I have finally had to admit that it is time for a few extra layers of clothing as the weather has taken a definite turn here over the last couple of weeks. I am still not ready to fully embrace the autumn vibe though and am definitely not buying into the pumpkins and spooky vibes just yet! As for the very premature references to Christmas that I am already seeing in my inbox and in the shops, all I can say is Bah Humbug! It is only September after all! 
 
As the days get shorter and the breeze is cooler, I cannot help but think about starting some cosy projects. I am still working on a couple of small cotton projects for my workshop trip to Morocco at the end of October, but am already looking forward to working on some bigger, woollier, projects that will keep me warm as I do so. Adding edgings onto blankets is the perfect project for me as the weather gets colder and I have a couple of new baskets in the pipeline, so that's all good!
 
As the Autumn equinox is still ten days away I am making the most of every last bit of summer that I can, in between the showers at least! The garden is looking better for the rain and we still have quite a lot of flowers and veg busy thriving, so I am a happy bunny this week!
 
I have a few things to tell you about, so I hope you can spare a couple of minutes to catch up with our news - hopefully glitch free this time, unlike our the last email that went a bit wobbly in places! 

I frequently look at surface pattern traditions from other countries as the source of my designs and have been incredibly fortunate to visit quite a few. Tutoring workshops for Stitchtopia means that I have been able to travel more over the last few years and I am really proud of the relationship I have built with them, which means I get to work closely with them to plan new trips.
 
We already have the Turkey trip fully booked for next October, but I have also suggested a couple of workshop tours closer to home including the trip to Northern France which will take place next June and I am also looking forward to giving you more information about a UK crochet trip within the next few weeks.
 
There are still a couple of places left on the trip to France. We will be travelling by Eurostar to Paris and will then go on to Versailles and Rouen. We will also visit Monet's famous gardens at Giverny - a destination I have wanted to visit for many years.
 
The trip will be sponsored by West Yorkshire Spinners and you can find more information by following this link and you can look at all the other amazing trips that Stitchtopia have to offer by following this link.

​We currently have a good stock of kits and yarn packs and paper patterns. You can find download patterns available via Etsy and Ravelry.
 
If you have been waiting for stock of our West Yorkshire Spinners kits, we now have both Persian Tiles Original and Peppercorn back in stock.
 
If you are a fan of natural yarns, you can also find kits made using Yarnsmith's Superwash Merino DK on the Wool Warehouse site here. 

I felt very honoured to attend the UK Knitting & Crochet Guild Convention at the weekend, where I tutored a crochet with beads workshop and gave a keynote speech about my work and passion for crochet. I had a really fabulous time meeting new people and chatting to members.
 
If you want to know more about the guild you can find their website here and their Instagram feed here and, if you fancy having a go at adding beads to your crochet too, you can find free video tutorials on our YouTube channel by following this link.

Whilst at the convention I met Kelly Ferguson who has a company called Way Out Crafts. Kelly is an expert at making Yorkshire buttons, a skill I had not come across before, so she explained the process to me, whilst she also instructed others within a workshop who were busy making their own lovely buttons. I think the buttons are super cute and am planning on making some soon using Kelly's nifty templates.
 
I asked Kelly to send me some words about how she came to be such a Yorkshire Button expert and this is what she had to say:
 
'I first came across Yorkshire Buttons about 18 months ago when a small group of friends travelled to Northumberland for a yarn shop visiting weekend. Each group member was tasked with running an activity in between our trips out from the cottage. As soon as I started to weave the threads around the spokes we created on the button template, I knew I was hooked as the possibilities were endless. As well as decorative buttons, I was envisaging pin cushions, necklaces, Christmas decorations, brooches and so many more uses for these little sea urchin type buttons.

On return home I challenged my husband with making a template using his 3D printing design skills, which has led us to where we are today. We now have reusable templates available in seven sizes ranging from 3cm to 10cm, which are available to purchase individually. We sell the five smaller sized templates as boxed set that can also hold three needles, this is great for on-the-go projects. 
 
Our template design has a centre circle in a contrasting colour to show the size of the finished button, making the choice of template much simpler. The rule of thumb is that the button will be half the size of the template. Once complete, it can be filled with toy stuffing, an existing button, yarn ends or beads for example, depending on how you want the button to look.
 
Our template and storage box design are registered to our small business, Way Out Crafts and are available via our Web Shop and at yarn shows. I enjoy passing on this heritage skill at workshops across the North, having attended yarn shows such as Spring into Wool and Threads Festival, and I continue to support Knitting and Crochet Guild events, such as branch meetings and the conventions.

We are really looking forward to exhibiting at Yarndale again in a few weeks time. It is amazing how quickly the show comes round, year after year, and we feel incredibly fortunate to be getting ready to be there again in 2025. It really is a fabulous show and we love it! 
 
You can find more information about Yarndale, including the details of tickets still available, by following this link.

Emily Littlefair, of the Loopy Stitch has recently launched a new website called Made into Magnets, where you can turn your treasured photos into beautiful keepsakes. Each photo is carefully crafted into a high quality magnet – a simple, heartfelt way to capture memories and keep them close. Perfect for gifts, fridges, and craft spaces.
 
Emily is currently shipping within Australia only, so if you are there and fancy taking a look you can find a link to the new website here.

I haven't been one hundred percent well this week with a bit of a lurgy making itself apparent at the beginning of the week. I went into battle with Vick's First Defence spray (which is full of zinc I think) and it has been a little better thankfully. Getting poorly when you are self employed is always a bit of a worry, but I haven't been unwell in a long time, so I guess it was my turn!
 
I am hoping to be back to normal by tomorrow evening when Andy and I are heading out to see the final show of Tina the Musical in London's West End. I have seen this show twice already in the last five weeks, so you could say I am a little obsessed! Having never seen Tina in concert when she was alive I feel that seeing Karis Anderson play her in this production is the closest I am ever going to get! The show is set to tour the UK and North America and you can find more information here. 

My talented niece is showing some of her excellent photographs as one of the artists featured in the Borough of Ealing Art Trail this weekend. If you want to find out more about this event and see which artists and venues are taking part, you can find more information here and you can find Helen's fabulous new Instagram account, where she show-cases her brilliant photography skills, by following this link or by clicking on her images above.
 
I am really hoping to find some time to sit and crochet this weekend, but I am also planning on finding some of the almost finished projects I put to one side in the spring! I am also hoping to rediscover some of the yarns and patterns I bought at yarn shows over the last six months or so too! I know I have the yarn for the Utility Two cowl, by The Knitting Shed somewhere and feel like this would be a great project to lead me into the colder season over the next few weeks, so I have my fingers crossed that I can find it in my stash! 
 
If you are a fan of adding beads to your knitting and fancy embarking on a good old stash busting project, especially one that you might complete over a weekend, you could take a look at Jeanette Sloan's fabulous new Rae Beaded Scarf project (shown below). The pattern is available via Ravelry here and Payhip here. I just love it and will definitely be trying to find some DK weight yarn that will work for this project in my stash.

As usual it has been a busy couple of weeks since I was last in your inbox. Sadly the weather has changed a little here this week after our amazing spell of summer sunshine, and it is a bit of a shock to the system to have to dig in the wardrobe for a cardigan in the evenings.
 
As a true sun lover I would never admit to looking forward to the colder weather, but there is no denying that it is a perfect time for crafting and we are definitely seeing an increase in crocheters taking on larger projects for the autumn months. Thankfully we have a good stock of kits to keep everyone happy! 
 
