Cold Weather = Harlequin Hoodie

I have seen the pattern for the Harlequin Hoodie many times as well as on Ravelry. After looking at it I decided to make this. I figured it would be perfect for the upcoming cold weather over the Thanksgiving week. All the yarn used was from my stash probably all Red Heart which worked out really well because I didn't have to spend any money. Of course I didn't have it finished by then but it's complete now just in time for the next snap of cold weather.

                                  
I am happy with the way it turned out. I did add ch stitches to the hood as well as the cowl and added a few more rows to the hood so that it would be more oversized vs close fitting. I also tappered it off in the back with decrease rows so it would be sort of rounded instead of square. If I make another one I will follow the pattern exactly and make in a solid color except for the edging rows. And use a differnt type of yarn. Looking foward to wearing it soon.

THANKS FOR STOPPING BY.....HAVE A GOOD DAY!!!

Christmas Stocking & More...

I haven't posted in awhile but that doesn't mean that I haven't been crafting. I've been also trying to get back into taking surveys which in the end can help fund my projects. Lately I have gotten back into baking...cream cheese pound cakes have been in the cake plate a lotaround here. I started slippers for my son...still need to attach the sole on one. I've also been drawn to those darn African flower hexagons and started a blanket using them in shades of blue and green.

I'm trying to attach along the way as well as sew in or crochet in the ends so I won't be stuck with that daunting task in the end. I don't know how big it will be I plan to go until the yarn runs out. I want to start a pair of these slipper boots in gray and cream with maybe a hint of blue- green color.

I saw these on the Cozy Made Things blog and really liked her take on the slippers. The original pattern uses less hexagons for a short slipper but I like the taller version. I originally bought some plastidip to put on the bottom but after further research I also bought a roll of jute that I will use for the bottoms. This way I can wear them out the house if I please. I was going to go this alone but I found a pattern on for crochet soles - turning slippers into street shoes, which I think will be very helpful.

After going through my stash, even taking yarn from other projects (rainbow puff stitch blanket) I decided I wanted a hoided scarf. I refuse to buy what I can make and this time went with the Harlequin Hoodie on Ravelry.

African Flower Christmas Stocking

After making African flowers for the blanket I thought this would make a unique Christmas stocking. There is a Etsy shop that sells a pattern but I figured this was one of those things I could figure out on my own. I used this pattern for the Polka Dot Christmas Stocking to help piece the motifs together.

I attached them differently at the toe and took out two motifs from the toe as well as a full row at the top of the stocking. Instead I added half hexagons to make a straight edge along the top and some rows of single and double crochet. I liked the finished product and decided to list this in My Etsy shop.

Nacho Baby's Typical Blanket

I had an interesting request for a custom order baby blanket. A nacho chip including the cheese and a jalapeño. All I knew is that the chip needed to be a triangle shape and a slight idea of how to do the rest. I could not find any patterns anywhere for a jalapeño slice so I had to figure it out and go from pictures. In two weeks time this is what I came up with. 

 

Thanks for looking......T. Mitchell 

Colors, Colors, and More Colors....

I'm just a few strands away from finishing the Sunburst Granny blanket. That means its time to start another project. Once it's done I will post updated pictures of the finished product. There are so many things that I want to do next...blankets, sweaters, coats,hats. I have a lot of different colors to use so I was looking for a stash buster that would use up some of the yarn I have so when I buy more I won't fell bad :/ and so I can continue to build my blanket stash. These are the colors that I want to use to work with.

Colors I want to use in next blanket

These are ten skeins from my stash. Some have never been used and others are partials. I have frogged three blankets before remembering that I saw this at Petunia Pill's BlogSpot. I couldn't pass this one by.

 

On her website she gives a how-to for this blanket. So far I'm happy with how it is turning out. Since this picture I've added 5 more rows. I started using a smaller hook a size H I think but the "puff's" weren't puffing out like they should so I switched to a size K and it's looking good I think.

 



Puff Stitch Started


 

Thanks for stopping by...have a wonderful day,

 

                  T. Mitchell

 







Crochet Quilt Finished

I finally finished the crochet quilt and it is off to it's new owners. I hope they like it. 

I think it came out pretty good and I want to make myself one; with different colors. I don't know how long it took to hand stitch the binding to the blanket because I was watching tv and stopping. I like not being able to see the stitching. I can say stitching to the crochet side was a bit tricky because you had to make sure you were catching the thread onto something to hold. 

Updates...Sunburst Grannies & Crochet/Fabric Blanket

Update 10/7: The sunburst granny blanket is complete. 

I chose not to block it because I liked the way it looked in its natural finished shape.  I did a few rows of hdc around the edges and finished with a picot edge. It's now for sale in my etsy shop. 

Thanks for stopping by.... T Mitchell

Update 9/23: All the Sunburst granny's are done. I laid them out today to see how I wanted to piece them together. Some of the toes came out different as some of the squares got mixed up. So far the rows have been joined horizontally with a slip stitch and now working on joining the other way.

Progress has been made on both the Sunburst Granny Squares and the crochet blanket with fabric on the back. I debated whether to complete the fourth round on the granny squares separately or join as I go. I decide to do them separately using white yarn for the fourth round.

