Overcoming Stitches and Fat Fingers

The photograph is of my grandmother (Janice) with my twins when they were six months old. This is the woman who has inspired me to work so hard so that I can make things with my hands. My horribly clumsy hands. I know that I had a blog earlier this week that says we learn from failure, and should be proud of it, but I’ve gotta say, I don’t want to fail. So I refused and put in more time than indicated by the Digital Literacy class for which I am learning this passion based learning project.

Learning to crochet hasn’t been easy. I’m basically just working on the stitches I’ve learned from Crocheting for Dummies. There aren’t many that I’ve learned when compared to the dozens of stitches there are.  I thought it would be easier to make a chain out of yarn than it is. This is what took me the longest to learn, well specifically the slipknot. I accomplished this, and then I could move on, and so I did, I next attempted the single stitch. I thought that it would be easy once I had getting the chain down, but this “simple stitch” as they called it made my fat fingers very angry.  This is three rows of a single stitch. It’s what they called a “basic stitch” It took me an hour to get this one down. Once I did, however, the other stitches I worked with were easy. I think that getting the basics down is important, and I know for a fact that I wouldn’t be able to move on to the next step without mastering this one.

 This is a half double stitch. I know, that name is confusing. It’s basically between a single stitch and a double stitch. It was fairly simple once I got the single stitch down. This is three rows of the half double stitch.

 Here are the other three stitches I worked with from top left to bottom, the double stitch, the triple stitch, and the double triple stitch. It was hard to figure out how to make the yarn do what I wanted it to, but thankfully I figured it out. Now I can make something while, at the same time, learning other stitches, more difficult stitches. These stitches are used to make blankets and scarves, so I think I should start small. So next week, I will have at least one scarf done, hopefully I’ll have one for each of my children. Of course, I don’t think I’ll be as good as my cousin’s wife for a long while. She’s actually amazing. This mermaid outfit was made by Rebecca, my cousin’s wife for Lillian, our youngest. This is her newborn picture. Just the power of yarn, I guess. I can guarantee she doesn’t have fat fingers.

  Photo courtesy of Developing Memories Photography of North Platte, Nebraska