J.P. Kinda Crochets

I know that granny squares are one of the bedrock creations of the crochet world. It’s often the first project one does as they’re learning the craft. Nevertheless, I’ve made maybe one granny square in my life and that was just a test. I got a bunch of Red Heart Flower Power yarn from Amazon for review and for a long time, I didn’t know what to do with it because I’m just not a big fan of granny squares. I do like flowers and the idea of flowers in granny squares almost made me want to use this yarn as intended, but after the first attempt at making the perfect square with the perfect tension to get the flower just right, I knew this approach was not for me. The yarn sat in a basket in my living room, untouched and unloved for quite some time.

My favorite color is purple, but my second favorite color is probably royal blue. I love a bright beautiful blue yarn and after going through my stash and coming across the Bluebell and Marigold shades of Flower Power, I realized that I could take my love for combining variegated yarn and do something potentially interesting with these two colors that I knew would blend together perfectly as they shared all the same color families: blue, yellow, and orange. So, I grabbed my Tunisian crochet hook and got to work. I had three skeins of each color, and each skein is 417 yards, so I knew I could make a cardigan and vest along with a hat and/or scarf to match.

The Tunisian simple stitch is my favorite stitch for pairing variegated yarn as each row lets both colors shine through really well. So that’s the stitch I used to make this cardigan. It came out better than I expected; I was really pleased with being able to use this yarn that I didn’t really like to create something I truly loved.

But I still had a lot of Flower Power in a few other colors, and they were colors I didn’t like nearly as much, so I decided I’d use a couple of other colors to try making a raglan sweater. I’d been wanting to try making a raglan sweater using Tunisian crochet for a long time, but I had a little bit of dread of working in the round on something that large. I don’t mind working in the round for hats and cowls, but a sweater just felt a little daunting. I compromised with myself by saying I’d start with a raglan cardigan so I could use a regular Tunisian hook and if it came out well maybe I’d do a raglan in the round with yarn I really liked.

I looked at what I had left of the Flower Power, and the skeins were all shades of red and beige and those are colors I don’t wear nearly as often as blue or yellow. For most of the colors, I had enough to make large items like cardigans and sweaters, but for one of the colors I had only one skein. I decided I’d take that random skein of pinkish Rosy Disposition and pair it up with a skein of red-and-orange Poppy Star and use it as a practice project. I did not expect the final result to be wearable because the idea of pairing pink with red and orange was a stretch even for me.

I was wrong. These two colors that I would never have paired intentionally actually came out as one of my favorite projects of this whole Flower Power adventure. I think because you are blending both colors on each row, it just comes out looking like it was made from a ball of yarn that combined those colors and we are very tolerant of colors being paired up in one ball of yarn that we would never combine on our own. I was sad that I didn’t have enough yarn to do more with this pairing. I ended up with a vest that I very much wanted to wear. This vest was made with a combination of yarn-over and Tunisian simple stitches.

I still had two more colors left – Dried Bouquet and Red Hot Phlox. These were also colors I wouldn’t have normally combined, but I was no longer worried about how they might look together. I had enough of each color to make what I’d just made with the Rosy Disposition + Poppy Star but this time I’d be able to put sleeves on it, so I used the same approach for this cardigan as I used for the vest except that I widened the intervals for the front and back and shortened the intervals for the shoulders.

What I learned from this experiment is that I’m not nearly as adventurous in combining variegated yarn as I thought I was and I shouldn’t be nearly as concerned about unusual pairings as I have been. If you use the right stitches, you can create something especially unique and daring that will stand out in a crowd. So let that be a lesson to you as well – don’t be afraid to try seemingly crazy things with yarn because you may stumble upon your next masterpiece!