finished project from a GREAT crochet book

[Donnachaidh]

Something I finished last year -



closeup on stitches -



The book is titled - Blue Ribbon Afghans from America's State Fairs" 40 prize winning crocheted designs by Valerie Van Arsdale Shrader

There is a copy of it for sale on alibris.com. This afghan was on the cover (guess that's why I bought it). It's a great book with lots of stunning patterns.

http://www.alibris.com/search/search.cfm?qwork=9125769&wtit=Blue%20Ribbon%20Afghans&matches=19&qsort=r&cm_re=works*listing*title

[eleny]

1. What a fun beauty

It looks like an adventure with all the colors and patterns. A person would never be bored working on this one.

[Donnachaidh]

2. There are more in this book I want to do

One is the Tunisian crochet, but the hook is extended to 35 inches! It looks like a muted plaid. I'll have to scan the photo. I may even play with extending one of my older needles.

[eleny]

3. Afghans can get pretty heavy on the regular long hooks

A 35" hook is a monster. But this has me curious. Plaid sounds really nice. A good project to warm the lap during winter.

I'm imagining a yardstick with a hook on the end. Yipes! Perhaps a hook could be made from a dowel.

[Donnachaidh]

4. he removed the endstop, and replaced ith with some sort of wire

I wish they had put a photo of it in the piece, but they didn't. I'm going to do a search on google, because it was noted that you could also purchase hooks "pre-fixed", but who knows how much they would cost.

[eleny]

5. Seems like it would be easy enough to wittle a hook on the end of a dowel

But dowels aren't as silky as a store bought hook.

A wire to the end of the regular afghan hook. Hmmmm. I wonder how hard it is to maintain gauge. That afghan sounds like a challenge between the specialized hook and plaid patterning.

[AllegroRondo]

6. you could get a stock metal dowel and braze a hook on the end

a bit of polishing would make it smoother/more slippery than wood. You can get them at the hardware store in many standard diameters, up to about a half inch.

[My Good Babushka]

7. That afghan is gorgeous!

I really need to make a new one. I don't like stitching all the crochet motifs together, but knitting seems to stretch out so fast. I may look into that pattern book. Thanks for the heads up and the great pictures.

[Donnachaidh]

8. then you might want to look for the book listed above

it has some scrumptious stuff in it. I rarely buy books for full price, but this one had so many nice patterns I had to have it.

[My Good Babushka]

9. I will look for it

I wrote the name of it down in my notebook. Thanks again!

[EFerrari]

10. That's beautiful!