The face behind the crafty...

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And what a stunning face it is!...Actually, anyone who is a serious crafter, will normally look slightly odd, in my opinion.  We all have our strange habits or attire that we feel natural working in, and as I work from home, plus my dodgy thyroid, means I am ALWAYS cold and dressed for the arctic, with trusty headphones abound.

This is my haven, my little crafty dot on planet earth that oozes creativity.  I have made many things in this little corner, having been a papercutting artist for twelve years and a micro-crochet creator for the last five.  In 2021 I gave up booze, best decision I ever made, and ultimately the year I created some of my finest work.  However, I did constantly need to keep my hands occupied (being off the grog), so to give me something to do in the evenings I fell back in love with crochet (I dabbled when I was a kid) and knew a few basic stitches my mum had taught me, but it helped keep me sober.  Fast forward a few months and I came across some crochet on Instagram, but it was MICRO…wow, my head absolutely exploded.  I just adore anything miniature and I had to know more.

I watched the rare, few micro-crochet artists I could find.  Hardly any of them gave much away on how this was done, so I watched and listened, rewound, pressed pause and blanket messaged them asking questions, but all I was met with was tumbleweeds.  I started to realise that this was done with cotton and a really tiny hook.  I strained to see which size was on their hook handle, which cotton they were using and how their hands were handling the strain working on such a small scale compared to the large granny squares I was used to.

Eventually, I managed to buy a 2.0mm hook, the smallest I could find locally and some old embroidery thread, leaving all six strands together.  The result was apocalyptic.  My hands and fingers were all over the place and I couldn’t get a grip and keep the tension needed to actually make anything successfully.  So, I kept going, making it tighter, going slower and eventually worked my way down from embroidery thread to top stitch thread (slightly thicker than cotton) and a 0.6mm hook, again practicing.  I couldn’t afford a lot of colours in this style of fancy cotton (it’s VERY expensive) so brought white and used felt tips to colour it in (just to get my imagination going before buying more colours…yes, I really did this!  Then once I was good enough, I brought my first Tulip hook in a size 0.4mm (a big moment) and invested in Gutermanns silk cotton in a few colours and again, practiced until I had something that resembled what I was seeing others do.  Did you know I cant read crochet or knitting patterns?  The coding has and always will be gobble-de-goop to me, instead I use my imagination as it proceeds.  I will choose some good colours, have a rough idea of what I want to achieve and let my mind wonder off into the aether whilst I crochet.  That is why no two of my pieces are ever the same, I couldn’t make it twice if I tried, as I never write my patterns down…it’s a mystery, even to me.

So, for now, this is a little introduction to my crochet world and how I got started. 

I quite like this blog stuff…my husbands bored with me talking about everything crafty, so maybe this will be as fun for me as someone looking for how to get started in micro-crochet. 

I’m not a gatekeeper of knowledge and want to share with anyone who will listen how this beautiful craft works for me.  So, if you have any questions, just contact me!

I’ll be posting a lot more about running a crafting business, as I love listening to others who have or are doing this.  And watching my jewellery sell out in the shop window must mean I’ve finally cracked it a little…right?

Anyway, toodle-pips everyone and sending lots of love as always

Donna

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