January's edition of Happy Hookers saw us getting to grips with the corner to corner technique; a different way of making items as a square or rectangle, such as blankets or scarves. At least one member had envisaged it involved starting with one stitch and lots of increases until an equal number of decreases was needed, and was surprised to find it involves building up lots of smaller squares across the diagonal to form a textured result instead.
Talk also turned to what the group would like to tackle this year, with a number of suggestions discussed. We liked the idea of tackling a number of different stitches to form sample squares to build not only a stitch library of our own, but also the possibility of using the squares to make a blanket or cushion cover. Ann has already made a start of her own and the photo above shows her early results tackling the Never Ending Wildflower and popcorn stitches we discussed, alongside her textural corner to corner squares on the right. We'll also be looking at the African Flower pattern which can be used to make lots of different fun 3D animals alongside the more traditional blankets and cushions.
We also discussed how the choice of yarn can make quite a difference to how a pattern looks as well as feels. Michelle has tried the African Flower already, but her choice of yarn (acrylic) meant it looked more like a circle than the desired hexagon. Cotton would be a better choice in this circumstance.
Bella Coco has an excellent tutorial for the Corner to Corner technique.
Links to the other techniques mentioned:
Popcorn stitch (to follow as there are several versions)