2020 Fashion on the Ration Challenge

Laura_Elsewhere

@PipneyJane, thankyou! I first touched a crochet hook about four years ago, and it's been a revelation, really... I had never bothered to learn because I had only seen big chunky granny-squares in turquoise and nappy-brown acrylic....! 

"On crochet, the difference in “stitches” is really just a matter of how many times you wrap the yarn around your hook.  I never remember, so a good glossary is vital."
Yes, and the added problem that UK and US terminology uses *the same words for different things* - one uses 'double' to mean how many times the yarn is wrapped round and the other uses 'double' to describe how many pulling-through movements you make... the same with triple and treble, argh. Thus a double in one is a treble in the other and vice versa... 

I love the charted diagrams used by pretty well all of the non-Anglophone world from Korea and Japan, across Russia, through most of Europe... it's a long line with a diagonal line across meaning wrap the yarn once, or two diagonal lines meaning wrap the yarn twice, etc. SO much easier!!! 

PipneyJane

@Laura_Elsewhere - I have never made a Granny Square.  The closest I’ve got is The Granny Square Tea Cozy  I’m still not certain how you construct a Granny Square.

The only crochet charts that I’ve seen were in Interweave Crochet. I hadn’t realised the association between lines across and wraps around your hook.  That’s clever!  Somewhere in this house is an unfinished crocheted shrug from Interweave Crochet, that I started in 2012.  It only gets worked on during hot summer days when it’s too hot and my fingers too swollen to knit.  That was the first - and only - crocheted item I’ve made that had a chart.

- Pip

Laura_Elsewhere

I think a Granny Square is just the generic name for all those crochet things made by starting in the middle and ending up with a square on the outside edge - like my kitchen cloths for 2021!  

But what put me off crochet for many years was the 1970s craze for making granny-squares into clothing... 

Like this...

PipneyJane

Argh!!!  My eyes!  My eyes!! 

Seriously, I hope the early 1970’s fashions are never revived and not just because they don’t suit me.  There are some decades that should just stay buried.

- Pip

thriftwizard

Hahaha! I was there... my beloved sister-in-law, who taught me to crochet when I was 10, back in the very late 60s, is still crocheting & wearing granny squares to this day. On her, slender creature that she still is (at 72 now!) it looks good. On me, it looks like an overstuffed mobile cushion. Ah well! It was fun at the time... and I do admit to a huge fondness for Amanda Perkins' (Queenieamanda on Ravelry, https://www.amandasperkinscrochetblankets.com/ )  motifs & patterns, which are not so very different to Granny Squares!

I'm also a huge fan of the international crochet notation; it's very straightforward once you've got the hang of it.

MrsCD

Laura, your crochet is so fine, it's absolutely gorgeous!
I was taught by my grandma and I still have a purple and black granny square scarf that I made in the 70's. I agree about granny square clothes though. They were hideous! Might have just been the patterns and colourway. There's an Australian lady called Jenny King who teaches how to make clothes based on grannies, and they are so much nicer.

Laura_Elsewhere

@MrsCD I think you're spot-on - it's the patterns and colours, I think.

I mean, this is a granny square - literally. Just not in chunky nappy-brown acrylic with jarring acid-turquoise edging...

My first-ever design I just added some extra stitches in the middle of each side to make the wavy shape, but it is otherwise a classic granny square... I keep a little bottle of oil by my bedside for trying to keep my wretched psoriatic nails in some kind of condition, and it always left marks and sploggles, so I made a little mat for it to stand on  

Mrs_Salad_Dodger

That is so pretty, Laura

PipneyJane

That is lovely.

maddiemay

Your crochet is lovely Laura. I did go to classes about 10 years ago, but never really tried to do much afterwards, somewhere in the UFOs is a striped scarf (unfinished of course) with the stripes running long the long edge, sadly I did not do the corners properly so they are a bit rounded rather than square, can't press it out  as it is made from novelty yarns not wool.
I can't hold the hook properly (dexterity problems), a friend offered to show me the stitches again, but seemed to think that unless I did it properly it would not work!