A lady asked me to make her a crocheted jacket - already started by her grandma before she died. Not a knitter or crocheter herself, she wanted me to finish the jacket. However, she waited some weeks before she got the yarn, and the part that was already done, to me. She forgot to bring the pattern however, but presented me with a long piece of crochet in a very old cream wool, that had been washed, I suspect.
When she finally sent me the scanned pattern by email I could not read it. So then she posted it to me by snail mail - a photocopy, that had the top two lines and the right hand last three words of every sentence, missing! Ok - so then I had to work out what the missing words were. Then I started the yoke. Reading through the pattern for the patterned sleeves, I realised that the pattern was supposed to be crocheted downwards from the yoke, and the skirt of the matinee jacket then was continued on from there. But the skirt part had already been done by her grandma - and in a different stitch pattern from the one in the pattern!
Ok - back to the lady - and after discussion, she didn't want the original piece touched because it was the last thing her grandma had crocheted before she died. Fair enough. So I continued the yoke and made a scalloped edge round it. Then I had a think. The original crocheted piece was way too wide and I suspect was not made for this jacket at all - what to do? So I gathered the centre and then pinned the sides to the yoke at each front, making the fronts lie flat. Then I slip stitched the top edge of the skirt piece to the back loops of the top of the scalloped edge.
All good so far. Then I went back and from the original pattern, which is a slightly different pattern stitch from the skirt part, crocheted the sleeves.
Ok - but now I have a matinee jacket with a skirt that is about 40 cm long! Back to the lady - she met me at a Knit and Natter one Saturday at the local library - and I explained that if she would allow me to unravel half of the original skirt made by her grandma - I could then make a matching bonnet and booties in the yarn I would get from that. She looked at me in a weird way - then asked if I meant to fold the skirt over in half and sew it up ! - realising I was talking to someone who had no crochet knowledge at all - I showed her how the skirt bottom was made and that by simply pulling the last stitch apart I could carefully shorten the skirt, and then finish it off with a scallop to match the scallop on the yoke. Light bulb moment!! She was thrilled that I could do this!
So home I went, and in no time had the bonnet and booties made - I had just enough to make them too! Had to do the edging of the scallops with the new wool, which of course as you can see from the pics, is a slightly paler colour than the original cream coloured wool her grandma had used!
Found some cream satin ribbon, and Voila! the crochet set from hell was finished!
It is sitting waiting to be picked up right now. This lady did pay me for it - but I think it worked out at a rate of about $2.00 per hour !!!!
