I'd been curious about mosaic crochet for a while and had enjoyed seeing Charlie's @crochetandfairylights passion for the technique so when I saw the Sholach blanket doing the rounds on socials I knew that it was going to be my first mosaic crochet project! You can find the pattern here....
Ravelry: Sholach Mosaic Afghan pattern by Abi McIntyre
I absolutely loved the look of Sholach and I had got just the yarn for it in my stash.........Hobbii Dream Colour in Wintergreen which I'd had for several years just waiting for the perfect project. Trouble is I only had a couple of balls of it and Hobbii had discontinued that colourway so I ordered the colourway Mystery Forest hoping it would be similar and it was...phew! Both colourways are a lovely subtle variegated greeny blue and I used both Wintergreen and Mystery Forest in my blanket. My contrast colour was Drops Fabel in Off White, all these yarns are 4ply weight and I used a 3mm hook.
Mosaic crochet is much easier than it looks. There's no carrying yarn, you just use one colour at a time, and only two stitches involved, double crochets and treble crochets. The picture effect is created by working into either the front or back loop of the stitch along the row. The Sholach pattern is brilliantly written by Abi and you can work from charts or from a written pattern.
I started Sholach in autumn 2022 and it all started off so well, I enjoyed the first part but then things got a bit tedious for me. I really tried to love the technique but it just wasn't holding my attention and it ended up at the bottom of the WIP box for months. One of my craft and chat buddies had also started Sholach around the same time and we joked about having a race to see who would finish first and even that didn't spur me on.......which is strange as I'm ridiculously competitive!
I'm no quitter though and despite wanting to abandon it many times over the last couple of years I persevered with it in small doses and eventually I got all the picture parts finished.
The only trouble with mosaic crochet worked like this is the zillions of ends it produces. The pattern suggested working an 'envelope border' to hide the ends which is what I decided to do however in hindsight I think I would have preferred to sew in the ends! I don't particularly like the puffiness of the envelope border and it was a continuation of the tedium for me so it's not something I can see myself doing again. I actually don't mind sewing ends in and if I do ever have another go at a mosaic crochet project (unlikely!) I will probably do that instead.
But it's finished and although I'm not hugely happy with my finished article, it's not a straight as I would have liked, it's been good to try something new if only to learn that it is not for me!
Thanks for reading
Faye x
(Special mention to the nasty person who not only publicly accused me of stealing this pattern but also when she realised she got it wrong rather than apologising she insulted me a bit more 🤷♀️)