I blame it all on social media. We were vacationing for a few days by the lake.

It was gorgeous.

I wanted the perfect Instagram picture, so I set it up on the wall by the beach.

The picture turned out great.

Then the wind blew.

My hook now resides deep in a crevice at the edge of the lake, never to be used again until some unsuspecting fisherman hooks a hook.

That’s my story. That’s why I only got three squares done. Because my hook was lost to me.

Or because I was on vacation enjoying my family. The gaffe with the hook just gave me a great excuse.

If this is your first time reading about my current crochet challenge, make sure you go back and read this post for a refresher of my self-imposed rules. As I post each square, I will post the name and difficulty rating given to each square by Diana Krenz in her book 100 Vibrant Granny Squares, which I’m using for this challenge. Then I will give my difficulty rating and notes about the yarn I used and any new stitches, etc., that I encounter. See squares 1-2 here and squares 3-5 here and 6-11 here and 12-19 here and 20-25 here and 26-31 here and 32-40 here and 41-46 here and 47-50 here and 51-52 here.

I started using Paintbox yarns when it became harder to get Stylecraft yarns in the US. Paintbox has a billion colors to choose from which is an attribute I love. It is soft and acrylic (which I prefer to natural fibers for long-term washability and durability). The colors I used in this square were leftover from this project, which I just finished.

This square, without a doubt, gets a higher difficulty rating. The way the popcorns are made to look like they are floating involves changing color midrow on occasion. I have done many projects involving stranded colorwork this way, but if you haven’t you’ll find this to be more difficult.

I absolutely love this square. It is close to 12″, has tons of gorgeous texture, and is heavy. It uses a lot of yarn!

This square was the last of the 9″ square patterns. There are more that can be 9-inch or 12-inch. I have to contemplate what I plan to do with this square to decide how many more 9-inch I’ll make.

I used the same yarn as the previous square and leftover purple from this project. This pattern was written for two colors and I think it looks very smart.

After the previous square, this one was easy. I’ve done the stitches before and the instructions were familiar.

This was the square that caused so much trouble. What did I expect from a square called Pennywise? Wasn’t that clown an expert at disappearing things? Maybe it wasn’t the wind that disappeared my hook after all…

This square used more leftover yarn along with some stash yarn that I hadn’t used yet. This square has blanket written all over it, but I’m trying to make good decisions with my last few projects. It’s odd working on squares that I do not have a vision for yet.

This pattern had six diagrams! Six! That tells you how detailed the instructions are. I had to frog a bit on the round of dark purple. It is actually three rounds and I cut my yarn after the first round because I was relying too much on diagrams instead of written instructions. No harm done. It was just a few more ends to weave in at the end.

My overall thoughts: If Pennywise was as cute and cuddly as this square, no one would be scared of him. (I probably shouldn’t have watched It when I was twelve…)

I’m going to keep chugging on my challenge. Hopefully next week I will have more squares to show.

Keep stitching, Heidi