Category: Vashti’s Crochet Products

Posts about crochet yarns, patterns, and more that I add to the DesigningVashti shop.

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Shaped Star Stitch Class Swatch

Happy Memorial Day.

It’s a short update today. Checkout this pretty photo I took this morning of a brand-new star stitch class swatch. This is what the Starwirbel Cowl stitch pattern looks like when it’s done in flat spiraling rounds. (It still has the scrap yarn marking the spiraling rounds.) I’m testing the shaping information in the Starwirbel Way class handout.

Thank you.

Thanks for joining me as I blog the 50 days of preparation for the crochet conference this summer! It’s Day 11 which means I’ve blogged one-fifth of the 50 days.

Have I completed one-fifth of my tasks? Frankly, I don’t know. There are so many little things to do that they’re hard to count accurately. If my gut says I’m moving through things at a good pace, I’ve learned I can trust that and enjoy the constant river of details that get done as they flow through me. I’m halfway through my list of things to do for the Starwirbel star stitch class.

It was my gut that said, “For the 2016 conference you’ll have from half to two-thirds of 2015’s river of show booth details to manage. After several years of teaching you’ll have slightly less than half of a river of teaching details, so GO FOR IT! DO BOTH!”

Here’s a different view of the swatch:

Star Stitch Class Swatch: Shaping a Spiral
Would you believe the yarn I used is white?
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Special Class Practice Swatches

Today I get to crochet outside in my gazebo. The weather is gorgeous and the birds sound happy. We have plenty of coffee, chocolate, and fresh peaches. It’s a perfect holiday weekend. On the hook: very special practice swatches. What?

Well, we’re nearing the end of May.

One of my big conference prep goals is to complete the handouts for all five of my class topics by June 1. That’s why I keep blogging about how I prepare class handouts. It’s all I can think about. It’s like when I’m in the midst of solving a puzzle, or reading a good mystery.

Practice swatches try to become new designs!

I’m an unofficial pattern tester today, following my own directions in a class handout so that I send off the draft to my editor and pattern tester. I hope this doesn’t sound like work to you. It’s very exciting! So many designs happen this way by accident! Translating a class topic into ideal practice swatches for students is creatively inspiring. 

For the Steeked Tunisian Lace class I designed a few short practice swatches that build on each other. It’s inspiring to compare these three basic ways to crochet the lacy extended stitch net: with 1 yarn (Seshen is a great example), or alternating 2 yarns (Mesmer Scarf), or the double-ended hook variation (á là Maze Vest). In class we’ll then have practice swatches to steek!

Why this May 31 deadline?

  • It gives my editor enough time to go over the three new handouts. It also gives me time to incorporate her revisions without feeling rushed.
  • My close friend Annie arrives from Kentucky in two weeks. I can’t wait to see her! I don’t want to be mulling class handouts while she’s here.
  • The UPS truck is going to pull up one of these days and deliver five new colors of our Lotus yarn! I want to be able to turn my full attention to that when it happens! (You’ll know it because I’ll blog it.)
  • It’s for the best that I expect that the conference will sneak up on me. It always does. Plus, this is the first year I’ll have a booth while teaching. 
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Crochet Class Pattern Galleries

A Gallery of designs and effects for the Stitch Games Crochet class handout.

Pictured is a type of photo gallery that I’ve started including in my crochet class handouts. This one is for the Stitch Games class. View it full size. It shows a few different stitch games across the top. In the row below are finished designs that are based on one of those game types.

(I’m still tweaking the handout. This gallery may change by July 13.)

Pattern Galleries are Like 2-D Trunk Shows

Crochet class pattern galleries have turned out to be very useful over the years. I bring an overabundance of crocheted examples for what we cover in class. It’s like a whole trunk show per topic! Anyone is welcome to examine them and try things on. As you can imagine, I’m often asked what the name of a design is, or whether the pattern for an item is downloadable. It’s just easier if I label thumbnail photos of them in the handout.

I first did this in 2012 with the 21st Century Love Knots handout. It helped immensely. When I pass around items, someone will ask, “Is the information for this one in the handout?” and it’s wonderful to be able to say “Yes, in the gallery on p. 3.”

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Crochet Booth 203 Finalized (Day 8 of 50)

Crochet Booth PAID IN FULL

Every year CGOA’s Chain Link conference has a market with knit and crochet booths, in addition to a full schedule of classes and special events. I’ve attended these conferences every year since 2002 (except in 2003). It’s always fun to walk the show floor between classes.

As a teacher now, I look forward to seeing what students bring back from the market during a class break. This is often how I first hear about something I need to go buy before it sells out! (I can imagine other teachers nodding their heads when they read this.)

Doris and I had our first crochet booth in this market last year. (The event is also known as the Knit and Crochet Show because it also includes the TKGA/knitting guild.) That was in San Diego; this July it will be in Charleston SC.

It’s Officially All Ours: Booth #203!

Today I finished paying for the DesigningVashti booth space—well before the late June deadline. I paid first half of the fee ($300) in April to get a great location. It’s also one of the few corner spaces. I love the location. People will be able to see our crochet booth from the entrance, and I’m going to enjoy being right across from Crochetville’s booth. Not will it be fun to be near Amy and Donna the whole time (like last year), the market opens with a strong crochet presence.

 

 

It’s Friday and this is my last businessy item to cross off for the week. This is also Day 8 of the epic 50 days I have left to get ready. I’ll be teaching five classes at CGOA‘s conference and have a crochet booth on the show floor.

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Crochet Along Shaping Thoughts (Jempool CAL)

Jem CAL: Crochet Along Announcement for the Jempool Scarf methodThere’s a crochet along (CAL) going on right now for the Jempool Scarf. All the posts are public and it’s free (the pattern and technique info is $5), so anyone can join in any time.

While I was crocheting Jempool, I wondered if I should complete it as a traditional rectangular scarf. Maybe it would like to be something different?

I quickly discovered that when you stack each color of a variegated yarn, you can’t just increase or decrease stitches to shape a sleeve or neckline. The color repeat sequence becomes the pattern repeat.

Below are some sketches from when I was working this out. I needed colored pencils to help me see if there might be a 2-skein version I’d prefer even more than the simple 1-skein scarf.

Sketched ideas for other shapes of the basic Jempool Crochet Along rectangle.
A few ideas for shaping with a fixed-width rectangle.

If one complete color sequence gave me a 9″ (22.86 cm)-wide scarf, that 9″ is a fixed pattern repeat. That means I could double it (or triple, etc). In this case the colors are symmetrical, so I could also halve it; a 4.5″ pattern repeat is easier to design with.

So as part of the crochet along, if you try a Jempool and you’re loving it but you don’t need to end up with a scarf, you could think of it as a repeatable motif. A handy seam here or there could yield a ruana, poncho, shrug, etc.

Jempool is reversible, so it could easily be turned into a möbius. I’d just need to add a half twist then seam together the two ends.