Crochet Break: Size Matters

 Taking a break from the info seshes on women’s health to talk a little bit about crochet. Which, other than sleep and research, is how I spend most of my days until my surgery on Friday.

Lately, I started reflecting on the finer points of crochet like gauge, hook and yarn size. When you’re just starting out, these are things that tend to get jumped over and it’s true enough that they actually don’t matter for a great deal of projects… but are pretty integral on many others. I wouldn’t say that gauge is always important for fashion unless fit is a strict requirement. You typically don’t have to obsess about tension once experienced because it doesn’t matter as much as trusting the hook and the combination of hook size and yarn thickness or type.

Yarn type is a subject I could fill several posts with alone so I’m not covering it here; instead, I wanted to cover what I have really enjoyed doing as of lately; doing the same pattern with different hook and yarn sizes. Done correctly and with some knowledge of how and where to adjust the pattern (this is mostly in the number of rows, generally where there is a static repeat), you can really enjoy the results.

In this case, since I have most sizes of hook, it comes down to selecting different yarns. I used a thin bamboo silk thread (several ply like a yarn), ombré roving yarn (like Red Heart Unforgettable) with a milk cotton solid, and a chenille/velvet yarn I snagged on AliExpress (which is tough to work with for a beginner because plush yarn is deceptive in strength and thickness). These became my small, medium and large dragons. 

Picking the hook is actually fairly simple in this case; most yarns are best done with about 5 hook sizes. If the label itself has a recommendation, it’s that plus the two sizes above and below. So if the label says F hook, then D-H will likely be the optimal range. If it doesn’t say, sometimes you know by experience. Generally, you don’t want a hook that doesn’t fit the entire width of the yarn nor leave huge gaps in the work (unless that’s desired, but even then, a too-large hook will snag and work clumsily so you’re often better off making taller stitches or longer chains with a smaller hook). In this case, I used my smallest Clover Amour hook for the smallest yarn (B), an F for the medium range one, and a J for the largest, using the actual smallest, medium, and largest hook in the set. I did start with an L hook for the largest  but I could tell right away it was way too happy for this yarn and just one size down wouldn’t be quite enough.

So, if you’ve gotten through the lingo and I haven’t lost you, enjoy the results of this little experiment. And hop over to Etsy and snag the dragon crochet pattern if you have to try it yourself.

Can You Paint With All the Colors of the Yarn?

I did mention before that I was on a quest to find cheap, soft, strong yarn in many, many colors to begin making more amigurumi with. This took me to some interesting yarn choices on AliExpress. I'd bought some milk cotton from there in a pinch and ended up making some wonderfully soft headbands with them. One of the reasons I don't actually wear many crocheted hats or headbands is because even the softest yarns tended to irritate my forehead. Even if they were soft, they weren't breathable or caused more sweat than they could soak up.

I'm not a masochist for fashion so it's always comfort first.

A decent yarn of all those requirements was usually an expensive ask, despite how very cheap it is to make. My other option was to order from a Turkish company called ICE, which has beautiful quality yarns... But also came with a shipping cost of no less than $45, so unless you want to buy in serious bulk, it's not the best choice. And I did order bulk from them. For a little over 100 dollars, I bought a ricidulous amount and selection of yarn, averaging out to no more than $1 for every 50g ball.

It felt a bit like spoiling myself but it wasn't the kind of purchase I could make often. Where could I get a deal like for smaller volume?

Well, I answered that already so the suspense is gone, but yes, you can order a variety of wound fibers for an amazing price at AliExpress... If you don't mind the 3-5 week wait on average. Which I don't. In fact, I'm quite willing to wait to avoid retail mark-ups. Now, milk cotton sits at a little over a buck per 50g ball but even higher quality fibers like alpaca, silk, cashmere, and bamboo blends tend to hang around the 3-5 dollar per 50g ball range. Blends, of course, but I tend to prefer blends since they are varying percentages of other materials like merino wool (one of the few sheep wools I'm not sensitive to) or angora that actually provide more stable woven strands that make up for another fiber's weaknesses. Some luxury materials like cashmere tend to shed or cling to itself so stabilizing it with silk or bamboo, a much sturdier fiber, is a plus.

I'm going to break off topic for just a paragraph to inform here, but sheep's wool allergies/sensitivities  are not created equal. For a long time, I believed all animal wool was the culprit but in my case, only poorly processed wools that have high levels of lanolin were the issue. I'm able to work with merino because it is often properly processed. For those that believe that wool is the irritant, most of us are actually triggered either by animal dander or, in sheep's wool, it's the lanolin. Just like we secrete levels of sebum to regulate our skin, sheep secrete this as one of their natural defenses. Just like how humans can overproduce or underproduce sebum, sheep wool can contain levels that are irritants to us as well. Some wools are bleached in processing before they are dyed (if they are dyed, at that) so they are more prone to cause irritation. I myself have sebaceous dermatitis, an overproduction on my scalp, and not only can it make my skin itchy and flaky but even cause scabbing and bleeding if untreated. So of course, trying to cut corners on animal yarn processing means ending up with a 'cheap' product. Though removing wool from a sheep is kind to them, poorly processed yarn can in turn be unkind to sensitive human skin.

One of the reasons I like milk cotton is that it's a very renewable natural crop, definitely cruelty free no matter the process. It's very gentle on skin, both working with it and to be worn later...

Buuuut... Going back to the quest for a rainbow of yarn, I believe I've fulfilled that requirements, even nabbing those vibrant pinks, oranges and whites that I normally don't seek out. However, I wanted to challenge myself to make character plushies that DO utilize those colors. I don't enjoy that I'm a sort of color prude, a bit of a quirk that I won't let limit me as an artist. I find that preferences and hang-ups simply come from lack of good experiences, and that challenging those perceptions often means being able to change them and even embrace new attitudes that improve you. Aversions are hard to correct, but at times, the things we avoid are only minor annoyances or hesitations, something with room to be challenged. For me to actively avoid color choices has always been a discredit to what potential exists in reaching those who do gravitate towards them. What positive energy can exist by appealing to someone else's spectrums? Can I deal with my annoyances now to open my eyes to the response of positive energy that comes later?

And yes, I can. 

I wasn't looking to subliminally add a race parallel here, but I did notice it as I built. Literally, I'm exactly talking about my silly individual aversion to orange, pink and bright white being a problem. But sure, it's also silly for people to weigh skin color with so much finality. But you know, sometimes the shoe fits other feet. Life is no Cinderella story where no one else in the kingdom has the same tiny feet. Or make us wonder if he might've ended up with an 8-old-boy if he'd never found her.

Those stories are always creepier the more you analyzed them though, yeah? But face value is never where the juicier stories are at anyway.

Oh, I could tell you quite a yarn, but I just broke so many pun-haters' backs with that one...