Stringer and I used to like to be able to tell each other:

HYHIABC !!!

and this stood for

Haven’t you heard ? – it’s all been changed !!!

It was a favourite exchange when we were away on location together, as script pages in varying colours were being issued each evening, together with revised shooting schedules. Oh, we were an intolerant pair .. [grin]

Today I utter this unpronounceable “acronym” with regard to my temperature blanket. And when I say “all”, you’d better believe it.

1. 1. It’s not going to be a blanket; and I think it’s going to be a kind of modern art wall hanging, once mounted
   2. It’s being crocheted in sc*; and I’m happy to say that it looks wonderfully even and pretty damned impressive she said ever so modestly
   3. It no longer begins on 1st July but on 1st June: this is so that I can make four groups of the three months of each season (that the BoM agrees really should start on the 1st of the relevant month, not the 21st, Downunder). I’m thinking something of this nature:
      

So anyone who has the faintest memory of my last posting on this topic will understand that I had to frog everything I’d done – the whole of July – and start again. Strangely enough, that kind of thing doesn’t worry me !

There you go: Winter in Geelong consisted of four colours – with a fifth appearing just the once, when our lowest minimum fell below zero ! (see if you can pick it) – and they are, from coldest to least cold, Delphinium, Cobalt, Periwinkle and Alaska Sky .. a sort of lilac, dark blue, blue and pale blue.

If you look at it sideways –

you get an idea of how the four seasons might look, placed as my ‘sketch’ above.

Oh yes: I begin with plain white, and use it also to separate the months.

Any comments ?

 

*a stitch called, simply, ‘single crochet’

I came across some lovely stuff I had bought because I liked the look of it. But it was $16 a skein, so I bought only 2 skeins and used my lovely Stanwood things to wind ’em into balls. And then I rissoled the bits of paper left over; so I have NO IDEA what this stuff is – other than that it’s cotton, and thinner – or maybe more tightly woven ? – than normal, 4-ply cotton. Its colourway is an absolute knockout !!

Listening to yet a another crime novel I did nothing more than single crochet it into a scarf, and I was RAPT in it. I put it down the back of the green chair when I finished it last night, ready for photographing (I use the word loosely) in the morning. When I remembered it ..

someone else had decided there was a better use for the scarf.

Had some toast and 40% less salt Vegemite, and generally faffed about for a good long time; but Boodie didn’t get off, no sir ! So ..

here’s front shot showing the over-all effect of the colourway; and here

is a closeup of it, showing how effective ordinary single crochet can be. And how about those straight sides, eh ?!    😀

Not sure at all why the yarn appeals so much: I’m not a purple person (dunno if I’ve ever heard a Prince song !). But I just love it.

Will add it to the Minerva scarf for my sister.

This one comes thanks to a KAL by Michele Lee Bernstein: it’s her Minerva entrelac scarf or cowl. I’ve been making Tunisian crochet entrelac for a looong time; but have been attracted by the 3D aspect of the knitted version many times. I posted about starting this, and then it went into hibernation. (How I wish I could !)

I have made it as a present for my eldest sister, who lives in Paris (some may even recall the complete stuff-up I created when last trying to post her a knitted thingy: I put her address as no. 6 instead of no. 7, and all hell broke loose. It eventually turned up back here, months later !); and this time it will be addressed correctly. How it will get posted I know not: we’re back under stage 3 restrictions, which include not going anywhere unless it’s absolutely necessary ..

I truly and honestly do not comprehend the hype about Noro Silk Garden. It’s wound infuriatingly (huge swathes fall off the ball if you move it the wrong way); it’s not soft on the hands; it doesn’t respond to having an invisible knot tied (in order to match colours) .. What’s its secret for being permanently up there in the top however many ???

