I’ve been tending to a sick 5 year old which is never fun, but it has allowed me to sit during the day and work on my freeform purse.  As you can see I’ve made some headway!

 

My two free form experiments (Modern Irish FreeForm Crochet and FreeForm Crochet) have changed the way I look at this craft.  It actually makes me feel like an artist while I’m working, and I have never thought of myself that way.  If you haven’t given freeform a try and you like the look of it, I highly recommend checking out the two Craftsy classes I took to get started in this style.  I am not affiliated with Craftsy in anyway, but the freeform classes by Myra Wood are fun and fantastic.  If you are interested in the craft, but don’t want to pay, there are plenty of tutorials out on the web.

Now, without further ado, here are my

Top 5 Take-aways from FreeForm Crochet

1.The Rules Are, There Ain’t No Rules

There aren’t supposed to be any rules with FreeForm, but there seems to be plenty of guidelines.  The guidelines include specific stitches and appliqués, joining methods, and color changes.  These were great references because, as a beginner, if I got stuck these guidelines could pull me into the next area.  Still, if you go off the grid and do your own thing that is even better, and probably adds more Free to your Form.

2.  You Don’t Use a Pattern

Until now ALL of my crochet was done with a pattern.  Even if I made up my own design, I would write the pattern out and follow it as I worked.  I can’t tell you how many times I have lost track on a page and repeated the same stitch (or section) and then had to rip it all out and do it again.  I do most of my crochet at night, and almost always my mind is getting droopy from the day.  I make a lot of mistakes reading patterns, and do a lot of frogging.  With FreeForm you make it up as you go along, or you do your work based off a template, so the only thing that will hold you back is how creative you want to be.

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3.  You Don’t Have to Count

This goes along with number 2, but I feel it deserves it’s own space because it completely revolutionized my way of making circles.  As you can see below, I made a lot of circles to work on my purse, the only “guideline” was that they had to remain flat.  Therefore I added stitches when I thought it was necessary, and I tore some out if they started to warp.  The frogging was much less than when I read a pattern, though, which made it lots more fun.

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4.  Choose Your Own Color Changes

The reason I did a three part series on color exploration was purely selfish.  I was planning to do this free form project and wanted to have colors pop and not clash.  I learned a lot, and I hope you did too.  Plus, it gave me oodles of inspiration for future FreeForm projects.  My one “guideline” that I used throughout this piece was that no same color laid next to each other.  This rule helped me choose which color to use next, in fact, the bigger the fabric got the more I felt it was telling me what to choose.  Groovy.

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5.  Depth Does It All

After I got some circles made, it was time to do some overlay crochet.  Like you see in the mandala craze we crocheters are experiencing, the overlay adds such beauty and depth to the piece, it takes it to another level of complexity.  I learned a lot, and am still learning about adding depth to a piece, because it really does it all.  My opinion, the more you add, the better.

Let me know if you think you’ll try out FreeForm!  Happy  Crocheting!

 

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