I have continued to work on my beaded decoration designs in preparation for Christmas. It's always a bit strange to be working on festive projects when the weather is good, but I have so enjoyed working on smaller projects for a while. I have three blanket designs vying for attention on my pin board above my desk, so there are some plans for bigger projects in the pipeline. There is a rarely a time when I am at a loss as to what to do - I am sure you all know the feeling! 
 
We have a few things to tell you about this week and Gemma has been busy creating a really nice Quick Catch Up email for you, so I hope you can spare a few moments to get bang up to date with our news.

We received a lovely email a while ago from Rene Panagiotelis, in Australia, in which she told us about her journey to completing the Mystical Lanterns blanket you can see in the images further down. 
 
"I purchased the pattern in November 2016 and then some Patons 8ply Cotton Blend compatible colours. It was not until around October 2024 that I finally found time to start the project. However, I was short of yarn and the original colours were no longer available. Fortunately I was able to blend in some different, but complementary, 4 Seasons Brighton 8ply Cotton Blend colours.
 
Making this blanket was so rewarding and relaxing and by now, my granddaughter was old enough to take an interest in the progress. She became my chief consultant when it came to laying out the lanterns in order to assemble.
 
I really wanted straight edges and was thrilled to find vertical, horizontal and corner patterns. As striking as the lanterns were, I felt the use of the cream colour to join the lanterns really added to the final effect. I wanted to continue using cream as a joining colour and after much thought and a bit of trial and error I decided to make a multi color double edge with the final row being a ‘cross stitch’ crochet row (Edging 93, Annie’s 101 Crochet Stitch Patterns & Edgings). The ‘cross stitch’ row really finishes off the border, which was beginning to curl before adding that last row.
 
Now after 8 ½ years and much bonding with my granddaughter, I was so happy to hand her the finished product. This was a complete surprise, and she was thrilled to say the least. Creating memories, as well as blankets, is completely up lifting."

If, like Rene, you would like to add straight edges to your Mystical Lanterns projects, you can find a free blog post showing how to make the Vertical Half Motif here, and the Corner Quarter motifs here. you can find the Mystical Lanterns blanket pattern information by following this link.
 
Thank you to Rene for sharing this lovely story with us.

​We have been assured by Royal Mail that the new system for sending parcels to America will be easy to manage and should have little impact on our US customer base, so long as all goes to plan. 
 
We are hoping to reinstate postage to the US next week. We will be treading carefully to begin with though, so that we are not caught out if things don't go quite as expected. There still seems to be quite a bit of conflicting information coming from courier companies, both here and in the US, so it seems prudent to be cautious to begin with.
 
We would like to thank our customers in the USA for their patience while we have been negotiating this change in procedure. 

For customers in the US who might be itching to get on with a Janie Crow project, don't forget that you can get yarn kits from Mary Maxim who are based there.
 
We have collaborated with the team at Mary Maxim for quite a while now and feel we have a great relationship with them. You can find kits for many of my original colourways, such as Persian Tiles and Mystical Lanterns, as well as some exclusive kits that the team in the US have developed themselves, such as the Rose version of Persian Tiles shown below and the blue Summer Palace blanket shown above.

It seems that many of you simply can't have enough stitch markers, so the lovely Emma Ball has been busy creating some new versions to add to the collection. You can find the new star and flower markers by clicking on the images above and below.
 
We also have a new crochet hook pouch that features the Mystical Lanterns design, which you can find by following this link.

We've been enjoying seeing your versions of Estella popping up on our social media platforms. Here are just a few that Gemma has found on Facebook. Thank you to Elaine Hogan Hanley, Valentina Hall, Hazera Belal and Gina Berry for sharing their work. ​

Over on Instagram Emma has been canvassing opinions on whether or not you like using charts when you are crocheting. Gemma prefers a written pattern, but appreciates having a chart available when a written instruction isn't quite making sense and taking a quick look at the chart can clarify what the words are trying to convey. Emma likes the visual guide that a chart provides when she can't quite work out what something should look like when following the written words. 
 
If you avoid charts at all costs because you're not sure how to read them, Emma has included a video in the Zero to Granny series on how to read a chart. It's a very useful skill to have and adds another tool to your crochet kit, so do have a look at the video. You can find it here. If you are the opposite and always use charts but struggle with written patterns, there's also a video to help you with that right here. 

Gemma will be popping on to the blog at the weekend to provide you with an update on her temperature blanket progress, but in the meantime, if you want to be super organised and ready for the 1st September, you can download the new temperature recording chart here. 
 
If you don't already follow our social media channels, you can find links at the bottom of this email. Do come and join us! 

You can find a downloadable and print friendly version of the Estella motif over on our website here and over on our YouTube channel Emma has added a set of videos that take you through the pattern step by step. You can find the playlist here. 
 
We have had a few requests for a paper copy of the pattern so have printed some. They are available for £3.95 (in UK terms only) and you can find them by following this link.

Yarnstravaganza, the celebration of yarn shops, is taking place across the UK from the 27th September to the 4th October. It's a great way of showing support for your local yarn shop and it's well worth getting in touch with them to see if they have any special events planned. you can check on the UK Hand Knitting website here to see if they are taking part. ​

Gemma's chosen book this month was ‘Random Acts of Crochet Kindness’ by Olivia Dieterich. The idea is that small crocheted items are left out in the community to spread a little joy when found by members of the public. There is a Facebook group of the same name with over 350k members, which you can find here.
 
The book contains twenty five patterns for small items, like those you can see on the cover of the book, together with tips on making message labels and ideas on places to leave them. They are great little projects for stash-busting too.

You can read Gemma's thoughts about the book within her Book of the Month blog post here and if you the look of this book too, head on over to the Search Press website. If you're in the UK you can get a 20% discount and free delivery by entering the code DD88 at checkout. ​

This week Andy made a really yummy dinner using a recipe from our Bold Beans cookbook. The dish included feta, peas and mint as a base to some crispy queen butter beans. It was simply delicious! 
 
The recipe isn't available online as far as I can tell, but there are some very similar versions on the Bold Bean website. This one, which includes beans, peas, charred lemons and pecorino, looks really good too! 

Do you already know that we have a Janie Crow Lifestyle Instagram account where I share everyday things that have got me inspired or excited? To be fair, it is mostly images of food, such as the plate of puris I made for dinner last weekend, but every now and again there are images of flowers, books, plants and architecture on there too. Basically anything that I have felt photo worthy during my everyday life.
 
For some reason Instagram users don't particularly like it when everyday things are mixed up with crochet, so having two accounts means I can share bit of non yarny stuff too, without upsetting anyone! 
 
The images below give you a bit of an idea of the kind of things I post. If you're interested, do pop over there by clicking on the link here or on the images below to take a look. 

Over the last month or so I have been trying to stick to a new routine, which involves setting my alarm for the same time everyday and going to bed on the dot too. I have also been spending my mornings going to the gym and doing my shopping and food prep so that by the time I sit down to my desk, my chores are pretty much done and all I have to think about is crochet and lovely yarny things! 
 
I start my working day at my desk by picking up my hook and working on my projects. I now don't touch my email inbox, or anything hugely clerical until the end of the day, once all the creative stuff is done. Working in this more regimented way, and going to bed on time, has already really helped my focus and I am feeling nicely energised by my new daily habits.

Last weekend we celebrated my father in law's birthday with a family party in their garden and this week it is our son in law's turn for a celebration as he turns 30! I have made him a chocolate fudge cake as it is his favourite and we are looking forward to catching up with them on Sunday to raise a glass to the August birthday boys! 
 
