Sock progress

Yep, still working on my first pair of socks.

You can see the finished first sock in the upper left, and I’m up to the heel wrap and turn stitches on my second.  I got a lot done last night at knitting group.  We went to a new restaurant, and they have LIGHT.  I could SEE what I was doing!

I like the way the second sock is “pooling,” the pattern that develops with the color changes of the yarn.  It changed abruptly when I had to start increasing for the instep, but that is part of the fun – watching the colors change you make each stitch.

Crafty family

On Mother’s Day I was thinking about how Mother always had crafty ideas in her head and passed along this interest in making things. It was hard-wired into my DNA. I can prove it – she and her sister got it from their mother and passed it along to my sister and me (and our brother, but his crafty things are a BIT different). Even our niece likes to make things. We can’t swear she got it from our side of the family as my sis in law’s family is and has been quite crafty and creative for generations, too.

We were visiting Mother’s sister, Aunt C, in the wilds of West-Central Florida. Highway 19 was a four-lane road through palmetto scrub back then. She and Uncle liked to sell their creations, and were making bare-foot thongs or sandals out of crocheted metallic elastic and tri-beads. They were cute, and I learned how to make them. Then Uncle showed me the bead rope he was crocheting and I HAD to learn how to make that project. After a trip to the craft store for the beads, HOURS to string them in the precise pattern to make the swirl, crocheting the rope was the easy part. It turned out fabulous.

To crochet another one is on my lengthy to-do list.

That’s it for now. I leave you with another one of my favorite things – photography

Knitting Nancy or Crochet Part 1

One of the things I enjoy and have done for many years is crochet. Grandmother crocheted beautifully and I remember watching the silver hook flash as she worked on another medallion for a tablecloth. We (sis, bro, and me) started on spools that Daddy had driven four finishing nails into the top. I now know this is called “Spool Knitting” or using a “Knitting Nancy.”

Crafty pod has some illustrated instructions on how to do this

http://www.craftypod.com/?p=100

There is a free e book available at Project Gutenberg:

http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/22029

This is a great website. The author is an engineer and brings his willingness to test and evaluate every step of the process. He begins with a detailed history of the various implements and proceeds to reviews of the modern craft and toy tools. A little more than half down the page is a section on using a toilet paper roll, Popsicle sticks, a rubber band and some yarn to make a knitting nancy that is safe to use in school.

http://www.waynesthisandthat.com/knittingnancys.html

If you have some time, check out his other articles. They are fascinating and you can really loose yourself in the analysis. The section on the ultimate super-soaker was memorable…

Back to the main topic. Spool Knitting was fun, and soon we were ready for the next step, actual crochet. The foundation of all crochet is the chain stitch and is very simple to do. We each practiced to become proficient and of course our competitive nature kicked in. Racing to see who could crochet the fastest was our next challenge. I remember sitting there with my eye on the second hand on the clock so I could call time for one of my siblings. Then we started the World’s Longest Chain. Our goal was to crochet a strand of chains long enough to wrap around our house. I remember holding one end and running around the side of the house to see how far we had gotten. It is funny; I remember working on it, and seeing if it went around the house, but not if we ever finished it. The same with racing; I don’t remember who was the fastest. I’ll have to consult Sis, as she seems to remember a lot of these things better than I do.

After we had exhausted these challenges, I was interested in actually making something different. Grandmother taught me single and double crochet. We were using cotton thread so it started tiny. As I progressed I found my tension was loosening and I produced a trapezoid. I used it as a Barbie Doll apron.

I didn’t crochet a lot as a child because I spent as much time as possible reading. I started crocheting again in college and my first project was an afghan for my dorm room bed. It was a lot of fun, and I crocheted one for my sister at Christmas and another for my brother the next year. In the years since then I’ve started a lot of projects and even finished some! Each time I pick up the thread and crochet hook I think of my Grandmother and how she not only taught me a life-time hobby but left a legacy of beautiful crocheted lace tablecloths, bedspreads, and other items she made for family. They are a marvelous and true treasure.