Don't Panic

One day I hope to write a book of amigurumi patterns and I've always wanted to steal the idea from Douglas Adams Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy and have the words don't panic written on the fount cover.

I think we all get in a flap with our crochet sometime. How many times have you got to the end of a round and not had the amount of stitches your meant to? What do you do? Well if like I used to be you'd undo the row trying to work out where you went wrong and muttering to yourself and getting annoyed.

I'll admit something now to you all, I can't crochet properly, you know like they teach it in the books or how people show you. I hold the yarn different and I wrap it round my hook like I'm knitting. When I first started crochet I was told I must crochet the right way  and my way was wrong. I was told my tension would be uneven and I'd never be able to make anything good crocheting this way. Well I got myself in a right tizz trying to learn the right way to crochet. I couldn't do it, whats more I didn't enjoy doing it so I nearly gave up on crochet all together. Then I thought sod it I'll crochet my way and if its goes wrong then so be it. Well I think its safe to say there is nothing wrong with my tension and I've made a few good things but I still get people who watch me crochet tell me I'm doing it wrong. I remember this when I teach people to crochet and I tell people it doesn't matter how you crochet, just don't panic and do it how you feel comfortable.

 Do you want another confession? I can't do magic ring. I'm sure its very easy when you get your head round it but I can't get my head round it and I find chain 2 and do however many stitches in 2nd chain from hook, works in the just same way. I've actually seen people not attempt a pattern because they cant do magic ring which is crazy. I start my patterns with 6SC into loop. You can make that loop anyway you want, It doesn't matter.

That is the thing I love about amigurumi, it is so forgiving and the patterns are not set in stone. Unlike some other forms of crochet where if you get on stitch wrong you have to pull it out and go back to where you made a mistake, in amigurumi if your meant to have 24 stitches at the end of a row and you've got 23, just put another increase into the next row and it'll be fine. There is no pattern witch looking over your shoulder who's gonna tell you off if you deviate from the pattern slightly so Don't Panic it'll all work out in the end. Right so you need proof, just try it, grab a bit of yarn and one of your favourite quick patterns and make a few mistakes and see how it goes.

By the way the idea for this blog post came to me last night. I'd just started to crochet a ripple blanket, was on the third row and I must of made a mistake so when I got to the end of the row it wasn't matching right. I had to take out over 200 stitches and start again. Needless to say I wasn't in the best of moods after that. You can't make mistakes in ripple blankets but you can in amigurumi and that's why I love it.