It has been quite rainy here today and it looks set to be similar over the weekend, so I am hoping that will be the perfect excuse to do a spot of weekend crafting. I have a few knitting projects that haven't been touched all summer, so maybe it's time to dig these out to finish off in the autumn. Whatever you have planned, I hope you have a nice weekend and are able to squeeze in a bit of time with your current project too.
 
I will be back in your inbox in a couple of weeks time with news of some new Climbing Rose Wrap yarn packs and some more dates for your diary. 

While the UK has been sizzling in the heat of record temperatures I have been retreating to the relative cool of the summer house where I have been working on some small projects. Tackling a big project at this time of year is just a no go area, so rather than melt under the weight of a blanket that needs an edging, I have been working on smaller projects, using lighter weight yarns. 
 
The summer is usually a bit of a slow period for us, with many people taking holidays or finding it too warm to crochet, but this year has been unusually busy, thanks to the continued sharing of blanket drop-down reels on social media we think! It is so amazing to see my projects still creating such a buzz on social media platforms, so big thanks to those of you who are busy sharing pics of your projects.
 
We are particularly excited today as it is worldwide Granny Square Day and so social media channels are choc-a-block with lovely crochet pics! You can find the details of my new free crochet motif, especially designed for Granny Square Day, lower down this email, alongside some other news, including a note about the new US duty tariffs. 

I hope you can spare a few minutes to catch up with all things Janie Crow.

After much anticipation Granny Square Day 2025 has finally arrived and I am so excited to present you with my newest free motif pattern, which I have designed specifically for today.
The motif is called Estella and you can find the download pattern for free on our website via this link, or you can head over to the Simply Crochet Magazine feed on Instagram to find more details there.

I am really passionate about the importance of passing on our crochet skills to future generations and Granny Square Day is the perfect way to inspire new crocheters to get involved. It is fabulous to see social media platforms taken over by crochet images and witness the real sense of community that the day creates. 

I am honoured to have been asked to be an ambassador this year and hope that either my motif, or one of the many that you will see on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok today, will inspire you to get making! 
 
I have written a blog post about my Granny Square memories and my first steps into the world of crochet, which you can find by following this link. 

Simply Crochet magazine are honouring Granny Square Day with an exclusive offer for you! By subscribing to receive either 3 print copies of the magazine, or by taking out a year's subscription, you can get a Rico yarn bundle worth over £50, plus the opportunity to download their Granny Square Day pattern booklet, which features 52 brand new designs. 
 
All this for only £19.99 for 3 issues (which is a saving of 30% on the magazine shop price), or £94.99 on the yearly subscription, which is a saving of 23%. Overseas readers can also get great discounts on the magazine shop price. Click this link to find out more. 

Over the last few months we have seen sales of our patterns increase substantially and we think this is down to video shares on both Instagram and TikTok. The Persian Tiles blanket design continues to dominate and we love seeing it made in alternative colour ways.
 
If you want some ideas on yarn palettes, a good place to start looking is by using the hashtag #persiantilesblanket on Instagram. There are some real beauties on there including this reel by Mipi The Label, which has had a whopping 62K likes. And this one, where Famke shows the blanket drop down in slow motion, has had 21k likes. 
 
You can also find lots of images of Persian Tiles blankets within the dedicated Facebook group, which you can find by following this link. The group has almost 20k members now, which is just incredible! 
 
If you are making Persian Tiles and need a bit of help, or just want to double check that you are working in the correct way, you can find a series of fabulous videos, made by Emma, on the Janie Crow YouTube Channel. 
 
For more information about this project and the official colourways I have designed, take a look at this link to kits and this one to paper patterns. Download versions are available via Etsy and Ravelry.
 
We have good stock of lots of other kits and patterns at the moment, so if you have been waiting for something specific to come back into stock, or just fancy having a little rummage around in our store, do take a look at this link.

​An important note for our customers in the US

New tariffs will apply to shipments that arrive in the US from 29th August. As a result, customers will be required to cover this import duty cost.
 
We are currently looking into how the new system is going to work and we have done lots of research into it already, but there seems to be a lot of conflicting information.
 
As a result we will be pausing shipments to the US from August the 20th for the duration of nine days. 
 
To be honest, there seems no way of ensuring that parcels sent to the US from now onwards will not qualify for the import duties, but if you are in the US and want to purchase items before the tariff officially comes into place then we suggest you make an order as soon as possible. 
 
Into the early part of next week, before we pause our dispatches to the US, we will do our upmost to get orders out as quickly as possible, but please be aware that you could still be charged import duty on delivery. 
 
You can find more information on the Royal Mail website here.
 
For customers who do not require shipping to the US, our prices will not increase.

Stylecraft Yarns have chosen the Love is Enough Fruit Garden blanket as their Summer Make Along project! The MAL started a couple of weeks ago on 29th July and all patterns are still available to download free of charge from the Stylecraft Yarns website here. You will need the original Fruit Garden patterns together with the Love is Enough yarn substitution documents for the project. 
 
The Fruit Garden pattern, including the details of Love is Enough, is also available in a book, which you can find by clicking here. The book includes crochet charts, clear step-by-step images, testimonials and more background information about my inspiration and design process as well as an additional colour way of the blanket project, called ‘Red House’.
 
All the supporting videos for the project remain available over on our YouTube channel too! If you fancy joining in with the make along you can find yarn packs on our website here or speak to your local Stylecraft Yarns stockist. 

We are really looking forward to exhibiting at Yarndale again in six weeks time. It is amazing how quickly the show comes round, year after year, and we feel incredibly fortunate to be getting ready to be there again in 2025. It really is a fabulous show and we love it! 
 
You can find more information about Yarndale, including the details of tickets still available, by following this link.
 
If you are already planning yarny events for the autumn, then you may like to know that I will be on the Stylecraft stand at the Knit & Stitch Show here in London in October. You can find more information about the show by following this link. 

Andy and I had the best day celebrating our Pearl Wedding Anniversary a couple of weeks ago at a party with friends and family. Of course I did my best to include as much crochet as possible, including the pearl edged doily I made for the cake and baskets of yarn and hooks on each table at our afternoon tea! 
 
You can find more images of our fabulous guests getting into the swing of all things yarn and crochet by following this link to our Instagram feed.

After a busy couple of weeks we are looking forward to a relatively quiet weekend at home. The weather forecast is good, so we are hoping to spend some time in the garden and have a date with some friends tomorrow for dinner, so its shaping up to be a nice couple of days.
 
I have been really busy with my crochet this week and have possibly over done it a little and my hands are a little creaky, so I will be resting them a little once Granny Square Day is over. I think it's really important to listen to your body when it is telling you that enough is enough and I'm finding more recently that even lots of typing and time on the PC aggravates my hands, so I think its time they had a bit of TLC…. maybe a home manicure will be on the cards too!

The tree in our neighbour's garden is fit to burst with figs, so we have been enjoying a kindly donated supply of them over the last couple of weeks. They really are delicious and just so pretty too! 
 
We have a couple of compost heaps in the garden and put all our vegetable waste into them, so most summers we get surprise plants growing as a result. The last couple of years we have had an abundance of butternut squash, but this year we have pumpkins! You can see the massive plant and peer through its leaves to the growing pumpkins over on the Janie Crow Lifestyle Instagram feed here.
 
