I learned how to crochet! And in one night too!!
We had a snow storm coming (which didn't turn out to be super serious in our area) so I had my husband stop at the store on the way home from work and grab me a couple of crochet needles. He bought me a super nice pack with lots of different sizes. I had already purchase a roll of yarn last week. I bought black cuz I love black and what won't look good in black?
Welp I got on the handy dandy YouTube and Pinterest and I learned the basics. I can't credit one person because I learned what the basic stitch was and then watched like 5 different people do it and looked at images on Pinterest and blogs too.
At first trying to read the codes for patterns seemed overwhelming but it was just because I didn't know the terms and the stitches yet. I have learned the 4 basic stitches that are most commonly used and I'm pretty sure I have those down. For the most part.
Huge hold up was the black yarn though. For a beginner I do not suggest going with a dark color. You can't really see it well enough to see where all the stitches go and the patterns you're making.
So I remember I had some brown yarn from crafting and I had a giant soft blue roll from my baby shower. We used it for a game to measure my belly. It was cheap and people could cut a lot from one roll to measure how big they thought my tummy was. We had a LOT of people participate and they didn't use like any of the yarn cuz there's a TON on each roll.
So I used this Carolina Blue color to start. I had done a couple of pretty big squares on the black but I kept starting over because I simply couldn't see if I was being successful.
I was sure I had the basic down so I found a simple tutorial on Pinterest that took me to a blog and then to YouTube, of a bun beanie. I didn't have to read a pattern because she explained what to do.
I'm not a perfectionist so a lot of the time I will do things kinda messy and make it work. But in a good way. If that makes sense. So I wasn't positive, at the beginning, if it was coming out right. But I knew that if I was doing it wrong at least I was consistent. Lol!!
However, I was doing it right. I single crocheted the entire hat. I didn't count my stitches, this is the part where I do things messily. I think it's probably important to count them but honestly, I can't watch my shows or whatever and count the whole time too. lol after getting about 15 rows in I realized that in the first few I had done them about 5 stitches too long and it gradually slopped down and then I was consistent with the same amount of stitches so I figured I'd fix it at the end some how. Well in that mistake I learned something. I learned how to make things diagonal and descending or even ascending, and for a beginner that's good knowledge. I always learn from my mistakes, especially in crafting.
I felt like it was taking forever. The way this lady described this beanie was a little different then how I saw some other hats be made. I thought the end wasn't in sight. I worked on it a lot the first night. But I looked at the video and she said something like 60 rows and I was like OH ok! That's not too bad. I'll get there soon.
I really had to get use to how I was holding the hook and the thread and my work. My hand wanted to cramp and my work was loose. I had to get some practice in to get full dexterity. Before being halfway through I found my rhythm. And I can tell you, as a beginner with crocheting. The first bit of your work is probably the hardest. Once you get into a rhythm it's natural. And a lot of fun. It's crazy how halfway through my project I instantly understood how all of these motions with the loops could create different visual effects. It had a lot of gears turning in my head and made me excited for the different many patterns I can do with one simple hat if I want to.
I worked for an hour or two and finished it the next day.
I did the entire beanie with a single crochet and then I decided to add one row of triple just to try it out and somehow cover up where I had those few extra rows, it worked!
I'm super happy with it as a first project!!
I can't wait to see what's next!!
