This crochet podcasting lark…

In the last few weeks I’ve started to do something I never thought I would. I’m making videos of myself talking and then putting them all over the internet. Eeeeek… And people have been watching, some of them on their giant TVs in their living room! So why have I done such a strange and slightly bonkers thing as crochet podcasting?

Since Christmas I’ve got into watching podcasts and, one day, I just got the idea that this would be something that I would like to do. I kept telling myself not to be daft and that I would be horribly embarrassed to even watch a video of myself never mind to broadcast one.

But the niggling voice somewhere in my subconscious kept chattering away and eventually, about 6 weeks ago, I decided to have a go. Making videos is something that I tried last year and did a few tutorials but the whole editing thing was so time consuming and the picture quality was generally quite poor, that I gave up. Since then I have got a better phone, one that I bought specifically because it had a good camera so I decided to have another go.

The start of my crochet podcasting adventures….

My first (and painful) step was to spend a couple of days really finding my way around iMovie, the editing software I’ve got free on my Mac computer. Once that was done, I thought that I would have a better chance of making some crochet tutorial videos, even if the podcasting didn’t work out.

The internal voice then became a shout and I just had to set up the camera one day on my aging and dusty tripod and have a go. I will spare you the technical anguish of me doing things wrong and then not being able to see what I was filming (the best camera is the back phone on the camera, which means I can’t see what it sees)… Let’s just leave it that I have sorted the mirroring thing now, phew.

It was a great surprise that once I started chatting to the phone, which did seem very weird to begin with, I actually enjoyed doing it. But I still thought that I would take one look at the video on the computer screen after importing into iMovie and my toes would curl and I would press the delete button within seconds.

So it was even more of a surprise that I started watching and actually felt quite interested in what I was saying… What?!?!? No, I couldn’t believe it either… could crochet podcasting be in my future???

Anyway, to cut a long story short, I went through the editing process of the first podcast, left it a day and then rewatched it and decided in would be going to YouTube. Its journey was not without some peril, bearing in mind the slow speeds of the t’internet in rural East Yorkshire, but finally it was ready and I pressed the ‘public’ button.

Episode 1

Then I did the whole thing again – three more times!

Episode 2

Episode 3

Episode 4

And soon to be Episode 5

Fast forward to now and I’m in the process of preparing my fifth podcasting episode and I’m absolutely LOVING it!!! Thank you so much for all of your lovely comments and encouragement and support and I hope to now be able to continue and chat about all things crochet for as long as people will listen… or until the technology moves ahead at sufficient breakneck pace that I need to regroup.

In the meantime, please do subscribe to the Crafternoon Treats channel on YouTube. We now have almost 600 subscribers and I’ll be doing loads more giveaways in the next couple of months, just for subscribers.

Other crochet podcasts and knitting podcasts

I’ve also been watching loads more knitting, yarn and some crochet podcasts. There aren’t many out there yet but its amazing what videos are being made about crafting and yarn these days. I’m preparing another blog post that lists a few podcasts that I think you might enjoy so keep a look out for that later in the week.

One thing I’ve noticed is that knitting and crochet in the YouTube community is no longer exclusively done by women – men are discovering the real therapeutic and practical benefits too and I thought I would close this post with a couple of really inspiring videos that I found today. Inspiring because they show that working with your hands and with yarn is a pleasure that all of us can share in. Enjoy!

The man who knits

This is a professionally made video about EJ Jones, who lives in a village near Columbus, Ohio, USA…

Knitting behind bars

A video about two women who have set up a progamme to teach inmates in a US prison to enjoy knitting