Hooray for Crochet!

It's March and that means it is (Inter)National Crochet Month (NatCroMo). Crocheters all over the world are celebrating in many varied ways, but none as exuberantly as my fellow hookers on Ravelry. Every day in March, kaet will inspire those of us participating in the second edition of the NatCroMo Freeform Game with a daily instruction. By March 31st each of us will have completed a freeform creation and no matter what it looks like we will all have had great fun along the way. Today's instruction is very unstructured, as befits freeform. It is: A is for Apple. Here is my interpretation, greatly inspired by my love of Granny Smith apples. The photo is a bit on the fuzzy side so you will have to use your imagination.

This is a good time for me to mention my attendance January 21st and 22nd at a series of Freeform Knit and Crochet Classes at SouthWest Trading Company, Inc. in Tempe, Arizona. Prudence Mapstone, a talented fiber artist and gifted teacher, was the instructor. Prudence's work, as well as inspirational guidance on freeforming, can be found here.

I basked in the camaraderie of my fellow attendees during the two sessions I participated in and learned so much about freeforming through the hands-on approach we followed each day. I was not prolific, but am very happy with what I was able to accomplish.

This freeform leaf will eventually be part of a shawl for me:

This scrumble looked so much like a fish when I was finished that I decided to make a tote bag with it for my daughter-in-law who loves all things nautical:

A scrumble, by the way, is a freeform patch made with an assortment of yarns which can combine both knitting and crocheting. The scrumbles are then joined to form a larger item such as a handbag or a shawl.

I reported last March that I was making some scrumbles to send to Prudence Mapstone for The Pink Project, an activity to support breast cancer research. Well, Prudence has taken all the scrumbles sent to her from all over the world and combined them to make beautiful and unusual items. They are now up for auction and can be viewed and bid on via this website. I encourage you to view them and bid if you feel so inclined. It is for a very good cause.

Mind Games and New Projects

One of my mental activities in retirement is the solving of cryptograms. My local Sunday paper has one every week, but I craved more. I found this online source of weekly cryptograms--usually about 10 a week. I'm really addicted to these.

I mentioned starting a new freeform project last week. I am embellishing some house slippers for me. I am adapting some patterns I found in Margaret Hubert's pamphlet published by Annie's Attic, Fun with Free-Form Crochet. It is a good way to use up some of my yarns from The Think Pink Challenge and The Pink Project. I work on it at odd moments. It is both relaxing and fun.

Another new project has actually been on the back burner for some time. I promised my daughter I would make her a new afghan to replace one that had been too damaged to repair. I've had the yarn for a year or more. I finally have finished enough of my WIPs to feel ready to proceed with a larger project, so started last night. I am using Lion Brand Homespun and one of their free patterns for a Log Cabin Afghan--size K (6.5mm)hook. I like the pattern and it is very easy, but the yarn is a bit finicky to work with as it catches on the loops I'm trying to pull through. Hopefully, as I get more used to working the pattern, I will improve my technique.

Long Time No Blog

Why has it been over a month since I last blogged? I can think of lots of excuses:

1. We were in California with no access to a computer for 10 days;
2. Since returning home I've been very busy catching up on things neglected while we were away;
3. I've been very focused on finishing a number of knitting/crochet projects;
4. I've been reading several books for the book clubs I'm in.

However, in all honesty, I'm not sure that any of those reasons is really accurate. No matter, I'm resolving right now to post at least 3 times a week for the next month. We'll see if that goal will keep me motivated.

The weather for the last week has been extreme. First it warmed up to almost 100 degrees for several days and then the winds came. It is frequently windy here, but these were the most ferocious, sustained winds we've had since moving here last July. I could hardly stand up in the gusts and we lost one tree--snapped the top off. D says he thinks it was weak in that spot, but it hurts like losing a friend. We battled the winds several days ago to stake two of our trees and are hoping they will be okay. The bark on one seems to have received some damage, but only time will tell.

