need is the stitch count for that row.  I've condensed a pattern written out over several pages to just half a page before ;).

I am able to improvise my own patterns and figure out some patterns just looking at the finished product.  I've written and shared a few of my own patterns, and I hope to do more - possibly to sell. 

There are several techniques I haven't tried yet, such as Tunisian crochet, that I would like to try eventually.  Right now I want to get more into overlay crochet.  I'm finishing up a few projects and I think my next project will be something from this book:

Source: amazon.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

As for knitting, I'd say I'm an adventurous beginner.  I'd like to try another knitting project before the year is over.  Time is key, though.... there is just so much I want to try but not nearly enough time to do it all.

3KCBWDAY6

3KCWBDAY3 - My Crochet Hero!

Your Knitting Or Crochet Hero
Blog about someone in the fibre crafts who truly inspires you. There are not too many guidelines for this, it's really about introducing your readers to someone who they might not know who is an inspiration to you. It might be a family member or friend, a specific designer or writer, indie dyer or another blogger. If you are writing about a knitting designer and you have knitted some of their designs, don't forget to show them off. Remember to get permission from the owner if you wish to use another person's pictures.

I haven't been crocheting all that long, relatively speaking.  I've read so many crocheter's bios where they'd been crocheting since they were 3, and that's not the case with me.  My mother tried to teach me when I was  young, but she's a lefty and I have what I like to call "directional dyslexia" (I can't tell my left from right half the time, seriously), so I just was never able to pick it up.  My mom, when she was crafty, was a dabbler at best in crochet.  She made a ripple afghan and a Pepto-pink sweater vest that my poor sister wore in a school portrait, but other than that I can't think of anything else she ever made.  Myself, I didn't "get it" until I was 34.  Two years ago.  That's it.  I do know how to knit, but I never have been able to feel really natural at it. 

I admire a lot of crocheters, especially those who design. I would say that it's really hard for me to choose a hero among them, but I have to admit that there is one that instantly comes to mind.

Melody MacDuffee.

Melody MacDuffee first caught my eye when I picked up this book from the book store:

Source: amazon.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

That's her Stained Glass Window afghan on the cover.  I bought the book and had to make it.



It is, to this day, probably the project I'm most proud of completing.

Melody's "thing" is overlay crochet.  I'm so intrigued by this technique.  I've started another one of her patterns from this book:

Source: ravelry.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

Again, she made the cover, and she well deserves to, in my opinion.  I haven't made it far on the project, mainly because it is made with embroidery floss and working that small requires a lot of concentration (meaning it's not really something I can sit and do with the kids around or in front of the TV) and I let myself get distracted from it.

I don't buy many pattern books, I'd rather borrow them from the library if I can, but I made an exception for this book:

Source: amazon.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

Everything in this book is worked with sewing thread.  Sewing thread.  Can you imagine?  I have a few of the patterns in mind that I want to try on a larger scale with worsted weight yarn.

I'm just amazed at the skill and imagination she possesses.

Source: melodysarts.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

I just can't imagine coming up with this on my own.  And it's just so perfect... it's really hard for me to work with embroidery thread, so I can't even begin to comprehend doing it with sewing thread like that.

Source: melodysarts.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

So... there you have it.... my crochet hero.  Melody MacDuffee.  You really should try one of her patterns some day.

3KCBWDAY3