Finished at last

The long sleeved shrug (see previous blog) is finished at last. Sorry no photo as my niece came to pick up her 3 crochet jackets as I was doing the last round on the front edging so no time to take a quick pic. My jiggery pokery on the front shapings worked out fine in the end. A novice crocheter could never have done it. There were no instructions on how many double crochet to pick up for the border along the fronts or anywhere all it said was make it divisible by 3 ! Sorry but an idea of what I was aiming for along each piece would have been nice. Also no instructions to increase slightly around the bends at the bolero fronts. Had I followed the instructions, such as they were, it would have pulled rather strangely as obviously doing the outside edge of a bend gets larger the more rows it progresses.

The more crochet I have done with recent patterns the more I am convinced I should take up pattern designing once again. I do design most of my own work but as I write them down in language only I could understand I doubt if any other crocheter could follow them. Good tip is lay a jumper or cardigan that fits you perfectly on a table and crochet your new garment to match it, adapting necklines and sleeves etc to suit the style you are designing. I have even made tissue paper shapes as you would for sewing patterns and used them as templates. You need to take into account the "stretchability" of the stitch you choose for your garment as if it is a rigid stitch then you will probably need to make your garment a larger size than your sample as it won't stretch whilst you are pulling it on.

I am lucky I suppose in that I have been blessed with a good eye for doing very good copies ( sorry people if you think it infringes your copyright I do vary it on purpose from yours!) of anything I have seen in a magazine or a shop. Most of the articles for sale are so much like patterns I already have I doubt if it would be possible to say they are originals anyway. My mother had a saying "old times with vinegar on it" meaning same as she used to wear as a girl with a slight variation and they call it new fashion that they have designed! I have seen many articles for sale as "originals" when I have the exact pattern in my mother's old 1940 and 1950's patterns. The only variation being that they use thicker yarn in the more modern patterns.

My niece was over the moon with her garments. I have found some Twilleys black fine silky yarn "Lystwist" I think it was called in my stash and she has a pattern for a fine semi circular evening shawl. She will have to send me the pattern book back or scan it to me via the e mail so I can make it for her holidays. It will be light and airy. Ideal for those summer evenings abroad.

Today I am going to iron in the garden (when the sun shines I do everything I can in the garden) before braving the Sunday gardeners and council workers at the tip. I have 3 bags of tree clippings and 2 old tv's (sets - not elderly transvestites!)I know that before the car's wheels have stopped rolling some official will come and peer in the car and start barking out instructions for which bay I am to put my "greens (no plastic bags)!" as if I can't read the instructions on the wall in letters about a foot high! They bellow stuff at me like I am a dumb child. Blonde I may be but perfectly capable of reading instructions thank you.

The dog has had one walk but will be there tail wagging for another this afternoon. I am not a lover of Sunday walks as every man, woman,child pushchair and dog in the town seem to be in there and I am rather more of an solitary dog walker. We prefer the dogs we already know and socialise with as it saves on a lot of barking, growling and menacing. The hours I normally walk him there is the same network of dogs and they enjoy meeting each other. Quite a dog club and it's fun - all tail wagging and bum sniffing etc - but weekends it all changes. This morning I met a lady with 5 little yapping dogs. Who needs 5 of them? They surrounded Buster and were nipping at him. Poor soul was very upset he didn't know which way to turn to get away from them. Small dogs are rather like small men. They think they have something to prove.