samedi 22 août 2026

WOOOOL

First I must tell you that my next move should be : to buy a spray can for grafiti and tag my bedroom ceiling with the phrase "you don't need new ideas".

So I could read it every night before sleep and every morning waking up!

And of course ignore it!


I don't know if it's only because of the heatwave but I don't feel easy with cross stitching these days, taking the magnyfying lamp out, working on a dark fabric, be afraid of miscounting...  So I switched my plans to easier DIY as some paper scrapbooking or crochet.

As I still have big bags of wools from my Mum and individual balls of yarn I bought, on kind of impulse purchase often during holidays, because I liked the colour or they were furry or with special new threads or recycling plastic.

Those past days I have started some doll dresses to have fun crocheting small things.

Also begun four crocheted kind of "neckline" for future sewed summer dress (don't remind me please that the summer is almost done, it's only THIS summer).

I have seen on FB this amazing cover made with a lot of different crocheted flowers assembled together, could be a nice idea to use all these leftovers.

I have had fun crocheting small flowers and hexagones recently just need bigger patterns.



Then I have crossed the path of a woman making "shoulder warmer".

Some very classic like "Lidia crochet tricot"  tuto and others with very different kind of yarn which look like a shoulder length small poncho with kind of lace stitches very elegant, and I immediatly felt the urge to do one.






So put on your mask and snorkel and dive into the deepth of your bag...



I "re-discovered" a lot of yarns...  and try to put together some of them.

I got two sets : one dark red as main color and one pink as main color.




a short cut furry vermilion red I could use for the neckline start 

her twin yarn in speckled grey

I could associate with a light grey

a kind of soft darker red from an old pullover attempt I have to unravel

a eyelash yarn mixed colors red-brown-grey I could used for the edges 

since I took the photo I have also think of using some of my black/silver wool I made my snood with last winter and silver thread to light the rather dull grey wool.


I think that the first rounds will be great and soft made with the short fur red wool and the following ranks in the same wool in a speckled grey. Of course it's very fast to crochet but as you can't see your stitches you have to find the holes with your fingers, so weird.


Without special pattern, I'm going to crochet in the round and after a few ranks of classic single crochet use treble crochet or more to get loose stitches. I'm not sure I want to make chain stitches like the picture shows so I'll start some ideas and see what looks good, probably a lot of unravel works.




I found my grey yarn a little dull and I have chosen to crochet it
twined with a silver thread. As my black wool is already with silver
spots it will look ok.


I'm crocheting double, triple (4, 5) treble crochet stitches


and also try the crossed trebles






I don't think that the red and the purple will be nice close to one another so I'm using black and grey to separate them.

Without pattern I have learned "on the road" and often discovered that I had too much stitches above the shoulders and unraveled those sections.
I have used all the speckled grey, most of the red fur wool and the only ball of eyelash yarn I knew I wanted on the edges.

I'm happy with this first try...


The back

The front


To get the best fur-like effect, I'm trying using a crochet hook to lift the wool fibres up to the top.

It was fun to do, I know I'll use it at home this autumn (I'll post a picture then) or in the garden to feel warm. It is a good way to mix together different types of wool. The long trebles give an airy effect that I like combined with the thicker yarn.

Something to make one again soon!


Bizarrement j'ai constaté que pendant ces semaines de canicule j'étais plus à l'aise avec de la laine que attirée par la broderie ou la couture.

Donc l'occasion de replonger dans mes sacs, de redécouvrir mes pelotes et d'essayer un nouveau projet aperçu sur le net : un chauffe épaule.

En s'inspirant d'un modèle un peu original, s'apparentant à un petit poncho, mélangeant texture et couleurs et utilisant des restes de laine.

Ma plongée fût fructueuse : des laines fourrures rouges et gris moucheté (Louve - Cheval blanc), un gris un peu fade (Plassard) associé à un fil argent, la laine noire argentée (Eva -Textile de la marque) utilisée pour mon snood, un rouge foncé un peu angora d'un essai de pull à démonter, un petit reste de laine mauve et une laine Zibeline Phildar amarante.

