by Ardeana Hamlin
of The Weekly Staff
If your idea of crocheting heaven is to have at your fingertips 365 (one for each day of the year) patterns for granny squares, “The Big Book of Granny Squares: 365 Crochet Motifs” by Tracey Lord is the book for you. While Tracey Lord gets top billing on the book, she was assisted by Lucy Adam, Katie Clammer, Lindsay Obermeyer, Pauline Richards, Deborah Smethurst and Lindey Tydeman. The fact that seven women pooled their crochet talents to produce the book had me “hooked from square one,” so to speak, pun intended.
Motif designs include, lace, textural, colorwork and three dimensional, and flowers, composite blocks, cables and bobbles.
Finished blocks are all approximately the same size so they can be mixed and matched to make afghans, curtains, shawls, throws or purses.
In her Introduction, Lord says the book is intended to be playful nature and she encourages crocheters to experiment with color, yarn types and block combinations.
Each block bears its own name — Romany, Barnacles, Aloha, Spanish Lace, Fans, Gypsy Wheel, Aegean and Floe, for example. And yes, there is even one called Traditional Granny Square.
Some of the squares are easy enough for beginners to tackle and others are challenging enough for experienced crocheters.
Depending on how they are used, the squares can conjure up romantic, traditional, futuristic, modern, artistic, garden and other sensibilities.
The book also contains plenty of information to help get the crocheting started. There is advice on choosing crochet hooks, choosing and buying yarn, choosing color combinations, a well illustrated stitch tutorials and an index listing all the squares by name.
Those who possess a large cache of odd balls of yarn will find this book most useful. Those who have visions of lacy shawls dancing in their heads will find much to inspire them. And those who just love to crochet, will find this book a perfect addition to their needlework libraries.
For information about the book, go to interweave.com, http://bit.ly/1o9qgYg or inquire at a local library or bookstore.
Snippets
Stitchers who enjoy primitive cross stitch designs will find free patterns at ourpioneerhomestead.blogspot. Look for designs featuring crows and homey sayings, such as blessed be.
Knitters seeking a last-minute gift will find a free pattern for a tiny pine tree knit in the round in a series of cable stitches at simplynotable.com. Each tree, which measures approximately 3 to 4 inches high when finished, fits over a bottle cork stopper, new or recycled, which serves as a base (or trunk) for the little tree. To access the pattern, click on Simply Freebies and scroll down to “pint-sized pines in a cork forest.”
Bear in mind that patterns at the website, while free, are copyrighted. Theyare for private use and sharing with friends only and may not be sold.