That's it from me for now. We will be back in your inbox in a few weeks time with a Quick Catch Up email, which will include the details of some great new Emma Ball items, including some pretty new stitch markers and a new crochet hook roll. I hope all is good with you in the meantime and that you get to enjoy some yarn based TLC!  

With just a few days to go until Granny Square Day 2025, I thought I'd drop in to share my granny square journey with you. Emma has already shown you her reworkings of Jane's very pretty 'A Flower for Alice' square, named after Jane's Great Grandmother and how bunches of sweet peas from her sister Jules have inspired her colour choices. 

I've been having a think back to when I learnt to crochet 8 or 9 years ago, and successfully completing a granny square seemed like the pinnacle of achievement and oh so exciting. So proud was I of that first square that I have always kept it in the box of samples I always take along when I teach beginners classes to show learners who are convinced they'll never be able to make one!  Here it is...

I'm fairly certain there were others that came before it that didn't have 4 corners and looked more like something the cat dragged in. They were pulled back fairly swiftly but this is the first one that seemed to have the right bits in the right places, more or less at least. I'm quite critical about it nowadays, the stitches are very uneven and a very expert eye could spot an extra stitch  and a missing chain here or there. However, at the time this was a huge achievement and brought with it an almost obsessive need to carry on crocheting! 

The next challenge after that square was the solid granny square and to this day it remains my favourite of the two basic squares. It also taught me a lot about crochet construction. I needed to understand that because there were more stitches along each of the four sides, effectively taking up space, the corners needed to have a reduced number of stitches in them so that the square didn't 'buckle'. I'm quite a 'technical' crocheter and it's important to me to understand the why of something as well as the how, so this knowledge has been useful, for example, when adding a border of my own design to a blanket and understanding that too many stitches will cause rippling. Here's one of my favourite solid granny squares from the current temperature blanket project. 

Certainly over the years since I'm been crocheting it seems like granny squares have grown hugely in popularity, particularly for garments and accessories. All the crochet magazines seem to feature at least one project using granny squares in every issue. I wonder if part of the appeal is the opportunity to play with colour so freely as well as the nature of construction i.e. putting smaller parts together feels less overwhelming than making larger pieces?

At Jane and Andy's 30th wedding anniversary party recently the table centrepieces were bowls of small balls of yarn, crochet hooks, scissors and darning needles, together with patterns for those who needed them. So many of the guests joined in to have a go at a square, from those with experience to those who had never even picked up a crochet hook before. It was great fun. You can see Emma & I below, proudly showing off our handiwork - I even sewed the ends in, I don't know what came over me! 

So fast forward to today and as part of our preparations for Granny Square Day 2025, Jane suggested that if we fancied we could have a go at designing a square ourselves. I had a ponder to myself and wondered if I could create a representation of a double chrysanthemum flower by using small loops of chains to create the petals. So here is 'Cassandra'. A little work on the design is still needed, particularly to refine the leaves, but as a first attempt I'm quite pleased with it! 

We're all looking forward to Granny Square Day on Friday. Do check out the Simply Crochet Magazine socials to join in the fun and there will be a new square to look forward to from Jane. Until then, enjoy your crochet! 

Here at JANIE CROW, we have been busy getting ready for this year's Granny Square Day, which will take place in a fortnight's time on August 15th. Emma and Gemma have been very industrious making videos and social media content and I have designed a free motif, called Estella, which will be released on the day. If you want to find out more about Granny Square Day, make sure to have a look at Simply Crochet Magazine's Instagram account by following this link. 
 
We have a few other things to tell you about this week and I am very grateful to Gemma for helping me collate this Quick Catch Up email. I hope that between us, we have something that will interest you! 

Andy and I got back from our holiday in Spain last Thursday morning. We had the most amazing time travelling down through the country on the train, stopping off in some amazing cities on our way. We travelled via Paris and Barcelona to get down to the south, with our ultimate aim to visit Spain's Golden Triangle - the three Andalusian cities of Seville, Granada and Cordoba. 
 
We had the most amazing time away and I am feeling full of inspiration having visited so many incredible places, including the Alhambra in Granada, which was on my bucket list. 
 
We also visited a few smaller towns while we were away to find some of the crochet sun awnings. The mandalas shown in the image below were in Algarrobo and we found the filet crochet in the second pic in Alhurin de la Torre. Our friend Matt, lives in the picturesque town of Casares up in the hills near Malaga and he showed us all the lovely crochet that had popped up there. I adore the purple and lilac awning in the third pic and would love to do something like this at home, although I am not sure it will have the same kind of impact here in North London! 
 
You can see more images of the crochet I found on holiday on the Janie Crow Instagram account by following this link.

Our kit stock is fairly healthy at the moment and although a couple of colourways of Persian Tiles have gone out of stock, there are still plenty of kits available, all of which can be found on the website. You can have a browse of all our stock by following this link.

Over on the Stylecraft Yarns Make Along Group this week the Love is Enough make along began and already there are lots of fabulous images of motifs appearing in the group's posts. 
 
If you would like to join in but aren't sure how click here for all the info on how to find the patterns and the video tutorials. We do currently have kits in stock for the Fruit Garden Love is Enough colourway over on our website here. 

Over on the blog Gemma popped in briefly to share her progress on the Temperature Blanket project and to provide the August temperature recording chart. You can also find it by clicking right here. There have been some lovely rich colours appearing in the blanket over the last month or so. ​

If you don't already follow our social media channels you can find links at the bottom of this email. Do come and join us! ​

My good friend Juliet Bernard is leading a fabulous Stitchtopia city break to New York in October 2026. The break includes, among other things, two days at the New York State Sheep & Wool Festival and a Hudson River Cruise so it promises to be a wonderful experience. You can find out more on the Stitchtopia website here or by clicking on the image below. You can find out more about Juliet over on Instagram here. ​

If you enjoy listening to podcasts you might enjoy some of the most recent episodes of the Craft Talkin' podcast. On the 18th July Jamie and Merion chatted with the knitwear designer Jeanette Sloan and on the 20th July it was Emma Varnam's turn in the hotseat. Click on the images below to be taken straight to the respective episodes. 

Gemma's chosen book this month was ‘Crochet Journey’ by Mark Roseboom, also known as ‘The Guy with the Hook’. It's not a bang up-to-date publication but one that Gemma has wanted to look at for a while. There are 12 projects in the book, all inspired one way or another by Mark's travels around the world and the photography is a real treat. ​

​You can read Gemma's thoughts over on the Book of the Month blog here and if you the look of this book too head on over to the Search Press website. If you're in the UK you can get a 20% discount and free delivery by entering the code DD88 at checkout. 
 
In the image below you can see the Santa Maria Maggiore Rug project from the book, one of Gemma's shortlisted patterns to have a go at making. 

We found some really good food while we were away, so this week I am suggesting a few ideas for meals rather than a specific recipe. 
 
In Barcelona we had the most amazing Poke Bowl experience. Mine included soft boiled eggs and toasted pumpkin seeds and was truly delicious. Andy's scrambled eggs were good too, but I think he was a little disappointed that he hadn't ordered the poke bowl as well! 
 
Poke bowls are like a deconstructed sushi, that traditionally include rice and fish, but veggie options are always good and we often make them for dinner this time of year, chopping up vegetables and salad from the fridge and adding lentils, tofu and feta. They are always so yummy and making a poke bowl is such a quick and easy meal!
 
One of the salad options we saw on almost every menu while we were away was warm goat's cheese with dark honey and nuts. We had a really good one, which also contained preserved morello cherries and crispy onions, while we were in Seville. Definitely an idea we are planning on copying at some point as it was so good. 

