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Wednesday, August 7, 2019

Dune Afghan ~ Finally on the Attic24 Bandwagon!

When I first started Hooked On Needles back in June of 2008, it became apparent very quickly that there were a lot of other creative people out there loving yarn and hooks and fabric and needles and color and all things creative. One of the blogs I landed on was written by a lady from England named Lucy who lives in an attic and she was a relatively new crocheter at the time. Lucy was also a relatively new blogger, having started her own blog Attic24 in March of the same year. Lucy shared beautiful photos of her home and town and crochet projects and rain boots and all sorts of colorful things. If you've never strolled through Lucy's world, you really should. It's just lovely.

Over the years, I popped into Lucy's Attic regularly to read about her adventures and see what she was working on. I even made use of one of her afghan patterns to make the blue/purple/white cozy afghan seen in this post for a friend of mine to give to her daughter.

Lucy's blog has continued to be a delightful respite over the last 11 years, full of color and creative crochet ideas. A while ago, she started working with a yarn manufacturer putting together her yarn choices for her different blankets so that her fans from all over the world could take advantage of her creativity and make their own blankets using the same yarns and colors. I resisted for as long as I could, even though each blanket seemed to be more appealing than the last. Then Lucy introduced her Dune blanket and I could resist no longer! As soon as it was available for purchase, I put in my order and look what showed up on my doorstep...



...the Dune blanket yarn pack complete with full-color printed pattern, with all the yarn needed to complete the blanket, all wrapped up in the sweetest organza drawstring bag. Wool Warehouse does a great job packaging and shipping these little bundles of joy! While I was at it, and since I was already paying shipping, I went ahead and splurged even more by ordering an earlier yarn pack and pattern for Lucy's Cupcake blanket. The colors are just about delicious enough to eat!


After allowing these lovely packages to rest a bit from their long journey across the ocean, I broke open my Dune pack and used my handy dandy yarn ball winder to wind each of the 15 balls of yarn into center pull cakes. I rolled up the ball band and tucked it into the middle of each cake so I could reference it for the color name. Then I stacked them into a covered bin to keep them neat and tidy. When I started working on the blanket, I took one cake out at a time and put it back when I was finished with that color stripe. After a few stripes, I realized that leaving the cakes unwrapped like this was not going to be practical. I needed to package each cake individually to help keep it neat and tidy throughout the process of crocheting this afghan. So I took regular plastic bags, the kind that come with the little sheet of twist ties, and wrote the name of one color on each of 15 different bags with a big permanent marker. Then I placed each cake into its own bag and loosely closed it with the twist tie, leaving the tail of the yarn hanging out. After doing this, the yarn stayed much neater in the box and was easier to move in and out of the bin without the cake falling apart.


I had never used Stylecraft Special DK yarn before, and I am pretty sure it was love at first sight! The colors are luscious and the yarn feels so nice in my hands. I started working on my Dune blanket and loved the pattern right away.


It was easy to get into the 4-row-repeat groove of this pattern, and before long I was well on my way.


This picture shows the front, or what I call the front, of the afghan. It is the side which shows the right side of the shell stitches. Some people in the Hooked on Attic24 Facebook page, where many of the fans of all things Lucy and Attic24 gather to discuss their colorful projects, like the other side better as the front because it looks more like actual shells than this side does.


In this picture you can see both sides of the blanket, my front on the top and my back on the bottom of the picture.


There was some discussion of starting each color stripe from the opposite end of where the previous stripe was started. Would that change the overall look of the afghan? Would it resolve the problem some people were having with their woven-in ends causing one side to feel more bulky than the other side? I decided to do a little short-row experiment to find out for myself. In the picture above, you can see that the tails for each short color stripe alternate sides. But can you really notice the difference in the actual stitches of each stripe?


This picture shows the same short rows of my experiment, only from the other side. What do you think? I can tell the difference, but then I've been crocheting for over 45 years. I don't really think the average person would notice.


I also didn't seem to have a problem with the side where the ends are woven in feeling or looking any more bulky or stiff than the other side. This picture shows the front of the afghan along the edge where the ends were woven in. Oops, I just noticed I took the picture of the afghan upside down!


And this is the back side of the afghan along the edge where the ends are woven in.

Once the color stripes are finished, 100 in all according to Lucy's pattern for a full size afghan, there is a lovely four-round border that encircles the whole thing, so even if your edges aren't perfectly straight and neat, the border should help to even out the finished project.

Next time, I will share pictures of the completed afghan and my thoughts on using this Stylecraft yarn for the first time.


Happy Stitching!

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3 comments:

  1. Oh I love the pattern and the yarns are gorgeous. I look forward to seeing the finish and reading your thoughts on Stylecraft.

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  2. Your dune blanket looks so pretty already. I love all the blankets Lucy designs. I still need to start one, but I don't know which to chose.

    Sweet greetings,
    Emily
    (casacreaemilia.blogspot.nl)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow this is going to be beautiful. I have followed Lucy for as long as you have - love all her projects and she has such an eye for color! I have been so tempted to order one of her kits but worried about ordering from overseas. I am glad you had no problems. Hope you have been enjoying your summer!

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