Oh, never mind; as long as it looks OK. I think my sister will like this colourway.   🙂

Last night I was able – thanks to BOM’s always showing each day’s lowest temperature before the day has ended – to finalise July as the first month of my temperature blanket. I planned it in Excel for two reasons:

1. 1. there IS one calculation column within it;  and
   2. it’s much quicker to tabulate input and move it around in Excel than it is in Word.

I have wasted literally hours trying to solve the problem of linking to an Excel spreadsheet that one has uploaded to one’s Media Library. Every time it appears to be fine until clicking on the link; and then one is told the file is corrupted. So, after a whole big lot of swearing and grinding my teeth, I can only insert part of the Excel page as a screengrab:

I had decided I’d use

• • Winter solstice = lowest temp.s
  • Spring equinox = mean temp.s
  • Summer solstice = highest temp.s
  • Autumn equinox = mean temp.s

but I was wrong. If you check the sole calculated column within the document – and here I’m hoping you can see it, in all its truncated glory – that are the mean temp.s, and observe the colours each day’s entry produces, you’ll see how extremely boring they are. I mean, two colours only – Alaska Sky and Periwinkle – with a single day of Cobalt (off the bottom) ! No way will I risk that lack of differentiation in my “blanket” !  So it’s going to be the first two low and the second two high. More colours !   🙂

Now to take a couple of terrible photos. Wait one ..

 

 

 

So the completed .. thing will be 12 times that large. I’m going to have to stop deleting posts older that six months.   

Regarding my mention of (ACK !) knots .. At the beginning of this project, I must have tried about ten different stitches, each time determined that THIS WILL BE THE ONE ! For at least nine different reasons, I changed my mind. Hence knots. At least they’re invisible knots ! (Should you check that link, first mute your machine then go to about 1’28” to get to the useful stuff.)

There will be another 11 posts like this one.

I fervently hope ..

You may/may not recall my whingeing how no pattern fits me on account of my distinct pear-shape, yes ? (or no ?) – in this post ..

So I finally got ’round to it and finished off my version of the Fiber Spider’s double-hexagon pattern for a granny-stitch cardi, complete with said reverse gussets. These, I think you won’t have difficulty in believing, are NOT in his pattern !

Here you can view the gussets in all their weird glory:

(Well, you try crocheting short rows !)

I’m considering trying to get hold of those little double grab thingies to attach: yes or no ?

And I fear my total lack of photographic ability is once more at the fore with the photo hereunder:

I have NO IDEA how to take a selfie with my phone. Yesyes, I know you can see that for yourselves: shut up !

The cardi actually goes the whole way ’round my (_|_) and could be done up, had it any buttons (or little double grab thingies). Wonders will never cease !

[grin]

This is pretty bloody important. Not sure why this article needed to be written: I thought masks were already compulsory in both Melbourne and Sydney ..

To see testing on masks done in a way even the loathesome De Santis, Governor of Florida, could understand, watch this:

Here is less than three weeks of my temperature blanket.

I mean in future only to post a photo at the end of each month; but I simply have to show you this because I haven’t found this variation on Tunisian crochet anywhere on the Web.

I offer a small prize to s/he who can find this stitch on the Web.

Far as I’m concerned, its name is Funnycomb Stitch. Tunisian crocheters will realize that it’s the alternative to Honeycomb Stitch.  [grin]

I discovered this enticing idea through an on-line American woman whose posts I’d first found a long time ago, when she was just a really keen and really able crocheting person. Now she’s a business, and doing so well as to have a DreamBox !! Sighh ..

It was through Toni that I learned of a crocheting project (although it could be knitted, I haven’t found a single example) that takes a year. Exactly.

It’s like this: you take the highest temperature your town/city experiences and the lowest, and divide that range into small groups – mine is in groups of 3°; then you allocate to every group a colour.  My total of colours is 14 (I think, without checking). You choose your starting date – it can be as noteworthy as January 1st or as insignificant as May 23rd – and off you go.

Get it ?

