Types of Crafters

I was thinking today about how there are 3 types of crafters: product crafters, process crafters, and planning crafters.

Product crafters work towards an end goal of having a completed item. Sometimes they prefer small blocks that can be joined together because they get to be “done” lots of things before being done the big project. Immediate gratification is required.

My pile of squares that gives me immediate gratification.

Process crafters are in it for the long haul. They are pleased to have finished items as well, but it’s more about trying new stitches or keeping their hands busy.

Perhaps this one really requires two categories: process crafters who like repetition (think about dc blankets), and process crafters who like to explore (try this stitch, play with this new tool, figure out something new even if there is no finished product from it).

This blanket is taking a long time, but the process is therapy 😍

Planning crafters are those with too many patterns, too much yarn, too many wips, etc. They see potential projects everywhere but never seem to finish anything. Their creativity has filled up storage bins, shelves, closets, and entire rooms.

My unorganized yarn / project stack.

I think I have been all three at some point. Depending on what stage of life I am in. And I think I prefer to have some projects in each category so I choose what to work on based on my mood. 🤣

What about you? Can you think of other “types”? I just made these up based on what I know about myself and other crafters.

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Mesmur Avenue

I don’t think anyone enjoys the process of moving. The only thing I like is that it means we are no longer living in that apartment! (And I can get back to pattern making; new pattern details at the end of this post!)

We were very thankful to have a warm place to live these last 5 months but I really did not enjoy that place.

I like people who are real and honest without being overly dramatic. So, that is about all I want to say about that tiny apartment, with a terrible kitchen, loud and scary upstairs neighbors, moody and rude administration, with a cockroaches and bed bugs scare (thankfully, we found neither in our apartment).

We are now renting my brother-in-law’s house! They built a new one and we are happy to be in their old place.

My 3 kids, enjoying our first meal in the new place: pizza!

My kids are amazing, as always, and they are handling the chaos well. Plus, they really like the ability to get some space away from each other. Three floors to explore compared to the tiny basement suite!

I have definitely missed my yarn and hooks. I went at least 4 days without touching my crafts! The other night I grabbed my tunisian hooks and some cotton yarn and started making a washcloth. A new house needs a new cloth set.

The tunisian cable is about 10 times too long but a normal hook is about 2 inches too short lol

And a new house needs a new pattern! I present to you, Mesmur Avenue.

The wrong side will be striped when done using the overlay mosaic technique, and it will have this pattern (the 2nd picture) when done using the interlocking crochet technique.

I drew this pattern up right before we moved and finished the pattern-writing in the new house.

As usual, grab it on Etsy or Ravelry. Get an automatic 30% discount until 11:59 pm, February 27, 2021.

I prefer Ravelry (thank you to those who have asked!) but I publish on Etsy too because I have a wide customer base and I want it to be accessible to everyone.

And, to answer another frequently asked question: my patterns include written instructions for both the interlocking and overlay mosaic crochet techniques, plus a chart that can be used for both techniques. The charts do not have x’s to denote the dropped stitches for the mosaic, but ai do have a tutorial on YouTube that explains how to read my charts.

These tutorials, and more, are available on YouTube:

Thank you for allowing me to share my art with you all!

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Among Us – turning a hat into a character

So, if you live under a rock, you may not have seen any of these “Among Us” toys, hats, etc. I admit, it took me longer than most to figure out why everyone kept using the phrase “sus”.

My bestie asked me to make her son a stuffy and a hat.

I *mostly* followed a pattern I found online for the little amigurumi guy. I couldn’t get the eye… goggle… face thing? I don’t know what it is, but mine wasn’t working so I had to free hand it a bit.

There are lots of free patterns out there, make sure you do use a FREE one because the creators of Among Us have been clear about their wishes: read about that here.

So, here is my little guy:

See his little wolf ears? Special request. I did 3 chains in a magic circle, then 2 single crochets in each stitch around (6). I then did one more round of sc. Flatten and sew on.

The pattern I followed made weird goggles so I kind if squished and shaped them into something I liked better.

Then I made a hat. A basic beanie.

For the matching wolf ears I had to do a lot more than 3 rounds lol

For these big wolf ears I started with 4 single crochets in a magic circle. Increase all the way around (that means put 2 sc in each stitch).

I didn’t join the rows, I was just working in rounds, so make sure you grab a stitch marker!

3rd round: repeat *sc, inc* (12)

4: repeat *2 sc, inc* (16)

5: repeat *inc, 3 sc* (20) (I moved the increase to avoid a spiral line)

6: repeat *4 sc, inc* (24)

7: repeat * 2 sc, inc, inc, 8 sc* (26)

8: repeat *inc, 12 sc* (28)

9 sc around. Cut and tie off. Leave a long tail for sewing.

