“Crafts make us feel rooted, 
give us a sense of belonging 
and connect us with our history. 
Our ancestors used to create these crafts out of necessity, 
and now we do them for fun, 
to make money
and to express ourselves.”
– Phyllis George.

My chosen craft is crochet, creating textiles by using a crochet hook to interlock loops of yarn or thread.
At first crochet did not come naturally, I was beyond useless. I couldn’t even master a chain even though I spent a whole weekend trying, watching YouTube videos over and over again. I just couldn’t master it. Thankfully my determination paid off and suddenly it clicked.
I was soon well on my way to making my first continuous granny square blanket. I’ll be the first to admit, It was full of mistakes, and fell apart pretty smartish, mainly down to the fact that I cut my yarn as close to my finishing knots as I could and called it job done.
It was a fast way to learn the art of weaving in your ends, something I dislike doing but now know the importance of it.
Being young and naive I jumped straight into one of the most famous crochet patterns out there, Sophie’s Universe by Dedri Uys. Surprisingly I actually mastered most stitches and even more surprisingly it looked half decent. It never got finished as I was too eager to move on to next thing. I was desperate to learn as much as I could about crochet, reading patterns, choosing colours etc, which really wasn’t the best approach.
I had dreamt of crocheting since I was a wee girl, wrapped up snuggly in a crochet blanket, my Mum had made me, how I loved that blanket. ❤️
Being a lefty I found crafts extremely hard, the world was a right-handed one and not set up for us left-handed creators. Thankfully the human race no longer force the right hand. That being said I crochet with my right hand and wouldn’t even know where to begin using my left hand.
Remembering my humble but rather useless start to crochet, I can’t believe how far I have come, how many hours, days, weeks, months even years, I have spent with my hook in hand. 
Crochet became my greatest therapy. It got me through some really tough times.
I owe so much to my hook and yarn, but more so the extremely talented crochet designers out there, working their magic, giving us the most beautiful patterns to get creative with.

One designer in particular has helped me more than I can ever thank her for. I’m sure you all know who I’m talking about, yes you guessed right, the one and only crochet queen, Tinna Thórudóttir Thorvaldsdóttir.
You see last year during lockdown, my passion for crochet subsided, and I just couldn’t pick up a hook. My coping mechanism, my therapy was no longer my light. I struggled to find any pleasure at all, in what had become my life line.
I tried desperately to reignite the flame.
It wasn’t until the lovely Tinna messaged me, to ask me to join her testing team and test her new pattern AMMA, that the flame began to burn brightly once more.
Her kindness and trust, was the spark I needed to fall back in love with crochet.
In all honesty I’m totally blown away and in shock that, little old me would even be considered for such an important task.
I’m incredibly honoured and hope that I can do her amazing pattern AMMA and any other pattern she asks me to test, justice.

After a discussion about colours etc, Tinna asked me to make something a little different to her other amazing team of testers.
I was honoured with the task of making the simple version of AMMA, only using, part 2 the AMMA LOLO square. I would be making 48 of the AMMA SAGA square, 24 starting in Colour 1 and 24 starting in colour 2, making a checkerboard effect.

My chosen yarn was, Stylecraft Special DK, in Grey and Cream.

I used my, Clover Soft Touch 4mm hook, due to it being smooth on arthritic hands. 

Below is a little more information about yardage for each colour square.

For the Cream square – 

• 1 skein of cream yarn made 8 squares.
• 1 skein of grey yarn made roughly 10 squares 
• Each square weighs 23g.
• Cream per square used roughly 13g of cream. (The odd times 12g)
• Grey per square used roughly 10g of grey. (the odd times 11g)

For the Grey square – 

• 1 skein of grey yarn made 8 squares.  
• 1 skein of cream yarn made 10 squares.
• Each square weighs 23g.
• Grey per square used roughly 13g of cream. (The odd times 12g)&
• Cream per square used roughly 10g of grey. (the odd times 11g)

Joining.