You’re crocheting a blanket comprising a record (within 3° or whatever) of the temperatures of where you live, over a whole year, one day at a time.

Here‘s a perfect example, from 2016.

The woman who made that one has chosen an interesting group of colours, and you can imagine how other people’s blankets would be completely different. Hers was celebrated by our Bureau of Meteorology (known all over Oz as BOM); whereas mine also utilizes the BOM range, but interpreted differently:

There’s the colour range that BOM uses on its weather maps; but I don’t see, e.g., exactly the same colours in her blanket.

So: you observe that I’m doing a 1st July – 30th June year, and that so far only three of the colours are in play.

All I’ve been able to do to date is the very first row, which is a divider that will occur between every month: I don’t yet have the relevant colours in hand. My own fault: I meant to use the mean temperatures until I discovered through doing the sums that I was going to have a very repetitive colourway. So I decided instead to do what I hope can be read below the dark blue bit on the top left – Autumn equinox and Winter solstice the lowest and Spring equinox and Summer solstice the highest. Having purchased the colours for the mean temperatures, that left me without any for the lowest; but they’re now ordered – and posted ! – from Tassie, and will reach me some time this week.

Having seen the size of the blanket the BOM employee made, I’m going to copy Toni and do mine in five*# panels: that way it becomes a controllable and even usable object ! And I will use Tunisian crochet, too (won’t need a cable about 5m long if it’s in panels); but maybe not TSS .. Hmmm ..

This is very definitely a project that requires quite a number of posts. Stand by, anyone who likes the sound of this !

 

*I lied. It’s going to be seven panels.

#No I didn’t: five panels it is.

 

I am more than merely the “big” that my beloved second-eldest sister was wont to tell me – I am fat. Have been for nearly all my life – apart from those times when the need not to be over-rode everything else; but they were short-lived. I am a distinct A shape; I can often wear tops that are 3 sizes smaller than my pants – and it is always pants, for I never wear skirts (if you’d inherited my mother’s ankles, you wouldn’t either !)

So here I am, trying to make myself garments because I so detest shopping for them that 95% of my ‘wardrobe’ is roughly 17-22 years old – going back to when Chic was with me and would drag me off to buy some new gear. Then, I was unenthusiastic about it: now, it fills me with fear and loathing.

Consider this poor crocheting person: her shoulders are nothing like a swimmer’s, so there are many patterns I could use that fitted me from the top down to the waist. Thereafter they would fly apart and become useless in terms of protecting me from cold; and certainly any kind of button of toggle would be screaming in a tiny voice (like Boodie’s) across the vast tundra of my tum to its matching thingy on the other side – which would be screaming back “WHAAAT ?” – and never the twain would meet. Sighh ..

Now, were I clever enough to find a pattern that fitted my arse, its shoulders would be falling off mine, and the rest of its top half would be hanging in a wrinkly muddle almost down to my midriff.

What to do ?

There ! – I added an image, anyway. Reams of text are off-putting.

I had reached farther than midway point on one of those hexagonal granny-stitch cardigans by following instructional videos from the dearest bloke who works very hard to be as helpful as possible (and he is !) – the point where the tops of the inverted Ls have been joined and they have been crocheted together, and I tried it on. Same old same old. Of course.

So: am I going to frog it all – approx. 6 balls of Stylecraft Special DK, which is a shitload of wool – because whereas my instructor’s hexagons required 18 rows, mine required 24 – in a rage ?

I am not.

I am going to invent how to add an inverted V of short rows – yesyes, I do realize it won’t be in granny stitch ! – to each front edge. I shall make it as fancy as I can; but short rows’ being hitherto unknown to me I am not sanguine about the ‘fancy’ part. The gussets (sort of) will probably end up as garter stitch. But if they can achieve two straight edges that will meet, I shall be ecstatic, regardless of their total unlikeness to the rest of the cardi.

I shall post a photo or two along the way. You are at liberty to shudder and turn your eyes away ..