Janie Crowfoot's Crochet Club 2014 - February

At last I have time on a Sunday to sit down and show you the first part of Janie Crowfoot's 2014 Crochet Club.  Unfortunately, the reason I have time on my hands is because I am sitting at my mum's hospital bedside, occupying myself whilst she sleeps, so there may well be a few mistakes littering this post, as my mind becomes preoccupied by other things.  

The observant of you will note that these are photos from the February pattern, which I've got round to writing up on 30th March, so I'm sure you can imagine how far I am along with the March parts of the pattern - hardly at all!  However, this in no way reflects my enjoyment of the club; whilst initially I was a bit worried about the whole tension thing (amigurumi allows me to have the free reign to use whatever hook I like with no consequence other than  larger or smaller toys at the end of it!) it was nice to actually push myself to use the right hook at the correct tension to go forward for an end purpose.  

I was surprised by how many pattern pieces there were to make.  I've done a few kits and CALs and am usually underwhelmed by what you are given to do, but not this time.  Oh no, this club could easily fill a good few weekends if you want to do a nice job of it all.  Here are the first few (sorry about the colour overload):

This presented another challenge - blocking.  I don't think I've ever really blocked anything, I perhaps have half-heartedly attempted it on a couple of things but this was the real deal; making sure things were the necessary size and shape for when they finally come together as one big piece.  I scoured the Ravelry Group looking for advice and decided to try a hot steam iron hovered about 1 inch above the pieces and luckily it worked out very well.  

There was one part of the pattern that I was particularly hesitant to make a start on, the Quant Flower.  Partly because I hate working up and down the stems of flowers (chains, how I hate you) and partly because it looked almost lacy (slip stitches, I hate you too).  Eventually though I made a start and eventually ended up with a curled up, scrumpled looking colour ball.  But, with a little bit of blocking...

It looked just like the pattern picture! 

March's patterns involve bead work which I am very much looking forward to.  Now just to find the time to make a start...

Crochet Club 2014

Just in time for the weekend I received a VERY exciting package; my Janie Crow Crochet Club 2014 pack.  In case you haven't heard of it, Janie Crow is a British crochet and knit designer who each year runs a mystery crochet club.  Over 6 months, a section of the pattern is delivered to you via email, and there is forum and online support to help you create the perfect blanket.  It allows you to develop your skills in new techniques and stitches and this year, you could buy the yarn bundle as well to make the exact blanket that Janie designed.  I have been waiting for this for a while, it seems like ages since I begun paying my monthly instalments to cover the cost of the club (it was a little expensive but I asked/told Coop about it conveniently when he was playing his Playstation so he agreed without hesitation!) before finally I received my email telling me that it was on it's way. I rushed to the post office with my little red ticket, hoping that it was my yarn stash and not something else I'd forgotten that I'd ordered, but once I saw the size of the pack and gave it a good squeeze, I was certain:

I ran my package straight up to my craft room to try and avoid Squitchy hair as much as possible.  It's moulting time again and unfortunately that hair gets everywhere!  I was a little bit stuck as to where I was going to keep it so that it was free from Squitchy and kept all together and safe, but luckily, the team at Janie Crow seem to have read my mind:

It all came superbly packaged in a neat linen bag to keep it safely stored away.  How charming!  Inside the bag was an even bigger delight:

28 skeins of Rowan yarn, 6 bags of beads and one crochet club sewing label.  Rowan yarn is the posh stuff I only treat myself to when I have been given a John Lewis voucher, and even then I might only buy 4 or 5 skeins before I felt like it was excessive, now I have 28 of these little bundles of colour!  

I lost track of myself pouring over the yarn.  I spent so long looking over the colours, giving them a squeeze, putting different colour combinations together to guess what the mystery blanket might look like.  I even popped my new macro lens onto my camera and snap snap snapped away, trying to master the blurry/focus balance to make the photos look extra professional.  I'm a little embarrassed to say I wasted  indulged for over an hour doing just this!  Taking a photo, rearranging and taking another.  Here's a little glimpse of some of my shots:

For now, I've safely tucked the stash back in the project bag and placed it high on top of my cupboards for fear of Sas getting hold of it.  Not that he's ever touched any of my yarn before, but I wanted to be on the safe side.  Now it's just a case of waiting for the email with the first pattern on the 6th, just 4 days away... ooohh I'm excited! x