About Gaynor
Gaynor is a crochet-obsessed teacher and pattern designer from Wokingham in Berkshire.
She learned to knit and crochet as a child, trained and worked as a French teacher for over 10 years, and then picked up her hook again 10 years ago. Gaynor jokes that she is “lucky enough to call myself a full-time hooker…”
In 2012, Gaynor set up The Barkham Hookers crochet group with a few friends in her living room. They now run 4 group sessions a week as well as many regular private lessons with over 600 members on Facebook alone. You can find them on Facbook via The Barkham Hookers’ Charity Group, where many of their charity projects can be seen.
She is very proud of the fact that The Barkham Hookers raised over £60,000 for various national and international charities, £52,000 of that for the Royal British Legion Poppy Appeal. Click here to watch Gaynor share a quick and easy method for crocheting a poppy.
Gaynor loves designing and making blankets, many of which can be found as free CALs (crochet-a-longs) on her blog: Confessions of a Barkham Hooker. During the pandemic, she designed the Coronavirus CAL, posting a new section daily then weekly with colourful pictures and detailed notes.
Signature Technique
Crochet Blankets incorporating a variety of patterns and colours
Top Tips
- Crochet is very forgiving. Don’t be afraid to adjust or change the pattern to suit your needs or likes. And remember, if in doubt pull it out!
- Use a larger hook to work a long foundation chain to avoid it curling up.
- If you work quite loosely choose a slightly smaller hook than advised and a larger hook if you work tightly.
- When working in rows do not forget to work into the last stitch – – which is probably the chain 2/3 made at the start of the previous row.
- Use military buttons as the centre in poppies to add something special.
- If you are working with several balls of yarn, chuck them on the floor and let gravity help you keep them untangled.
Videos
Patterns
Posts
What size do you need to cut with the rotary cutter?
The rotary cutter means that you dont have to use templates and here are some simple rules that you can apply throughout your patchwork: On the Flying geese fast no-waste method you just need to add 1 1/4" to the finished size you need for the larger square so for 4" you need 5 1/4" and then 7/8 to the size of the smaller square - so again you are right at 2 7/8 and if you want to enjoy the video on this click here: The other magic numbers for rotary cutting are as follows:
For a plain square you add 1/2" so 4" finished becomes 4 1/2" For a half-square triangle we now add 1" - so cut 5", - and once sewn trim back to be an accurate 4 1/2" before sewing
and for quarter-square triangles we add 1 1/4" (as per the flying geese) and pay attention to the seam allowance we sew!
Do you love Butterflies?
I do and certainly can't resist fabric that has them on; not so keen on moths however. Still follow this link and you will see them in a whole new light: North Carolina-based artist Yumi Okita creates beautiful textile sculptures of moths, butterflies, and other insects with various textiles and embroidery techniques. The pieces are quite large, measuring nearly a foot wide and contain other flourishes including painting, feathers, and artificial fur.
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