Herringbone

As many of you know, I like to experiment with stitches and learn as many new ones as possible. This week, I decided to give a new stitch a try; basketweave and herringbone. 


Basketweave to left, herringbone to right.




Both, came out gorgeous in my opinion, and the basket weave is the perfect stitch for winter blankets and dish cloths. However, I decided to concentrate on the herringbone stitch; something I only thought possible for knitters. Although it doesn't quite create the traditional pattern that you see in knits and tweed, it does create a rather interesting stitch, and is a good take on the half treble. 


Herringbone tweed to left, herringbone knit to right.


As I was in need of a hook case, to store my colourful metal hooks in, I decided this would be the stitch to use. Different from any I've seen in books or magazines, I knew this was the stitch for me. Wanting a bright and moderately thick yarn, I chose Sirdar Supersoft Aran in a turquoise/sea green colour and chose a gorgeous denim blue colour for the inside. 

Initially I was going to give the outer edge a puff stitch in the denim blue, however after adding the lace bows, I decided that simplicity is much better.



Finally a hook case!



Also, out of this stitch I fashioned myself a little wrap around bracelet, which colour was inspired by an 80s jumper of my grandfather's, giving a little modern edge to a vintage look. 



My bracelet, with a great spare leather button from, wait for it, my tweed herringbone jacket!



Grannies Galore

Hi all, sorry I've been rather quiet lately, life seems to be passing quickly with my impending move and the huge amount of crocheting I've been doing lately!

First off, I'd like to share my latest amigurumi creations; often I find people suggesting animals or even requesting them to purchase! (If you have a request please let me know and I can offer a quote.) I really feel like I have expanded my collection and improve with each pattern, not to mention the fact that I love scouring the Internet and shops for the perfect colour.

 



My new creations, loving my penguin the most!

A popular crochet item is the Granny Square.. These creative little shapes hit Europe and the USA in a big way in the 60s-70s and have been treasured since; although they have been adapted in many ways since, the basics still remain the same.

 

 

Varying takes on the Granny Square.



Vintage patterns and even Sir Paul Mccartney in a Granny Square vest!

 

 

Since they vary in size, colour, pattern, material etc, they are extremely versatile and look great when created in the right way. 



It's recommended to start with a basic square and advance to more difficult patterns as your technique progresses; in fact my first ever completed crocheted item was a Granny Square snood! After this initial project, I didn't really touch upon the idea of Granny Squares again; that is, until I found this beautiful pattern when browsing Pinterest.

 



Pattern by Julie Yeager

Each stitch looks like a petal, creating a flowerbed effect; and let's face it, what girl doesn't dream of being surrounded by flowers at some point?

Each 'petal' is created using a cluster stitch, and once you get in to it, extremely easy to do, and adapt for smaller squares. I decided to use this gorgeous pattern to create my first crocheted blanket (que squeal). For this blanket I have stuck to basic pastel colours that will look timeless, and hopefully last the ages.



Don't just embellish your life...

... embellish your pages too.

For those who know my family well, you'll know that my mother is a talented scrapbooker, and when it calls for it, card maker. For over half a decade, I have watched her transform lifeless pieces of paper into works of art, depicting our lives right from an early age; giving my brother and I the chance to have memories of our youth to pass down to our children.



A couple of examples of my mother's scrapbooking pages! (Ignore my ugly mug :P)


Now, like any good scrapbooker, she embellishes her pages to give them extra detail and to make them look even more beautiful. However, these embellishments do have a drawback; cost. Even though they are gorgeous, my favourite are the flowers she uses, they cost a fortune and well, you can't exactly reuse them! When looking at a few of my amigurumi animals she noticed my use of roses, giving us a thought; crocheted scrapbook embellishments.
I decided to give roses a try, and have created them in varying sizes and colours.




Examples of my rose brooch




Small, medium tiered and medium embellishments



Personally, I think they look gorgeous and will adorn any page beautifully, however, I did decide that my larger layer rose was far too big for a scrapboking page, but not to big to be a brooch. and, voila, a new product; crocheted rose brooches in the customers choice of colour arrangements.

Over the next few weeks I will be working on a variety of flowers to add to scrapbooking pages and cards, and those of you who are handy with a hook; why don't you give it a go too? And those of you who aren't handy with a hook, just go to my etsy shop (http://www.etsy.com/shop/TheHookHut?ref=search_shop_redirect) there you will find all of my products!!

Goodbye for now, and remember to whip that wool out!!!

p.s. If anyone decides to crochet any flowers, please send me pics of your pages! I'd love to see them!!

Cute Cuter Cutest

Is there anything cuter than a small stuffed crocheted animal? Of course there isn't! Especially when they have bows, hats, rosettes and felt patches. Amigurumi is one good way to go about creating this cuteness, a Japanese craft that works in rounds with increases and decreases, enables you to form unproportioned, extra adorable items; animals, dolls, you name it, you can create it.