Andy and I celebrated our thirtieth wedding anniversary this week. We are looking forward to a party with friends and family tomorrow, so I have been busy cake making and sorting out a few decorations over the last few days. The day we got married was particularly warm, but I don't think we are in line for such a good day tomorrow - whatever the weather, I am sure we will have a lovely time! ​

I have been working on some beaded decoration designs and had hoped to get more done while I was away, but with all the travelling it wasn't easy to work on anything complicated, so I made a beaded doily for our anniversary cake instead. 
 
I have made beaded doilies for my daughter's and niece's wedding cakes over the last couple of years and used an image of a traditional one I found on Ravelry as the basis for the design. There are hundreds of doily patterns on there, and most of them are easy to adapt by using different yarn. I have added pearl beads to the fan edging on this one.

With the holiday and party prep in the mix I have been avoiding the gym a little, but I am looking forward to getting back to training next week. We did a lot of walking while we were away, but I can already feel that my strength is waning a little after almost a month away from exercise. 
 
It is lovely to be away and have events in the diary, but I really like routine too, so I am looking forward to getting back to ‘normal service’ next week and settling down to some new design work too. 

Thanks so much to those of you who sent messages in response to my call out for project ideas a couple of weeks ago. I am working through my inbox and will reply next week. We had a couple of suggestions for table runners and mats, bags and even a waistcoat, so lots to think about! 
 
We will be back in your inbox in a couple of weeks time when we will be revealing my new Granny Square design and showcasing lots of others. It is always such a globally positive day for crochet, so I am really looking forward to it.  

Hello fellow yarn lovers, I hope this email finds you well. I am writing this whilst cooling down in an air-conditioned hotel room in Granada, Spain, after the most amazing visit to the incredible Alhambra this morning. Andy and I have been away on our summer holidays for a little over a week so far and have visited Paris, Barcelona, Seville and Cordoba, all of which have been fabulous and have provided me with lots of design inspiration. We have been travelling on the train as much as possible, so I have even managed to keep up with my crochet projects and jot down some ideas in my sketch book! I am feeling incredibly lucky and full of ideas for new designs!
 
While we have been away, Emma and Gemma have been expertly holding the fort at Janie Crow and between us, we have some things to tell you about this month. We even have a healthy stock of kits at last, so there may be something of interest within this email for you.

A few weeks ago I had a fabulous time with a lovely group of knitters on a Stitchtopia holiday in West Yorkshire. During the trip we had the pleasure of visiting the amazing collection at the Knitting and Crochet Guild in Slaithwaite. 
 
They have a huge collection of knit and crochet related things - including wooden knitter’s sheaths for holding needles - something I had never seen before! They provide an incredible resource and their collection means that items that could have been lost over the years will be saved for future generations. You can see some of the items in the collection in the image below. Isn't that tiger sweater just fabulous?
 
The guild has members all over the UK and membership gives you access to their archive and regional groups. Check out @kcguild for more information. ❤️ 🧶

We certainly haven't been short of sunshine over the last few weeks here in North London and the project this time of year always makes me think of is the Sunshine & Showers blanket. ​

​Sunshine & Showers was a crochet along project released in parts in a magazine back in 2017. Since then it has been through a pattern refresh and a whole set of supporting videos have been uploaded to our YouTube channel. 
 
This would make a great next-step project after completing our Zero to Granny video course as it was designed with beginners in mind. The patterns include step by step images and the project gets more difficult as you go along so it's a great learning tool. You can read more about it and find yarn packs for sale over on the website (click on the images above and below). It's a great stash-busting project too though! 

I'm so excited to share the news that Stylecraft Yarns have chosen the Love is Enough Fruit Garden blanket as their Summer Make Along project! The MAL begins on 29th July and all patterns are available to download free of charge from the Stylecraft Yarns website here. You will need the original Fruit Garden patterns together with the Love is Enough yarn substitution documents for the project. 
 
The Fruit Garden pattern, including the details of Love is Enough, is also available as a book here. The book includes crochet charts, clear step-by-step images, testimonials and more background information about my inspiration and design process as well as an additional colour way of the blanket project, called ‘Red House’.
 
All the supporting videos for the remain available over on our YouTube channel too!

If you fancy joining in with the make along you can find yarn packs on our website here or speak to your local Stylecraft Yarns stockist. ​

I will look forward to seeing your progress popping up on the Stylecraft Make Along Group over on Facebook. If you aren't already a member of the group you can find it here.
 
This time of year can bring gluts of fruit and vegetables and for Gemma that means a visit from a neighbour with marrows and large courgettes. The courgettes have been turned into soup and the marrow duly stuffed. If you have any suggestions for tasty marrow or courgette recipes do let us know! 

​It's just under a month until Granny Square Day is here. The date for your diary is 15th August so keep your eyes peeled for lots of colour and inspiration appearing on social media. The day is being hosted by Simply Crochet Magazine and I'm so proud to have been invited to be an Ambassador for the event this year! 
 
You can read more about what the team at Simply Crochet have in store here and to get you in the mood for making squares you can find a pattern I designed for Granny Square Day 2022 here, called a Flower for Alice. 

Gemma will be teaching a one day workshop on making a crochet hexi cardigan at Community Learning Partnership in South Oxhey (near Watford) on the 14th August and there are still a few places left. If you're local to Watford and fancy spending a day among like-minded companions, click on the image below for booking information. You'd be sure of a very warm welcome! ​

Working on a large project at this time of year can be a bit too warm so here are some of our suggestions for summertime projects. Click on the images for more information. ​

​With Granny Square day on the horizon and lots of ideas inspired by our trip to Spain, I am hopeful that the next few months will be full of crochet for me. I have been thinking a lot about creating more simplified crochet designs, so that my work can be accessible to beginners, and I have also been trying to think of smaller projects, so that not everything I create is blanket size! I get told a lot that crocheters don’t know what to do with all the blankets they make, so if you have an idea for smaller projects, do let us know.
 
During the summer months, when the garden is pretty and the light is good, I am better at posting on the Janie Crow Lifestyle Instagram account. I have been posting quite a bit while we have been away, (mostly food if I am honest!), so if you want to catch up with things other than crochet or are interested to see some of the places we have visited while away, you can find the account by following this link.
 
I hope that wherever you are, and whatever you have planned for the weekend, you have a lovely time, and I look forward to landing back in your inbox in a couple of weeks' time.

I have been away tutoring a workshop trip to West Yorkshire this week and so have been enjoying the company of a group of lovely knitters as we visited the Knit and Crochet Guild head quarters, Stylecraft's fabulous Mill, where we saw their yarn production first hand, and the amazing historical mill town of Saltaire. 
 
While I have been away, Gemma and Emma have been busy, brilliantly holding the fort on our social media platforms and Andy is back up to speed with sorting orders and answering your emails after a brief break, so it's nice to know that Janie Crow is in good hands.
 
It has been a busy fortnight since we were last here in your inbox and we have a few things to tell you about, including a nice stock update, so I hope you can spare a few minutes to catch up with our news. 

​We have two new yarn packs to tell you about this week. Wool Warehouse have now released the Yarnsmiths Merino versions of the Mystical Lanterns and Sandalwood blankets. We know that many of you prefer to use natural fibres and are really pleased with how these colourways have come out. 
 
The Yarnsmiths palette is a little brighter than the original Sandalwood but close enough to keep the same name and the Mystical Lanterns colourway is bright and fun. You can see them both in the images below - click on any of the images to find the yarn packs. They are currently on offer at 40% off so if you prefer natural fibres it's a great time to snap up a pack. 

