Tuesday 28 August 2012

Granny Sampler Afghan More Progress

Good morning all you lovely people, I hope that your week is going well. I'm pleased to say that I am right up to date with the granny afghan sampler and still enjoying it very much.  This week is blocking week but as my motifs are made in acrylic yarn I'm going to skip this bit.  I have tried blocking acrylic in the past but have found it doesn't really work that well and once the motifs are sewn together they usually look fine anyway fingers crossed.
You can find week one and two here
Weeks three to seven here

Week Eight
The Sunburst


I tweaked the last round in this one, I love the sunny centres.

Week Nine
Three Dimensional Granny Square Flower


I love this one it's lovely and neat and I found it easy to make.

(Week 10 was catch up week)

Week 11
Popcorn Flower Granny Square


I was a little bit worried at the start of these because I always find Popcorns difficult but I overcame my fears and once I got the hang of it they were easy enough.

Week Twelve
Granny Square Spiral


I love the way these have turned out, I think they are very effective, but I did get myself in a bit of a tangle using four colours at once.

Week Thirteen
The Whirlygig Granny


I enjoyed making these but keeping your tension even for the top round is a must or it can look a mess.

Week 14
A Rectangular Granny


I like these and of course you could just go on and on and make a big rectangular blanket if you wanted .

So there you are that's where we are at the moment,  it's fun trying out new stitches and squares especially as you know they will be used in an afghan.   As you can see my squares aren't perfect so I am hoping they will look ok once they are sewn up, I think we will start some sewing next week.

My favourite? well each one has a special something but I think it has to be week nine because I love flowers, which one is yours?



If you want to join in with this CAL just click on the link below you can find all the instructions for each square on Blairs lovely blog Wise Craft

Tuesday 21 August 2012

Soft and Cosy Baby Blanket


A lovely easy baby blanket that works up in no time.  Nice and portable too as you only need to take two balls of yarn with you and your crochet hook of course.  This is made in a lovely soft baby yarn and the delicate shade of peach is just perfect. I found the pattern here but tweaked it a little to make it my own.


I just love playing around with my photo's I couldn't decide which image I like best so I have put both, you have the misty romantic version at the top and the sharper clearer version at the bottom, which do you like the best ?   
Hope everyone is having a great week :)

Friday 17 August 2012

Gathering of Scraps TUSAL

First of all I would like to thank Kara over at petals to picots  for featuring my granny circle's  at her Friday link party, if you haven't been over there it is well worth a visit.

 I can't believe a whole month has gone by since my first gathering of scraps TUSAL post, but it's a New Moon once more and here is my gathering jar for this month.



Full to the top once more in fact I had to squash it down a bit to keep all the scraps from falling out.  Mr frog just loves this jar as you can see. :)

Then here we go all emptied into larger container more than half full already I can see there will have to be some serious squashing of contents before too long.


How are your scrap jars looking ? 
Next New Moon is September 16th.

Friday 10 August 2012

Three A Day

Thank you for all the lovely comments I received about the Chevron cardigan and also a big thank you to Mrs Thrifty over at New Beginnings for nominating me for the The One Lovely Blog Award :)
Now I'm going to reveal that long term project I have been working on and yes of course it is a blanket, I started this way back in February but I fell out of love with it and it was pushed into a bag and stuffed under my bed. Well I rescued it a few weeks ago and now I am working on it  every day and I have fallen in love with it again.
I find I have to take a strict regimental approach to blanket making otherwise it will never get done.  I am using this motif which is very popular but I first found it on Angie's blog here I love these little wheels of colour.








I have let my self go a bit crazy with colour, using all the colours I have in my stash, I want it to be bright and cheerful and I find that as long as you have one joining colour pretty much anything goes.  I'm not going to reveal the joining colour until it is all done and according to my calculations that will be sometime in November maybe just in time for my 60th birthday.  
As you can see these motifs have three rounds


What I do is choose 3 colours and do three motifs a day with just these three colours so I have three colour combo's like this.





As you can see I love playing with these cute little wheels, I make colour stacks like this, then I can see what colour I need more of, that way I'm hoping to get an even match of colours throughout the blanket.

I have calculated I need 360 of these little colour wheels altogether, I then began to worry that I wouldn't have enough of the joining colour so I did some more calculations and realised I wouldn't have, luckily I found some of the same colour on line and was able to stock up, if I had left it till November I might not have found it.
I love making blankets by working slowly just a little bit a day you know that eventually you will have something beautiful at the end, and because you do just a little a day it still leaves you time to get on with other projects.

Hope you all have a lovely weekend :)



Thursday 2 August 2012

Chevron Cardigan

I have just finished making this for a friends little girl she left me to choose the colours so I'm hoping that she will like what I've chosen.  The fronts and back are made in one piece for this sweet little cardigan so there is only the sleeve seams to sew.  It should have been simple enough but I got a bit confused with the shaping so ended up doing my own thing but I think it has turned out just fine.  I love the stripy colour combination but it means there were lots of ends to weave in, I do them as I go so don't find them a problem at all.




The pattern for this little cardigan can be found here


I used Robin Dk and a 3.75 mm hook to get the correct tension.

Guess what else I've been up too..... I have been trying to master the art of knitting on 4 needles.  Loving hands has had a request for fingerless gloves for the soldiers, I do have patterns for some knitted on two needles but I thought I would give four needles a try.  Well I have to say I have nearly pulled my hair out in frustration I started these last night and have only got this far up to now.  



I will keep on trying but if I'm having problems with the rib already, I can't imagine how I will cope once I reach the thumb/fingers haha wish me luck folks :)