Flatten the cone into an ear. Make sure you curve it strongly. Use stitch markers to place both ears on the hat before sewing.

You want them to match up! And you don’t want to have to cut your work off and redo it.

The goggle part on the hat is a 2D item instead of 3D like on the little amigurumi.

To make an oval:

Chain 17, sc in 2nd from hook and across (16).

Don’t turn your work, sc in each stitch along the bottom of your work (+ 16, 32 for this round).

Round 3: increase (put 2 sc in the same stitch), sc x14, inc in both of the next 2 stitches, sc 14, inc.

Round 4: inc, inc, sc x 14, inc x 3, sc 14, inc. Cut and tie off, leave a long tail for sewing.

Give it a try!

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September Summary

August was pretty busy, September didn’t slow down.

September 1st started my 3rd CAL (Crochet-A-Long)! The Abstract Queen is a beautiful, big queen-size blanket that uses motifs from my small abstract squares. This was my first CAL to be offered in both techniques: LFM and Mosaic.

You can find the Abstract Queen on Ravelry and Etsy and also for free, here on the blog.

Don’t forget to create your project on ravelry (with at least one picture) to enter the weekly draw!

Quite a few people have asked about making the Abstract Queen smaller – and there’s no easy way to do that. Many mosaic patterns out there are just repeats of 8 or 12 or some small number like that but this was drawn up more like a single image (like the Speedy Train). You can cut the end off if you want, but it wasn’t designed for that.

I did draw up a smaller blanket using the same abstract themes and I call it the Abstract Princess. You can get that pattern on Ravelry and Etsy.

My 33rd birthday meant a sale for you: for a few days everything was 33% off and a lot of you grabbed some new patterns! I can’t wait to see all your new projects!

Speaking of new projects… I really meant to just focus on getting the mosaic instructions for the patterns I already have. I really didn’t plan on creating new patterns. But, then my husband lost his job and I wanted the instant gratification that comes from a new pattern (or two). 🤣

All of my new patterns come with interlocking and mosaic instructions. And I publish them to Ravelry and Etsy. These are the new ones this month:

I did also manage to update these patterns to include the mosaic instructions (the interlocking patterns are still there, don’t worry!). This is the Ravelry list and these were added to my MOSAIC BUNDLE:

Then I updated these patterns on Etsy and I learned that there is no easy way to get updated patterns to my customers on Etsy! 😱 So, that really disappoints me and I don’t know what to do to fix that.

If you have purchased on Etsy and you want an update please send me a message asking for the pattern, including your email address!

October is sure to be just as busy! We have moved into a small apartment temporarily while my husband looks for a job. Depending on where he gets a job, we may be doing another big move right away here. I am sure the second move will go smoother because of all the packing and unpacking practice we have now lol. Thanks for sticking with me through this big transition!

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August Summary

I like the monthly summary because it is hard for me to remember what happened 30 days ago. Lol

Besides being very busy in the household (3 birthdays, our anniversary, listed our house for sale, conditonally sold it and bought another in 5 days) I have also been quite busy with my computer work for these crochet patterns.

The Birthday Cupcake pattern was on sale all month. The Preemie Love Blanket was on sale all month. Then it was free for 3 days as part of a promotion with Sunflower Cottage Crochet.

I published 6 new patterns on Ravelry (with LFM and Mosaic instructions of course):

I published these ones on Etsy (LFM and Mosaic):

I published these ones on this blog (free!) (some were previously published on Ravelry, at least 5 were never seen anywhere before) and they can also be found in my Facebook group files:

I also created a Buzz Lightyear sweater for my son. I wrote about it on the blog, you can decide if it counts as a pattern.

And I crocheted the Heart Levels Banner and some Lightning Squiggle pieces to make my purple Preemie Love blanket larger for a friend to use as a lapghan.

I added these videos to my YouTube channel:

I updated these “old” patterns to include mosaic instructions:

Wow, I feel exhausted just looking at that list. September might be slower?I will only have the start of the Abstract Queen CAL, more patterns to update with mosaic instructions, my birthday, and moving (we should be taking possession mid September if all the ducks fall into line).

Thank you for coming on this journey with me!

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Preemie Love Blanket

I’m new to designing, new to having a blog, new to this world of turning my hobby into a business. It seems like a good idea to team up with others who are more established.

This pattern was created in response to a challenge from Sunflower Cottage Crochet to create a pattern suitable for a donation to a NICU or other preemie charity. They will be featuring one pattern a day from different designers for the month of August, 2020. And we will all be using the hashtag #preemiecrochetchallenge2020 so you can find the projects easily! Don’t forget to tag your works too!

The challenge is that each free download (see below for the link) will be considered a pledge to make that pattern and donate it by the end of November (which is Preemie Awareness Month). I don’t have a nearby NICU centre (since I live in the middle of nowhere, Saskatchewan), but I do have a new baby niece!

