Tackling jacquard crochet

It's halfway through January and I thought

by now I'd have done a lot of yarn work.

But I do have a good excuse why that didn't happen.

My oldest son has been home for the holidays,

and I drop everything anytime I've got my whole family together.

Things have now returned to normal so

I've picked up my hook again 

and tackled a project that I've had on hold.

since 2009 (2 years!!)

This pattern is made mainly using a technique
called jacquard crochet.
It's basically a technique that works with
strands of colours hooked into the back loop.

When I first tried it I was having a lot of difficulty
with the tension since jacquard crochet

is much tighter and less stretchy than regular crochet.
I'm a tight crocheter as it is so
that didn't help.

I also found all the new techniques

a little overwhelming so I

put it aside until I felt more confident.

 I've decided to start completely over again.

Here is a picture of how far I've gotten.

I'd love to say that the stitches are quickly sliding off my hook,

I won't even tell you 

how many hours I've spent on this so far,

but what's different now is that it's a bit 

easier and I now see it as doable.

Some things I'm still struggling with

and I'll post more specifics 

about them in a later post in case 

you want to give this a go yourself.