Ready for the Advent CAL

Hi, I’m getting ready for the Advent CAL! I did a crochet a-long last year in the 24 days of advent and found it gave me an hour of peace to look forward to each day in all the hectic preparations of the season. Some days I didn’t find the time, but I caught up and finished the blanket on Christmas Eve, as planned. This year, I thought we could have a bit of a CAL together. So I’ve put together my lovely 25g mini balls of natural hand dyed yarns from earlier in the year, with some skeins of nettle dyes yarn from my lovely friend Steph Thornton of Perran Yarns. The yarns are Bluff Cove Hills wool and Devon Alpaca and should make a gorgeously cosy blanket. The mixed colours are the main blanket stitches, with the nettle dye colour as a hint of colour in chain rows.

I’ve gone very tonal and simple in my use of the colours, I want something gentle and calming to reflect the gentle natural dyes we made and used the day I did the workshop with Steph and her friend Amanda Hannaford. (See this blog for more on this…) Hopefully as I CAL the colours will help me feel calm too! I’ll post the crochet stitch pattern next week ready to go on Thursday with our Advent CAL. You will need at least 24 x 25g of yarn, mix and match, use up odds and ends, anything you want really as long as the yarn is all the same weight (ie all DK, Aran or 4 ply) and a plain colour for in between. I may finish off with this colour or a cream edging when I get to the end, I haven’t quite made my mind up yet!

So, are you joining me? What will you choose? Something jolly to suit the time of year, or something to suit a particular chair, or perhaps a colour scheme that evolves as it happens. I will keep you updated (hopefully daily via Pinterest and Instagram, and weekly by blog) with my advent CAL progress and I’d love to see how you are getting on.

Bye for now,

Caroline