Podcast Episode 219: Our Evergrowing Craft World

This week, Jenny and Kerin sit down for a chat about their easily-enabled world of crafting. From knitting and spinning to beading, weaving, crochet and tatting, it’s sometimes just too easy to get sucked into a whole new craft. Our recent obsession: crochet! Having attempted to learn crochet several times, both Kerin and Jenny share their prior attempts before finally mastering the basics of crochet. And after getting the basics, our enthusiasm obviously didn’t stop there! After moving onto different projects to expand our skills, we of course had to try our hands at making doilies with Curio. Next, we chat about different project ideas and interesting types of crochet – like Filet and Irish crochet – to inspire your next project.

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Simple Crocheting by Erika Knight

A calming neutral color palette, stunning photography and gorgeously simple projects – I’m not sure which of these qualities drew me to this book first, but I instantly knew that Simple Crocheting by Erika Knight needed to have a home on my bookshelf asap. Highlighting the wide range of finished fabrics and textures, you’ll find everything from chic accessories like fingerless mitts, shawls, and jewerly to home decor and even a cardigan.

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Finally Finished! The Billow Blanket

The feeling must be similar as to when one welcomes their first child into the world: you waited soooo long for it, upon its arrival you giddily parade it before all, and many people – even strangers – want to hold it, again and again.

Yep, I just finished my first crochet ‘child’, the massive Billow blanket. Well, the first crochet child of mine that I like (ugh, you messy cowl!).
Billow blanket

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The Great Courses on Audible!

Great Courses - Edited for Web

Earlier this week, I was feeling a bit at loose ends in terms of audio books. I couldn’t seem to find anything that kept my interest. So, I sent a tweet out into the great Twitter world and was thrilled with the suggestions I received. When I went to Audible to check out the tempting titles, I found that another of my favorite listening companies had joined forces with Audible.com — The Great Courses!

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Feather and Fan Crochet

So, as I’ve mentioned before that I have an incredible amount of lace weight yarn just lurking around in the shadows of my yarn stash. Everyone else in the office seems to have learned their lesson (aka that they just won’t ever get around to knitting with lace weight yarn) so they steer well clear of it whenever a stray skein winds up in the office. I, on the other hand am more than happy to snap each and every one of them up and take them home with me. Well… almost anything, and by anything I mean just the blues!

This means that I’m always prowling Ravelry, our own pattern section and all the available books in the office for lace weight patterns. ANYTHING to put this lovely, light yarn to good use. Eventually I found A. Westbrook’s free crochet Lacy Feather and Fan pattern on Ravelry. I loved how open the pattern was, the simple two-row repeat and that I could really easily turn this into a cowl. SOLD!

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Ballerinas in Pink

Michelle Miller has been part of the IDP program from the very beginning – her Knitting Project Bag has been one of our most popular patterns! I’ve known Michelle for several years now and last summer we discussed doing a collection of her beautiful lace work. She came up with a gorgeous proposal and the result is the stunning Ballerinas in Pink collection!

Michelle was inspired by the artist Degas’s series of impressionistic paintings from the turn of the century. (see some of the artwork here). Using a similar color palette, all of Michelle’s designers are stunningly beautiful and a wonderful addition to any lace lover’s pattern collection.

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Learning to Knit Lace

Light and airy lace – the epitome of summer knitting! Although it can look intimidating, the basics of lace lie in the added yarn overs to create an open fabric. Throughout the main body of the lace pattern, you’ll often find these extra increases paired with decreases in order to keep the stitch count the same. However, yarn overs can also be used to create the shaping found in shawls.

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Shadow Lace

If you have dabbled in lace or are new to the world of shawls, Kerin’s How to Knit Lace video class is sure to be your go-to guide for creating elegant lace wraps and shawls. This 12-part video class begins with a brief overview of lace knitting, then moving into the basics of how to determine the right yarn, fiber type, and color that will make your shawl shine! Next, you’ll follow along with Kerin as she shows you how to cast on and make the yarn overs that will create your lace motif.

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