Loop the loop

I work with really tiny thread; what is normally called “bedspread weight” is just huge compared to what I work in. I like DMC Cordonnet. I use size 30, 70 and 100. For the jewelry, 100 only. At these small sizes, the only colors you can get are white and ecru. On the one hand, it’s sad to be limited on color; on the other hand, working in darker colors at this scale is difficult to the point of painful! So, for the jewelry, it’s white and sterling. Someday, when I have enough wherewithal to afford the jewelry findings, I will do ecru and gold and sell them for a minor fortune.

My favored hooks are a Boye size 11 for the 30 thread, a Prime size 12 for the 70, and a Boye size 13 for the 100. Steel hooks are not as uniform in size as larger aluminum hooks. And newly manufactured ones are just awful in the smaller sizes. Really and truly, they don’t make ‘em like they used to. The shanks are all wrong. A while back, I went on a crochet hook shopping spree on eBay. I bought a whole bunch of steel hooks, did a compare and contrast, and picked out my favorite ones.

I don’t even know where Prime hooks come from. Possibly Mexico? I’ve never heard of them before, but I have a number of them. Lots of Boye, and one lonely Milward. Here’s a good overview of steel hooks, and lots of other nifty information on thread crochet.

Here’s a photo of my favorite steel hooks, sizes 11, 12 and 13 from left to right. The markings are millimeters.

I’ve just updated the fiber art page on my website. I put some of the older items back, but I sure do need to redo the photography. The tartan scarves look like the pictures have gone all old and overexposed, which is weird, because it’s digital. I’ll blame it on the old camera. Yeah, that’s it.

You have to learn so many different fields to do anything now. I’m a graphic artist, but I don’t really know much about photography. Color theory, yes. Resolution for different applications and needs, sure. But how to take pretty pictures? Sigh. I’m working on it.

My sister learned to weave in about 1999 or 2000. She can do anything. Cook, weld, throw pottery, raise kids, etc. Anything she wants to do, she does well. So she took a weaving class and subsequently bought a loom, a little Schacht rigid heddle loom, two feet wide. She was really enjoying it, and she taught me how to weave. And it’s a lot of fun. And I got the same loom for Christmas in 2001. Hooray! She likes to do cool texture things, manipulating the warp so that it’s not a simple over-under, over-under thing. I, on the other hand, went directly into the color work I avoid while knitting. Specifically, tartans. Now technically, I need a harness loom to do a twill weave for proper tartans. But I can do some lovely work with the tabby weave on a rigid heddle loom. I like to use cotton yarn, since you just don’t need wool too often on the Texas Gulf Coast. So yeah, it’s tartans in cotton in a much simpler weave. But they’re still cool. (My sister has done some tartan scarves, too.)

Neither one of us has had time to weave recently. It takes a pretty good amount of time and preparation to wind the warp and set up everything on the loom. But I think she’s going to get back into it soon, and I’m going to try my best, too. Maybe there will be woven goodies in McCord Works from both of us soon.

It will break your heart every time. Now, it’s perfectly wonderful to use inexpensive yarn, or discounted yarn. But don’t use cheap yarn. I love this sweater. It’s an Adrienne Vittadini pattern, with 3/4 length sleeves, a look I’ve really gone for recently. I loved the yarn when I saw it. A milk chocolate brown with a little purple in it. Cotton. It looked a little pilly, and that tickled the back of my brain, but I loooooved the color!

This yarn sucks. It pills all over, all the time. I’m going to have to remake the sweater someday, and use this for a cat bed or something. Grrr!

So there’s really not that many good crochet sweater patterns. And I was really grooving on making sweaters. I taught my college roommate to crochet. (I don’t think she appreciated making a 6-foot-long chain stitch.) She picked it up annoyingly quickly, and then went on to teach herself how to knit. And then she taught me how to knit.