J'ai crocheté en me fiant à la photo sans patron et j'ai avancé petit à petit, démontant, refaisant fonction des essayages. Passant de points simples pour les laines épaisses et utilisant des brides, double, triples ++ et testant les brides croisées pour varier les points et combiner des parties très aérées avec des parties donnant plus de maintien.

J'ai beaucoup aimé réaliser ce projet, je vais pouvoir le porter dès cet automne à la maison ou dans le jardin pour me tenir chaud. Le résultat est assez proche de la photo et l'association des couleurs me convient bien. A refaire prochainement !





lundi 17 août 2026

STAGE / ETAPE 14/1

 



What about a card game today?

Do you have a good hand?     Count your points!


Une partie de cartes aujourd'hui ?

Avez-vous une bonne main ?    Comptez vos points !





dimanche 16 août 2026

ETAPE / STAGE 13/3

 


Département  38    Isère

New department visited!


The town name is :       Pierre-Châtel






Grenoble et Pont en Royans... deux autres villes en Isère


Rappel des indices / Some explanations about the clues

1/ The shape of the frost on the window was (supposed to) showing a 3 and an 8.
On the book she was writing the poem The Ruin about wall-stones and stone in French is pierre.

2/ The ladies named all the villages around Pierre Châtel. All the names are male name of saints. Pierre is Peter and means stone. A famous "pierced" stone near the city.  Dauphiné (Dauphiny) is the name of the old province including Isère.
And again : châtel = château = castle


1/  Le givre sur les fenêtres dessinait un trois et un huit  3  8
Le poême : the ruin  faisait allusion aux murs de pierre.
Toutes les villages cités par les dames comportait des prénoms de saints masculins ainsi que Pierre-Châtel, le Dauphiné étant le nom de la province.


Our guide was Christine de Pizan - born in Italy around 1364 moving in 1368 to France where she lived until 1430. Earliest feminist French writer well known for "the book of the city of the ladies" and "the treasure of the city of the ladies" and poetry, biography, novels, philosophy...

Notre guide était  Christine de Pizan








She was honored with a statue during the Paris Olympic Games along the Seine with other renowned women.




As a little nod to our guide, some stitchings and crafts about

Petit clin d'oeil à notre guide avec quelques ouvrages sur


The dinner party - Judy Chicago  1974 1979   Brooklyn Museum  New York



A tribute to women’s history in the form of a large triangular table set with 39 place settings, whose stylised plates pay homage to 39 women—both real and mythological—who have left their mark on the history of humanity and women.


L’œuvre (1974-79), exposée au Brooklyn Museum de New York, est un hommage à l’histoire des femmes sous la forme d’une grande table triangulaire comprenant 39 couverts dont les assiettes stylisées rendent hommage à 39 femmes, réelles ou mythologiques, qui ont marqués l’histoire de l’humanité et des femmes.


Let's discover a local embroiderer

Découvrons une brodeuse de la région

Marie-Christine Duret,   lacemaker,    dentellière







Réunion à Crolles

La dentelle aux fuseaux était très pratiquée autrefois et des rassemblements de dentellières étaient organisés dans les villages que l'on appelait  "des couviges"


Bobbin lace-making was very popular in the past, and gatherings of lacemakers were organised in the villages; these were known as ‘couviges’




Un petit tour en montagne

Let's go to mountain




















Some other recipes about cheese cooking  "Fondue" and "Tartiflette"




The special shoe horn today is with...     the marmots

Petit lien inattendu avec ...  les marmottes



I have linked this stage with    medieval ladies

J'ai choisi d'associer cette étape aux dames à l'époque médiévale

























Tomorrow we're going to play cards...

Demain, nous allons jouer aux cartes...