I came across my first amigurumi pattern in a Simply Crochet magazine, and not having delt with circular patterns before, I ignored it (but still admired the the pretty pictures), however after a few looks at the pattern I thought this cant be as hard as it looks can it? So off I went to Pinterest to find tutorials and other patterns, and boy was I inundated with patterns!
After a sift through I found this great little bunny on All About Ami and adjusted the pattern slightly to give the bunny a smaller head making it all the more gorgeous.
                                              

 

After mastering this pattern I started looking at others, but decided to design my own! And voila I 
have already created pigs, elephants, chicks and octopuses! Truth be told, they are even easier 
than they seem!

                                                            

I highly recommend you find and try an amigurumi pattern as soon as possible! Or find one on my Etsy shop TheHookHut (up and running in a few days) 

Ahoy There!

Hello all, firstly I would like to apologise for such a long leave of absence, however I have been creating a huge amount of cuteness, softness and general yumminess. Over the next few weeks I'll be showing you the range of scarves, snoods, garlands etc that I've been constructing since Christmas.

As some of you may know I've been big on reading since a very young age and can be known to not surface for hours when I have a great book in hand, however, apart from the occasional Vogue, I do not enjoy my magazines in the slightest. But as chance had it, as I was walking past the magazine rack a cover caught my eye, after a quick flick through I knew this was a magazine for me.
Simply Crochet, from the creators of Mollie Makes, is a sophisticated, modern and jam packed magazine; better and more varied than most books, and frankly a whole lot cheaper. With ideas for quick projects for beginners or longer, more intricate patterns for advanced crocheters; it is the perfect magazine for all. Safe to say I have made a few small items from the magazine, created a variety on a beautiful snood and been inspired to make amigurumi animals! This is one magazine I WOULD recommend to anyone with an interest in crochet.

Love heart brooch from issue 1

 

A piece from this issue that really caught my eye was the chunky cowl, created in a chunky wool with a mock cable knit it is intriguing to look at and works up beautifully. Now I have chosen to do this cowl in a slightly smaller wool with a 9mm hook instead of a 12mm; partially due to impatience at waiting for my new hook to arrive and partially due to the love I felt when I found Sidar Denim Ultra wool. Having made one for myself and one for a family friend, it is easy to say these will be loved by all, and are frankly, very cosy!

Me wearing the cowl

Next time: Amigurumi, easier than it looks and just as cute.

Get glam and glitter up

Due to the fact that I'm currently working on top secret items, I thought I would share another love of mine, nails. I have always been a fan of keeping my nails in tip top shape, never biting them or even chopping them with clippers, all in all they're generally healthy (not to mention greatly envied by my mother). Now, the great thing about having nails, is that they are a blank teeny tiny canvas that you can decorate in whatever style to suit your outfit, mood, or thanks to one trend, your underwear!

Since the festive season is starting and Christmas parties and meals are due to start I thought I would give a few nail art ideas, the type that are easy to do at home with the supplies you most likely have in your cupboard. Over the summer I came across watermarbling, a great technique to get interesting, varied and beautiful nails; although tricky to do at first it's subtle and a fantastic way to compliment any outfit.

Check out YouTube to find a tutorial that you like!

However, if I was you I would opt for bold! Glitter is the way forward, I am officilly glitter obsessed, like a magpie I'm attracted to anything shiny and I love having my nails sparkled up! Any excuse to look pretty really ;) And thankfully this year the amount of glitter products have greatly expanded, no longer must you be 5 years old to wear sparkly nail polish, but thanks to the catwalk and vogue pages, glitter nail polish has become chic and sophisticated. My favourite way of wearing it is to layer over colour, having a good base colour with the glitter on top causes a pop, and safe to say it draws the eye. All in all, the perfect way to add something bold to a simple outfit.

Practice practice practice

Over the past few weeks, between making gifts, I have been mastering the art of crochet knitting. Sounds odd I know, but there are many ways to make a stitch, look like a knit; although it looks tricky at first, it's more than easy enough to master. Of course, I had no idea that this could be done until, BIG SHOCK, I found the stitch tutorial on Pinterest; I started off with a simple Tunisian stitch and have progressed to a Tunisian knit stitch (ever so slightly different but with big results) and have mastered a cable knit stitch! Now cable knit stitches are rather tricky but, well practice makes perfect, and I'm off and away, experimenting with the stitch itself to block the cables, continue the cables and elongate the cables.
As you can see from my pictures below, each stitch has a knit look about it and can be manipulated in ways to achieve the desired pattern or result, and like any pattern can be transferred through different thicknesses and materials to create beautiful textures. So, my next challenge, find more stitches and master them to create a world of crochet knit.

Left: cable knit. Top right: Tunisian knit stitch. Bottom left: Tunisian  simple stitch

Tutorials: http://crochetingthedayaway.blogspot.co.uk/2011/10/tunisian-crochet-how-to-basic-tunisian.html

http://www.anniescatalog.com/crochet/content.html?content_id=59


http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=x0XaqTQaYyM&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3Dx0XaqTQaYyM