I will likely have to make this blanket again because I have 3 children and 2 blankets – not a good ratio!

This pattern holds a special place in my heart because my first baby was preemie. She was born at 36 weeks – which is considered a late premature. Some babies are fine at this point, others can still have a lot of problems. After a 30-hour labour, my little 5 lb 13 oz girl was born. We stayed in the hospital for 5 days because baby Alice needed to stay in the warming isolette for a day or two (the details are a bit fuzzy to be honest).

The first few months at home were stressful. She hard a hard time eating. She always wanted to sleep. She dropped down to 5 lbs 3 oz and was in the 6th percentile for weight and the doctor considered diagnosing her “failure to thrive”.

Somehow we made it through. And I have a proud-mama-picture of her at 3 months old, FINALLY over 8 lbs! However, shortly after that, we discovered that the heart murmur she had since birth was not benign. She would need surgery.

A 7 months old, my baby girl underwent a balloon valvuloplasty to correct the pulmonary stenosis. One sentence doesn’t describe the stress.

But everything went smoothly. Every few years they check on her heart and so far, so good. She’s growing like a weed (do they say that about kids everywhere, or only here in Saskatchewan?) and she’s a sweet, kind, caring 5 year old now (well, she’ll be 6 in three weeks).

But, back to the crochet!

I could tell you a completely different story about the baby in this picture, but I’ll save that for another time. She’s my 3rd and she’s just as sweet as her sister and brother.

I crocheted this blanket using both the techniques I make my patterns for. The orange and blue one (with the thick blue envelope border) is mosaic. The colors seem more accurate in the picture with my baby versus the picture with the older kids holding the blankets but either way, you get the point, you can see the hearts and the word “love” and it’s soft and a good size.

The purple-on-purple blanket is interlocking crochet. It’s slightly smaller because there’s no extra border. This technique also uses *slightly* less yarn.

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I’m also MUCH faster at crocheting using the interlocking technique. It is sort of difficult for me to constantly be using the front loop or back loop of a stitch. Based on what they show in the magazines, mosaic seems to be the more popular choice. But I will definitely be sticking with the interlocking technique!

Another thing to note is that I used a medium (4) weight yarn but you could easily use a different yarn! When I use a baby or sport weight yarn I usually get about 6 stitches per inch which would make the finished blanket around 20″ (about 51 cm).

Many centers have restrictions on the size of blanket you can donate (example, it must be less than 30”). Make sure you do a gauge swatch if your finished piece needs to be a certain size.

You can buy this pattern on Etsy or Ravelry (it is on sale on Ravelry for the month of August – add it to your cart to see the automatic discount).

PROMOTION ENDED! For 3 DAYS ONLY (August 25 & 26 & 27, 2020) you will be able to download this pattern for free on Ravelry! The code “Preemie2020” is being used for every pattern in this promotion.

I will send a tally back to Sunflower Cottage Crochet and they will announce the numbers (downloads/pledges) on their pattern round-up post.

Go to Sunflower Cottage Crochet

I can’t wait to see everything you all create!

Personal update: 977 of you took advantage of the free promotion code! That is a lot of blankets! Wow! I did not expect so many! Great job everyone!

ashleebrotzell1 Comment

Mosaic Crochet Addition

I’ve included instructions for mosaic crochet in the last few patterns I’ve published. Everything I’ve published before then can be used for mosaic as well – if you can read the chart.

Chart reading is a very handy skill.

Not all charts can be instantly converted to mosaic or to interlocking or to whatever craft you’re using. But so many crafts use charts!

A chart drawn up for mosaic crochet generally can NOT be used for interlocking crochet. But any interlocking crochet chart CAN be used for mosaic crochet.

And technically you can do single-row (cut-and-tie) or two-row mosaic but if it is a picture-type-image it will be stretched if done in two-row style. The abstract designs are much more forgiving when it comes to that.

I do mention (very briefly) how to read a chart when doing mosaic crochet in my YouTube tutorial. *Updated to change terminology from f/b to dc/sc*

You’ll want to grab the PDF of the Mosaic Tutorial Hearts pattern from Ravelry or in my Facebook group (just like the interlocking pattern).

I would like to get more videos up but they take time. If you have watched my other videos you’ll hear me talk about my children, and about how I can only do the videos when they are quiet or when dad takes them outside for a walk or something.

I do a lot of the computer work for pattern-making on my phone while making the baby nap. I also waste a lot of time browsing pinterest or Instagram or Facebook 🤣

And now I get to add midnight blog writing to my repertoire. My 3 year old is having a hard time sleeping tonight. I’m sure that as soon as he falls asleep the baby will wake up.

Such is life.

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