The itinerary for my trip to Turkey in October next year is live on the Stitchtopia website and you can find it by following this link. There are now only a couple of spots left on the trip, so do take a look if you think it might be your kind of holiday. 
 
I am really excited about this trip already, even though it is over a year away, and I have been busy thinking about the knit and crochet projects I can design for participants to work on while we are away. 

We have a lot of kits back in stock this week and we've put a selection below, all of which can be found on the website. You can have a browse of all our stock by following this link.

Over on Instagram this month we celebrated the gorgeous Eastern Jewels version of Persian Tiles. Eastern Jewels was a collaboration between Lucia Dunn and Stylecraft and embodies the vibrant colourways Lucia is well known for as well as her way of embracing life in vivid technicolour! 
 
You can take a look at some of the wonderful makes we discovered using the tag #easternjewelsblanket by clicking here and we do currently have kits available over on our website here.

How are the temperature blankets coming along? Gemma has fallen a little bit behind, blaming the very hot weather that we've been having here in North London! We have found some great images of your work over on Instagram, which you can see below. The first photo from @soniams1 is tracking a Californian winter, while in the second photo @suelindt is showing off not one, but two blankets she has on the go! 
 
Do share your temperature blanket progress with us using the hashtag #janiecrowtempblanket25, so we can take a look at how your blankets are coming along. We'll pop it on the blog as well but in the meantime you can download the July temperature chart here. 

Over on Facebook we have been continuing with the Decade of Design series of posts and this time we focused on Frida's Flowers, which was a crochet along project released in collaboration with Stylecraft yarns in 2016. 
 
A lot of love has been shown for this design over the years and the patterns are still available to download free of charge from the Stylecraft Yarns website here. Lots of you told us that you loved making this blanket and for some of you it's your favourite JC project. 
 
Lucia Dunn worked her magic on this design too, with the incredibly pretty Primavera version of the blanket.

If you don't already follow our social media channels you can find links at the bottom of this email. Do come and join us! ​

There are lots of up and coming yarn shows around the country and UK Hand Knitting have complied a handy guide to what's on. Click on the image below or here to find out if there's a show near you. ​

Gemma's review this month was of Claire Montgomerie's Granny Square Flowers Card Deck, the hotly-awaited follow up to the Granny Square Card Deck. I have one of the sets too and it is fabulous! Gemma had a go at the Peony motif, using leftovers from her Bohemian Blooms project and you can see the results in the photos below. It's very pretty. 

You can read Gemma's thoughts over on the Book of the Month blog here and if you fancy getting your hands on this or the original card deck head on over to the Search Press website. If you're in the UK you can get a 20% discount and free delivery by entering the code DD88 at checkout. ​

I'm very excited to let you know that my blanket is finished! Well, certainly most of the hard work, with just a little bit of finishing to be done. There are a couple of ends from the joining process left to be sewn in and the blanket needs blocking to smooth out a few slightly ‘lumpy’ areas. Here it is in all its glory, together with a few close-ups of the detail… ​

I have loved making this blanket, and writing about it each month has helped to keep me motivated. Now the next question of course is, what shall I make now? Is there another Janie Crow project you'd like to see me work on? If so hit reply to this email and let us know. ​

The weather has been really good over the last few weeks, but it has been a little cooler over the last couple of days, especially in Bradford where I have spent the week with my workshop group. The cooler weather makes it a little easier to crochet, so I have been working on some beaded festive decorations that will be available later on in the year. Small portable projects are perfect for this time of year and I have really been enjoying working with beads again. 

We had a lovely time away last weekend with our daughter Summer, her husband Chris and the puppy! We spent a few days down on the south coast and had a lovely time by the sea! Stoick (who is now six months old) enjoyed every minute, but was shattered by Sunday after all the beach based adventures! ​

As usual there has been quite a lot of behind the scenes stuff going on here, and not so much exciting design work, so I don't have a huge amount to show for the last couple of weeks. I am still going to the gym quite a bit and keeping up with my new exercise habit - it seems to have become a way of life now, which is quite a relief as I don't have to force myself out of the door and down to the gym in the mornings, but I guess it's always easier to feel motivated when the weather is good.
 
I hope that you have something nice planned for the weekend and that you are able to squeeze in a little crafting time. We will be back in your inbox in a couple of weeks with the July newsletter, so do look out for that, and in the mean time stay safe and enjoy your crafting! 

Looking through the images I have taken on my phone over the last couple of weeks I can see that the predominant shade in my life has been pink! I have gravitated towards pink flowers, pink yarns and pink clothes, in much the same way as butterflies are more likely to be drawn to pink and purple too! Having bursts of brightness around me at this time of year makes me feel so happy and calm, and even on the cloudier days, it is so affirming to see a shock of gorgeous colour, don't you think?
 
I have had a busy couple of weeks and was even lucky enough to have a short break away with one of my oldest friends, so life is all good here at Janie Crow. I hope that it is treating you well too and that you have a few minutes to catch up with all my news.

I ordered this gorgeous box of sixty mini balls of Ricorumi cotton from Wool Warehouse last week, along with a couple of balls of the super cute ‘Nilli Nilli’ chenille (which you can find by following this link), and I got really inspired when I opened it on Tuesday morning! The colours are just so cheery and the little balls are perfect for smaller projects.
 
I am going to use the yarns to create some more beaded festive decorations and, whilst it does feel a bit strange working on a Christmas project in the relative heat of June, I am really enjoying playing with beads and this lovely yarn.

Emma and I have been a little out of love with Instagram lately, partly because we were very engrossed in our Zero to Granny project for quite a while, but also because the algorithms on there now seem to be throwing up a lot of stuff we don't actually want to see.
 
That said, we have always loved the way our feed looks and the way that you guys interact with us on there, so we are determined to give the platform more attention going forwards, starting from next week. You can find our feed by following this link, or by clicking on the image above.

Andy made this lovely crochet basket using a kit from The Left Hookery. 
It was the perfect vessel for displaying my gorgeous peonies from the garden recently and I am really proud of him for picking up his crochet hook again after a long break. The kits from the Left Hookery are perfect for those who want to make a relatively quick project and the leather accessories and high end yarns mean that the projects turn out so lovely.  
 
Andy has lined up the fabulous Glastonbury basket kit as his next project, but Tamsin has plenty more projects to choose from over on her website. You can find it by following this link. 

We have stock of quite a few yarn packs still, but as one of the shades that I tend to use a lot in my designs has been out of stock for a while, we are beginning to run low on some. You can find kits by following this link.
 
The warmer weather always makes me want to work on smaller projects that won't create extra warmth as I make them. This is a perfect time of year to work on shawls, cushions or bags, or even get well ahead of the game and start thinking about your Christmas decorations like me! 
 
Don't forget that you can also get Janie Crow project kits that contain natural fibres via Wool Warehouse, who currently have kits in stock for my Marrakesh version of Persian Tiles.
 
Within the next couple of weeks they will also have kits for a brand new version of Mystical Lanterns (shown below) that has been made using their Superwash Merino range of DK yarns. Of course it includes quite a few shades of pink and purple and the colours are so bright and scrummy that I am smitten by the palette.
 
I have created a copy of my Sandalwood version of Persian Tiles using the Yarnsmiths yarn range too and that should be in stock soon, so do keep an eye on the Jane Crowfoot area of their store for stock updates.