Seeing as how I live in Texas, I mostly knit with cotton yarn. I learned on cotton, so the relative inelasticity of it has never been a problem for me. I mostly knit sweaters, from tank tops to the full wool pullover. I’m not generally interested in socks, but I have made a couple pairs of kilt hose. But kilt hose are more than socks; they’re meant to be seen and admired! I have also done some felting, and the last few pieces have even been on purpose. (Sigh.) I had a big stash of this cotton/linen/wool blend that really should not have felted, and it took me several projects to just give up and use it for deliberately felted projects.

I primarily knit for myself. When people ask me to knit them a sweater, I grit my teeth and offer to teach them to knit. I do make stuff for other people, but not on request. I tend to knit textures and avoid color work. Maybe I’m still scarred from that argyle vest. I don’t like variegated yarn, because it inevitably turns into a pattern of some kind, and then gets all funky when you decrease for the sleeves. But I love tweedy yarns where you’ve got the same color combination from end to end. My current project is a sweater with blue-and-white flecked cotton yarn. You can see the purl side here in the background. In fact, all the backgrounds in my etsy store are things I’ve knitted, crocheted or woven.

I have a love/hate relationship with this little nautical design. I absolutely adore how it looks. It’s cute as can be, and it’s actually a coaster pattern from the 1950s. But it is a b—- to crochet, it’s so extremely tiny. And it’s another b—- to block. 24 pins within about an inch diameter. But it’s so cuuuuute! I crocheted a pair of these tonight. The jewelry part will come later.

Hmm, I need to decide on a profanity policy, because I sure wanted to use a couple of PG-13 words…

Grandma (father’s mother) taught me to crochet when I was 8 years old. First she tried to teach me to knit, but little control freak that I was, I got the yarn so tight on the needles I couldn’t maneuver them. So we went for crochet. First project: a chain stitch 6 feet long. So far, I bet my story sounds awfully familiar. Doesn’t everybody start out with an insanely long chain stitch, and trouble getting the hang of the yarn? Anyway, that was followed by a few circles and ovals, which upon reflection, seems a little odd. But after that, good old granny squares.

Grandma whittled me a crochet hook, about a size J. I still have it. It’s lovely and perfectly proportioned. I don’t think she ever used anything except worsted weight acrylic yarn. She stuck to afghans and other home decor, and footies. Tightly crocheted acrylic footies that kept your feet warm, but trapped the sweat so that your feet broke out in a rash. For the longest time, I thought I was allergic to wool, but as it turns out, I simply learned about the pros and cons of synthetic fibers. But Red Heart is great for afghans! I made lots of ‘em. Warm and washable.

Grandmother (mother’s mother) and Nanny (mother’s father’s mother) also crocheted, and I have a number of doilies as well as a lovely tablecloth that Nanny made. It’s in fine shape, very brown, though it probably started as ecru. I am also lucky enough to have a couple of quilts made by Grandmary (mother’s mother’s mother).

In high school, I got tired of two-dimensional projects and tackled my first sweater. Argyle vest in sport weight acrylic. Intarsia, with bobbins. The main color was butterscotch, with rust and brown. I had no taste. But the technique was good, at least. I got better at sweaters. I learned how to fake ribbing really nicely.* I made some pretty tops that I still have. But there are only a handful of really good crochet sweater designs, and I had made them all. I learned how to knit right at the end of college, but that’s for a different post.

I don’t remember when I started getting into doilies myself. But that’s the only crochet I do now. And I’ve gotten pretty silly over the scale. Most of the stuff I do is size 100 crochet thread (slightly finer than tatting thread) and a #13 steel hook. If you go over to my links on the right, you can see some samples. I’m collecting patterns from the last 50 years and older, and I love it when I can find ones that work with the sterling hoops. I like to crochet tight, and block to geometrical precision. I guess the little control freak is still here!

*Crochet ribbing is done sideways, relative to knit ribbing. Slip stitch in the back loop to the end of the row, turn, repeat. Most patterns will have you single crochet in the back loop, but slip stitch looks and behaves almost as well as knit ribbing. It takes forever, but it’s worth it.

Update: Here’s the pattern for the argyle vest.

I’m actually starting a blog. Me. Weird. Expect nothing of substance until I get this looking like I want it to look. I’m a graphic artist by trade.