I used the, flat surface slipstitches in back loops join.
I Joined with the Grey yarn and my 4mm hook.
I used 24g for the joining, leaving extra long yarn to weave in well. (77.3 yards)
If I could go back and change my colour choice, I would join in cream instead of grey, not for any particular reason, I just feel it may look nicer.
If I had to give advice when it comes to joining, it would be, Stitchmakers are your BESTFRIEND. They really do help keep things on track with the added bonus on holding your unjoined squares in place.

Border. 

I Started the border using the part used skeins from the squares and joining, they weighed –

Grey – 51g
Cream – 35g

I started the first round with grey (colour B) and went down to a Clover Soft Touch 3.5 hook.

The Cream rounds used the 35g plus 1 whole 100g and 15g of a new skein = 483.0 yards (150g) The Grey rounds used the rest of the 51g skein and 30g of a new skein = 260.8 yards (81g)

In total I used –
Cream – 715 grams / 2302.3 yards.
Grey – 630 grams / 2028.6 yards.

The final measurements of my, Checkerboard Simple Amma, with a extremely light block is,

Width – 123cm or 48.5 inches 
Length- 170 cm or 67 inches.

I hope this helps anyone who is planning on using, Stylecraft Special DK, for their Amma.
I have to say, I love this yarn for my everyday blankets, hats, scarfs etc. It’s cost effective, soft, durable and can even go in the tumble dryer. It’s perfect for snuggles with the kiddos.
Stylecraft Special DK comes in so many colours, you can play until yours hearts content, knowing it won’t break the bank, that it washes extremely well and will hold up to the test of time. It really is a great yarn. I love Stylecraft Special Aran to, just remember you will need more yarn if you buy Aran yarn.
I know we would all love to use expensive amazing quality yarn but unfortunately that can’t always be done, unless you have that giving money tree at the bottom of your garden. (If only😂) Trust me, Stylecraft Special DK has you covered.

So please tell me, have you got any big plans for your Amma?
Have you chosen your yarn yet?
Have you treated yourself to one of the delicious yarn kits? If so which one?
Are you ready to start the most important Crochet Along of the year, the AMMA Cal?

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Don’t forget The AMMA CAL schedule is as follows,

PART 1 – Friday October 1st – the AMMA SAGA square

PART 2 – Friday October 8th – the AMMA LÓLA square

PART 3 – Friday October 15th – the AMMA MARÍA square

PART 4 – Friday October 22nd – the AMMA ÞÓRA square

PART 5 – Friday October 29th – the AMMA TINNA square

PART 6 – Friday November 5th – JOINING the squares

PART 7 – Friday November 12th – the BORDER

The most beautiful yarn kits are available, in three different colour ways, trust me it’s going to be mega hard to choose which one, they are all beyond striking. I’m very much into monochrome but the coloured version is just WOW, I’m totally smitten with it. It really is beyond gorgeous I want it!!!

Each kit comes with a hard copy of the pattern and also a pdf version. 

The Kits and hard copy AMMA CAL pattern book are available on Tinnacrochet.com, but I’ll post the links below for you, as I’m sure you are itching to get your hands on a copy now!

You can purchase, 

The Happy Granny Kit, here.

The Modern Granny Kit, here.

And The Viking Granny Kit, here.

You can by a hard copy of the AMMA pattern here.

Amma pdf pattern here.

A pdf version of AMMA is also available on Ravelry here.

If there is anything I’ve forgotten to cover or you have any questions, please feel free to ask away, I’m more than happy to help if I can.
I can not wait to see all your creations light up the socials. It’s all very exciting.

Before I sign off, I would like to thank Tinna for this fantastic opportunity, your trust and friendship. I hope I’ve managed to do your absolutely gorgeous AMMA justice.🤞

Lastly thank you all for giving my little space in the corner of the interweb your time, I greatly appreciate it, and feel extremely honoured to have you here. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Have a hooktastic day.
Stay safe, stay true, stay you!

Too-da-loo.

🧶🧶🧶