Emma and I recently spent a huge amount of time creating our Zero to Granny, Learn to Crochet Course and so we are incredibly pleased with the fabulous response it has received since we launched it in early May.
 
There is something so special about the humble Granny Square and I am really proud to have been asked to support Simply Crochet Magazine as a Granny Square Day Ambassador later on in the summer. The date is 15th August, so I am busy coming up with a new crochet design for the day. 

Due to a cancellation there is one last spot available on my West Yorkshire Workshop trip with Stitchtopia at the end of the month. You can find more information by following this link.
 
Although it is more than a year away, there are also now only a couple of places left on my workshop trip to Turkey in 2026. I am already incredibly excited about this tour, which has an amazing itinerary, jam packed with yarn and textile inspiration. You can find more information by following this link or by clicking on the images below.

I have been reading about the importance of protein in our diets and how we should be trying to have a good amount in all our meals. Evidence appears to show that it is particularly important during menopause and as we get older, so I have been more conscious of getting my daily amount. 
 
Our lovely Sarah, the clever brain behind our pattern query service, recently sent me a fabulous recipe book by Dr Rupy Aujla and I have already made quite a few things from it. Last weekend I made the daily bread using a recipe that is very similar to this one and it was delicious! Incredibly quick and easy to make, and packed to the max with protein filled seeds, nuts and oats, it is a bit high in calories, but you don't need much to feel full and the nut content means you don't need to add butter or a topping, so it's a total win!
 
On Wednesday I made the red bean stew with chocolate and spices from the same book and it was really good too. I used sugar free dark chocolate, which gave it a really rich taste and texture without adding a ton of sweetness. I did go a bit heavy on the jalapeños, but I do love them and the kale on the side gave the perfect combinations of flavours.
 
You can sign up to Dr Aujla's mailing list via his website or just peruse his recipes - I have lined a few up for next week already!

​Tomorrow is World Wide Knit in Public Day, which I like to think also makes it a great day to crochet out in the wild! I often have a ball of yarn and a hook in my bag, so crocheting in public is nothing different for me, but I am hoping that I might see others out and about tomorrow. I would love to know what you have planned for the day. I might take my project to the pub garden as the weather is forecast to be good for most of the day after a little rain early on. 
 
Talking of knitting, did you see this incredible lace wedding dress knitted by Marii over on Instagram? It is amazing! 

​I am signed up to try a Zumba class tomorrow morning. My strength training sessions have proved that I have terrible co-ordination, so I am hopeful that the class might help me with this. I am assured that it is really hard work, but great fun too, so I am really looking forward to it, even though I will undoubtedly be the hot sweaty mess at the back of the class, out of time and out of energy very early on! 
 
I have volunteered to puppy sit on Sunday, so I am looking forward to a day in the garden with some toys and a few games of fetch with the lovely boy. Andy is away this week, so I the pup will be my sole responsibility - I will need to have my wits about me, so not too many drinks in that pub garden tomorrow!
 
I had a lovely birthday a few weeks ago and I am really thankful for all your lovely messages. I really can't believe how fast the years are starting to pass, but it is really good to know that I am in much better shape this year than I have been in the past and that 56 feels better on me than most of the last decade! 
 
I hope that wherever you are, and whatever you have planned for the weekend, that you are in good place too and I look forward to being back in your inboxes in a fortnight with the Janie Crow Quick Update.

As usual it has been a busy couple of weeks here at Janie Crow and I have a few things to tell you about in this Quick Catch Up email, including the details of an exciting new Stitchtopia textiles workshop tour that I will be tutoring in Turkey next year. I hope you have a few spare minutes to catch up with all things Janie Crow! ​

I feel so lucky to have a great relationship with the team at Stitchtopia who work really hard to create the most amazing calendar of workshop trips and tours for craft enthusiasts. They are always open to my suggestions for places to visit and I am looking forward to sharing details of all the workshops I will be tutoring for them in 2026 very soon.
 
My ‘Ta-dah’ moment for today is that the itinerary for my trip to Turkey in October next year is now live and you can find it by following this link.
 
I am really excited about this trip already, even though it is over a year away, and I have been busy thinking about the knit and crochet projects I can design for participants to work on while we are away. 

I am a big fan of the work of Claire Montgomerie. She is a super talented stylist and crochet designer who has recently seen a huge amount of success with her series of Granny Square card decks.
 
These super little boxes of pattern cards are so handy for crocheters and each box includes instructions for fifty pretty grannies! Following the huge success of her first box of cards, Claire has now released the Granny Squares Flowers Card Deck and you can find it for sale on her website by following this link or by clicking on the image below. Keep an eye out for a review of the set coming soon on Gemma's Book of the Month blog. 

We continue to have healthy stock levels of kits and you can have a browse of all our stock by following this link.

​Over on Instagram this month news of the arrival of Zero to Granny, our video series for complete beginners, was received enthusiastically, and Emma was waxing lyrical about some some of the temperature blanket colour combinations appearing in nature. 
 
She was very excited to have discovered a nest of blue tits in her garden and was immediately able to see echoes of the colouring of those particular birds in the May square she was making. The colours of one of Gemma's May squares was reflected in the gorgeous apple blossom in Emma's garden, as you can see in the photo below. 

Do share your temperature blanket progress with us using the hashtag #janiecrowtempblanket25, so we can take a look at how your blankets are coming along and for the very well organised amongst you, you can download the June temperature chart here. ​

If you don't already follow our social media channels you can find links at the bottom of this email. Do come and join us! ​

​Instagram @ritamontezuma

The Isle of Wight Postal Museum has been yarn bombed by the Women's Institute in a bid to raise money for an Alzheimers charity! You can read about it here or click on the image of the amazing Noah's Ark topper below. ​

Gemma's review of the book ‘Crochet Makes from Scrap Cakes’ is now available to read over on the blog and whilst she hasn't quite been converted fully to the idea of making items with completely random colour changes, Gemma did test out one of the patterns to great success. ​

The pattern Gemma chose to try out was for a clutch purse and here is the end result. We think it's rather stylish! 
 
If you like the look of the book and fancy having a go at using up all those pesky little balls of leftover yarn, you can get it from the Search Press website with a discount of 20% and free postage in the UK, by using the code DD88 at checkout. Gemma's next review will be of the Granny Square Flowers Card Deck by Claire Montgomerie (as mentioned earlier in this newsletter). 

In last month's Quick Catch Up I reported that I had made good progress on my Bohemian Blooms project, with the rectangular Gordon and Fitzroy sections, together with four Harmony and four Virginia motifs, in place. I had also managed to add the two Bloomsbury strips that I had made already.  
 
My new target for the month was to make the two remaining Bloomsbury motifs, join the Omega motifs to the ends and then attach the resulting strips to the blanket. I managed to achieve this and actually make a start on the edging! 

There's something very satisfying about reaching the point of adding the edging/border to a blanket. It feels like a long undertaking is coming to an end, with mixed feelings of excitement about completion and slight fear of that familiarity not being there anymore!
​
So with great excitement, I look forward to sharing the finished blanket with you next month! Fingers crossed…

As vegetarians, Andy and I try to eat lots of beans and pulses as they are a great source of fibre and protein, so I was really excited when Sarah gifted me a fabulous book by Amelia Christie-Miller where every recipe includes a jar or two! We are really lucky to live close to a Turkish supermarket that sells lots of different beans in jars rather than cans, so this book is going to be super handy! 
 
When I visited Sarah a couple of weeks ago, her lovely husband Paul used the book to make a Bean Florentine and it was just so delicious! I am really looking forward to making it myself soon, but there are so many other mouth watering recipes in this book that I am going to have to make a list as I can't decide which one to do first! 
 
