How does one get struck by a virus? Usually it creeps up on you unawares, does it not. And just like with a virus, you don’t realise that other people also seem to have been struck by it. To me it happened while visiting my brother in law in Wales. He bought a place there and my husband and I came over from Holland to put down laminate in his house. During a tea break we were sitting in his improvised lounge – a bedroom upstairs with a couple of easy chairs and a small table – and on the table were three potholders scattered on the little table which he seemed to use as larger coasters to place plates on. I’m not interested in coasters usually but these ones were special: they were cats, three different ones, and they were crocheted and they were made by my late mother in law. So they must have been made in the sixties or seventies of last century and I really liked them. My brother in law for sentimental reasons did not want to part with them, but he was fine with lending them to me so I could try to copy them. My first step was to visit a couple of charity shops to get some wool. I found plenty and got crochet hooks there as well. Then I sat down to work.The result of which you can admire here:

The ones with the brown stripes are Mother in laws’ the ones with blue are mine. I must confess I felt quite pleased with the result because the only thing I remembered of crochet which I learned 40 years ago at school was making a string of chains. So the rest I found out via tutorials. Therefore I want to express my heartfelt gratitude to all those who put tutorials on YouTube because they simply are great! After the cats I felt much inspired and went on to other projects.