My Josie Top from ‘My Crochet Wardrobe’…

Hello Everyone… how are you all? I hope you are keeping well during this worrying time of Coronavirus around the world…❤️ I’ve been grateful for my crochet… keeping me busy and providing a distraction. Being able to stay in touch with each other online is also a good thing… ❤️❤️

This blog post is all about fellow crochet designer Cassie Ward and the new crochet book she has recently had published called ‘My Crochet Wardrobe‘…

And to celebrate the launch of her new book Cassie and the publishing company ‘Tuva Publishing’ have arranged a virtual Instagram book tour which I was asked to be a part of. 🙂 30 designers and makers from Instagram were each sent a copy of the book and asked to crochet something from it. Each day for a month a different person shares their make and their thoughts from the book. It’s been fun to follow along and today is my day on the book tour! So I’m sharing my make here and over on my Instagram too…

I was really lucky to meet Cassie at Yarndale last year…

I’ve followed her for a while and she has designed some of the most wonderful crochet garments! She’s a regular contributor to Inside Crochet magazine and here are some of her designs from the magazine…

‘My Crochet Wardrobe’ is a book with 15 garment designs including 2 tops, 4 jumpers, 2 dresses, 2 ponchos and 4 cardigans / jackets. I decided to make a top called the ‘Josie Top‘. It was so lovely to be crocheting from someone else’s pattern! It’s been a while since I’ve been able to do this, with my own design work keeping me busy, but making the Josie Top was a real joy. I even crocheted a little tension square and was pleased to match Cassie’s tension…

The original design is in one colour but I decided to make it in nautical stripes using some cotton yarns I already had…

I rediscovered the joy of simple crochet with this design… that desire to keep going for ‘just one more row’ and before you know it a whole front panel is done! 🙂

And here are some photos of that front panel with Salty…

Oh it’s been so wet and windy here for weeks now… I’ve really struggled to get beach photos but just about managed it here! It’s the wind that makes it particularly difficult… just look at Salty’s ears!

The Josie top is a simple design with a matching front and back panel. It’s easy to wear and I really love it…

A few more windy beach photos…

And here is a video taken for my Instagram Stories in which I talk about the book. It was suggested that everyone taking part in the book tour tries to get in front of the camera to do a video and I decided to record mine on the beach! I thought it would be nice to share it here on my blog too… enjoy!! 🙂

Cassies’s designs are usually very very colourful. The patterns in this book are show cased in muted solid colours. It really means that you can see the design clearly and the book encourages you to experiment with different yarns and colours! 🙂

Here’s a snapshot of the other designs in the book which are all very wearable…

It’s been a pleasure to receive this book and be able to make one of Cassie’s designs. My daughter is making the ‘Roll Neck Poncho’ and some lovely ladies from my crochet group are doing another poncho design, the ‘Flower Poncho’ made up of 18 hexagon motifs…

I’d love to make more garments from the book… and now I have a copy, one day I hope I will. 🙂 The book is in US crochet terminology which is worth noting. And all the patterns also have a chart / diagram which is so helpful to refer to and just brilliant.

So there you have it… my ‘Josie Top’ from ‘My Crochet Wardrobe’… 🙂

Happy Crocheting Everyone… 🙂 🙂