We are still enjoying the blossoming of trees and cactus despite the winds. Here are a few more photos from the back yard.

One of the Kidneywood trees by the back gate

Prickly Pear we rescued after last year's monsoons

And finally, another FO--my scrumbles for The Pink Project in support of breast cancer research. I mailed them Friday to Prudence Mapstone in Australia. They were a challenge, as I'm new to freeform, but I really enjoyed making them. I feel more satisfied with these than the ones I made for The Think Pink Challenge for Jenny Dowde. In fact, I've begun a small project of my own now in freeform crochet. I'm embellishing some slippers using some of the pink yarn bought for The Pink Project.

Scrumbling

I love the sound of that word--scrumbling. It is playful, whimsical, a bit quirky. And that's the way scrumbling makes me feel. Yesterday I played with my yarn and made two pink scrumbles for The Pink Project that Prudence Mapstone is sponsoring on Ravelry to support breast cancer research. I like the way they turned out, but am afraid they may be a bit large. Also, I am not feeling really good about the yarn I've used. Since the only yarns I had in pink were acrylics for making baby blankets and some novelty yarns, I don't think they have quite the drape I would like in a freeform project. I will try gently washing them in Eucalan to see if they improve. I still want to make some more before I mail them to Prudence.


This scrumble is one I made following a pattern by Margaret Hubert that I found in a publication from Annie's Attic called Fun with Free-Form Crochet. The pattern is called Large Paisley Scrumble No. 1. Now, it may sound counter intuitive to follow a pattern for freeforming, but as a "newbie" I felt I needed some guidance.

For this scrumble I started out following a pattern from the same publication by Margaret Hubert and when I got confused I just decided to improvise and make it my own.

The scrumbles I posted the other day were mailed to Jenny Dowde today. She is sponsoring a similar project on Ravelry called the Think Pink Challenge. Her deadline for receiving fragments is mid-April so I wanted to get them off as soon as possible. As I was returning from the post office, I was amazed to see a family of javelinas running across the front yard of along the road. The creatures and plant life here in the Southwest are so different from what I am used to and I've been trying to spot them as I drive along. I have seen coyotes, road runners, lizards, hawks, and all manner of cactus, but had never yet seen a javelina. They are much larger than I had thought--definitely not something to mess with.

Spring Has Sprung!

There is no doubt about it--spring has arrived in southeast Arizona. And it has brought me another surprise. I didn't realize that bulbs planted in the fall would actually bloom here. Well, as you can see from these photos, they do indeed:

Daffodils are "my" flower, since I was a March baby, and my favorite color is yellow. I couldn't be happier or more energized.

And what have I been doing with all that energy and happiness? Taking my yarn for a walk by making scrumbles, of course! What's a scrumble, you ask? As defined by Sylvia Cosh and James Walters here: "'Basic' scrumbling means making freeform random patchwork pieces to be joined into a continuous, textured fabric."

On a trip to Santa Fe, New Mexico this past autumn, I wandered into a boutique downtown and was completely blown away by the coats, vests, and scarves they had displayed. I didn't know how they were made, but I loved them. Since that time and after a lot of research I've found out that they were constructed using scrumbles from freeform knitting and crochet. Check out the International Free Form Crochet Guild site for freeform examples and links.

I'm currently involved in making scrumbles to donate to two groups on Ravelry that will use them to make items for fundraising to support breast cancer research. I'm a real beginner and at first was very anxious about my scrumbles. Were they good enough to donate? What would others think of them? I checked out the work of others on their project pages to see how mine compared and then decided the whole idea was to do "my" thing. Last night I even got brave and made one without following the guidelines I had been using contained in Jenny Dowde's wonderful book, " FreeForm Knitting and Crochet." I'm happy with what I've done so far, but you can judge for yourself. . .

When I'm working on scrumbles I feel like my whole body is humming with energy. It is very liberating to work without a pattern.