Marlene's back porch · open every afternoon

Pull up a chair — the afghan's half done.

One crochet pattern a week, worked slowly on the glider and written down the way a neighbour tells it: every round, its count at the end, in US terms, and an honest word about how long it really took. The porch is new and the first one is not finished yet. Everything here is free, and none of it is in a hurry.

Ask for the porch letter
This week on the porch — Cozy Granny Square Hooded Sweater Crochet Pattern took me most of a week, an hour a night
A puff-stitch sunflower granny square in gold, avocado and cream, lying on the porch glider in afternoon light
on the glider today: a sunflower square, not written down yet

Before the first one goes up

What a pattern here will look like

So you know what you are waiting for.

Materials · every round · the count in brackets · the honest time

One square a week at most, worked all the way through on the glider before a word of it is written down. If a round does not come out square, it does not go up that week.

Then it is written the way a neighbour would say it to you: the yarn and hook that were actually used, one round to a line, and the stitch count in brackets at the end of every single round so you can check yourself as you go. US terms, with the UK word beside it where they differ.

At the bottom, how long it really took Marlene — evenings, interruptions, the round that had to come out twice. Not the number a pattern is supposed to say.

Took me: the last line of every pattern, and it is never rounded down

Have the first one sent to you

Start slow

Four steps from a length of yarn to your first blanket

This is the order the Tuesday circle teaches in. Take a week on each step if you like; the porch is not going anywhere.

The whole path, with times
  1. Learn the three stitches Chain, single, double. Open the stitch drawer and swatch each one until your hands stop arguing.
  2. Your first square: the classic granny Four rounds, counted out loud at every corner. It will be the first pattern written down here.
  3. A few more squares, then join two Tension settles around the fourth square. Then slip-stitch two together and you have made a thing.
  4. Your first blanket Twenty squares for a baby, thirty-six for a lap. One square, one set of colours, one season.

Sunday evening, from the glider

The porch letter

Dear neighbour,

When a pattern has gone up that week, I write a short letter on Sunday evening saying what it is, what the circle made of it, and how long it took me. Some Sundays there is no pattern and no letter. That is the whole arrangement: nothing else is ever sent, and leaving is one click at the bottom.

Nothing has gone up yet — the porch is new and the first square is still on the hook — so the first letter will be the one that says it is finished. There is no back catalogue waiting behind this box and I am not going to pretend there is.

If you would like it, leave your address below. If you would rather just read, that is fine too — nothing on the porch is behind this box.

— Marlene