If you want to get hold of the book, you can find it for sale on Waterstones here. If you want to follow a similar recipe, you can find one by The Bold Bean Co, by following this link.

It's my birthday today, so I am looking forward to a little celebration with my family this evening and we have a busy weekend planned as we venture into the first few days of June. Can you believe we are almost half way through the year already? I have only just got used to writing '25!
 
I have a relatively quiet couple of weeks ahead and I am hoping to be able to put the finishing touches to a couple of projects and maybe start something new. I keep having unexpected things crop up and take a lot of my time these days so it will be good to get some serious crochet under my belt in June! Fingers crossed!

The response to our Zero to Granny Square, Learn to Crochet course has been so positive since we launched it last week and we are incredibly pleased with how it has been received. If you missed any of the information about it, I have included it again in this email.
 
I have had a busy week away at a meet and greet event and workshop at the fabulous Black Sheep Wools in Warrington and have only arrived back home earlier this afternoon, so please forgive the late nature of this email.
 
I have a few things to tell you about this month, including a lovely big stock update, so I hope you have some spare time to catch up with all our news.

​As I said in the introduction, the response to the Zero to Granny course has been amazing and it has been fabulous to see positive comments from so many beginners. Gemma, Emma, Sarah and I have quite a long history of teaching between us, so we made a combined list of all the things beginners tend to ask for help with and tried to cover as many of them as possible in the videos. Emma spent a huge amount of time checking and revisiting them so that we could be sure everything was ship shape before we launched last week and I am so grateful to her for her amazing attention to detail and hard work on this project.
 
We have created a total of thirteen new 'Zero to Granny' YouTube videos, all of which are free to access and sit alongside our existing collection of almost two hundred technique videos on the platform. The videos are listed within a playlist in number order, with the first one (1), entitled The Basics, gently talking beginners through how to choose yarn and hooks, how to make a slipknot and tension yarn. Our second video (2) shows in-depth the process of making a chain, whilst also explaining how to recognise the front and back of each one and how to count them. Each subsequent video shows another technique so that crocheters can build their knowledge of basic stitches. By video number seven (7) we move to working through a Granny Square pattern, a true rite of passage for any new crocheter.
 
We have covered a huge amount of information within our videos and, whilst we acknowledge that they cannot replace the benefits of learning 'in real life', we hope that they are a comprehensive resource for those wanting to embark on their crochet journeys.
 
I gave my young cousin Lizzie a crochet hook a couple of weeks ago when she came to see us at Wonderwool as she was thinking of having a go at learning. I told her the Zero to Granny course was coming and so I was really proud to receive the text and image below last weekend - I am sure she won't mind me sharing it here!
 
If you fancy taking a look at our free course, you can find the dedicated web page here and you can find the YouTube video playlist here. We hope that you will love it!

All our YouTube videos are provided on the platform as free resources, so if you have watched any of them and have found them helpful, please be sure to click the ‘like’ icon and leave a nice review. We put a lot of time into our video tutorials and thankfully the majority of comments are good, but it can be hard when they are negative (or just downright rude!). We tend to get these kinds of comments on the videos where (we think) people are expecting not to have to pay for a written pattern and want to be shown the whole motif. 
 
We feel it is pointless to cover straightforward ‘plain’ rounds or stitch combinations in our videos, so it could be that people are frustrated that not all steps are shown. Emma and I often debate whether we should be removing comments where viewers discuss the rounds and explain them to each other, or whether we should switch off comments all together, but I am not sure this sits right with me. We would love to hear your thoughts on this….

We have partnered with the fantastic team at Wool Warehouse to create a yarn kit for my Marrakesh version of Persian Tiles using their gorgeous YARNSMITHS Merino DK Superwash yarn. You can find the kit here.
 
To celebrate the release of this fabulous kit, which contains all the yarn and the printed yarn substitution document, you can currently get 40% off the price and save yourself more than £60! 
 
As the colour palette in the YARNSMITHS Merino DK Superwash is so large (with 120 colours to choose from) this version of the blanket is pretty much identical to my original version, which was made using Stylecraft Yarns - you can find a link to the original kit lower down this email. 
 
The new kits, that use the Merino DK yarn, have been selling really fast, so head over to the Wool Warehouse website if you would like to nab one!

I had a really fabulous couple of days in the Craft Barn at Black Sheep Wools in Warrington. On Wednesday I was in store for a meet and greet event where I chatted to crafters about my projects and the joy of crochet, then on Thursday I tutored a crochet wreath workshop where participants made pretty crochet flowers from my Beaded Decorations pattern.
 
I was really blown away by the beauty of Hilary's amazing version of Spirit of Flora which she brought along to show me. She has used Felted Tweed from Rowan to make it and I think her colour palette is just so gorgeous, don't you! Black Sheep Wools are a Rowan flagship store, so if you fancy taking a look at their yarn range, you can do so by following this link.

​We had some friends over for a few drinks in the garden last weekend and my friend Julia brought along some super yummy jammy slices that she had made. Ingredients included oats, almonds, chocolate chips and jam and they really were delicious, so I asked her for the recipe so that I, in turn, can share it with you:
 
Ingredients
225g Plain Flour
1 tsp Baking Powder
100g Caster Sugar
85g Light Brown Soft Sugar
225g Butter
150g Rolled Oats
225g Raspberry or Strawberry Jam (Julia used Raspberry)
100g Plain Chocolate Chips (Julia used White Chocolate)
25g Flaked Almonds
 
Method
Preheat oven to 190/375/Gas mark 5. Line a 30 x 20cm (12 x 8in) rectangular baking tin. Sift flour and baking powder in a large bowl, add the sugars and mix well. Add the butter and rub in with fingertips until it resembles fine breadcrumbs. Stir in the oats.
 
To make the base, press three quarters of the mixture into the tin. Bake for 10 minutes. Spread the jam over the cooked base, then sprinkle over the chocolate chips. Place the remaining crumble mixture and almonds in a bowl and stir. Sprinkle on top of the jam and press down gently. Bake for a further 20/25 minutes until golden brown. Leave to cool in the tin and cut into slices to serve.

We have been pup sitting the gorgeous Stoick this afternoon and have him with us for a few days now, so there is not a lot of point in planning too many things other than puppy playing! It is our daughter Summer’s birthday tomorrow and she shares the date with my Dad, so it’s a special weekend in our family. Happy Birthday you two! ​

If you have been reading my emails for the last couple of months you may remember that Andy and I took on an eight week diet and exercise ‘shred’ programme mid way through March. Our challenge is now over and so we are navigating a slight increase in calories and a decrease in exercise. It has been a really worthwhile experience and I am definitely coming out of it feeling much better.
 
This time last year I got to the point where I knew something had to change. I had constant strains and injuries, bad knees, and aching shoulders, which I put down to my hunched position of crocheting. I was working hard and not making room in my life for much else, other than at the weekends, which were often full of food and a celebratory drink or three, which ended up making me feel even more rubbish on a Monday and yet, week after week, I perpetuated the whole routine again.
 
Last May I had a conversation with Emma which gave me the kick start to sort my life out and you can read more about how things have changed since then over on the Janie Crow Lifestyle instagram page here.
 
So, that is it from me for another couple of weeks. I have a busy diary through to the end of May and Gemma and I will be back in your inbox with a Quick Catch Up email on the 30th May. I hope life treats you well in the mean time and that you get some time to do some serious crafting!