I used the tutorial from Nittybits blog- as mentioned in the original post about this topic. Additionally I added a fifth round of single crochet in each stitch across with three sc in the corners. I have four more squares to go- 42 total them I can begin to join them. I plan to do six rows of seven and I think I will use the flat single crochet method to join and see how it looks. If I don't like it I will use the slip stitch method. Still debating what type of border I will go with. 

I have made my binding for the crochet and fabric blanket. Since I wanted a wider binding I cut more strips to make a continuos strip and zig zig stitched them together with the sewing machine. I pinned it to the crochet quilt and proceeded to sew it with my sewing machine. 

After sewing for a few. I liked the way the fabric side looked but not the back side since I tried to do both sides at once. So after a few attempts I ripped out the seams and began to hand stitch the binding instead. 

Hand sewn quilt binding

If I would have done this in the beginning I think I would have been done but I thought it was going to be much harder than it really is. I watched multiple YouTube videos and read many tutorials to see how to do this. I found the instructions at the blog Stitched-together on how to hand see a quilt binding very very helpful. I still have the back side to go. So far it seems to be going ok. Me being my worst critic there are some spots that I want to go back and redo.

Again, thanks for stopping by........ T. Mitchell

Crochet and Fabric Baby Blanket

So I made progress with attaching the fabric to the crochet blanket. 

I think it came out very nice and I really like my fabric choice. I first did a 1/4 inch seam around the fabric and then attached it with the sewing machine. I did not make the fabric too tight so if the crochet side is stretched then it would have some give. I attempted to attach a binding using the circle fabric- mentioned and pictured in previous post. I cut a 2 1/2 inch strip and preceded to attach it but for me it looks way too small especially on the crochet side. So I painstakingly removed what I had already sewed and cut more strips. I plan to attached the two sets of strips that I've cut to make one wide piece of binding then attempt to attach it to the blanket again. Hopefully this time I'll have better results.....

Thanks for stopping by!

Next Crochet To-Do....

So I've always wanted to make a blanket with crochet on one side and fabric on the other. I had this idea a very long time ago and never got around to it but of course like everything else when I looked more into it someone had already done it. Well that made my life somewhat easier because now I know what and how to do it and that it will work. I finished the blanket which is done in single crochet and purchased some fabric for the backing. 

This is a gift for parents of a new baby. Originally no one knew the sex of the baby so I figured the red and the circles could go either way. Since it took me I long to finished this blanket, thanks to my sewing machine, the couple had the baby, a girl- which prompted me to purchase more fabric. So now I will use the colorful paisley and flower material for the backing and the circles for the binding. I thought about crocheting a border but I figured a fabric binding would be different. I finally got a new sewing machine since the Pfaff I have would not cooperate. After attempting to fix it on my own with the help of YouTube- it would work fine then the needle would hit the bobbin housing and brake. I think the timing is off. It's old and one day I think I'd like to get it repaired.  Ive been putting this blanket off to try and get some other things done but maybe today I'm will break out my new Brother and work on it.  

Tunisian Crochet Started...

After indecisively trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my newly purchased Tunisian crochet needles I finally decided on something. I had seen a lot of mentions that it is a good stitch to use for charts so why make a plain boring afghan when I can find a cool chart to Tunisian crochet. I used YouTube to learn how to work a graph using this method. I first started with a circle chart with circles of different sizes and colors but after about 25 rows I was not pleased wit how this was going so I did one thing I don't like to do....pulled it apart. I continued my search and wanted a whimsical heart that could be done in any color but still be for a baby girl. This is the pattern I chose from Passion Creative Blog after looking at many images on Goggle. There are a lot of cross stich patterns on this blog.

The blog/website is in French which is where the translate tool comes in handy. Although I did not need any directions because fro cross stitching as a young child I remembered how to read a chart. The thing I like about doing this in the Tunisian crochet method is that I only have to read the chart one way. I wanted this to be a nice size blanket that could be used in the crib, in the car seat, or whatever so after finding the middle mark in the chart I added stiches to both sides as well as below and above the charted area to add size to the blanket. I printed two copy's and put one in a sheet protector an used one to mark off as I go as well as any notes about stiches and color (as seen in the first picture). I chose a tan color for the heart that was in my stash and I found a pound of caron in an off white in my stash also which I'm using as the background. I did use the bobbin method in the form of bobbins and mini yarn balls as far as the different sections so I wouldn't have to carry yarn except in some spots. It's fairly easy and only gets difficult when my three year old tries to take off with my balls of yarn as I am crocheting. When I run out of a color in a particular section I use the magic knot method to attach more yarn. I have made more progress since I took this picture-15 more rows completed so only about 76 more to go.... My goal if to do at least 10-15 rows a day!

Another Project at the Same Time- Sunburst Granny

In addition to my Tunisian crochet heart blanket I have grown to like the Sunburst Granny Squares. I found a great tutorial over at Nittybits BlogSpot. Jenny does a great job with this tutorial. Again with yarn from my stash I just chose three colors and this is what I came up with. I now have about 34 sunburst and I still want to make some with a purple center so maybe I'll do about 42 total or more depending on how I feel.

As you can see I still need to add the 5th row to make it a square but I'm debating whether to do each or join as I go. Row five will be white.

Now I'm back to crocheting...

Thanks for stopping by,

T. Mitchell

Retro Circles finished

I've finally finished the Retro Circles crochet blanket that I came across from the blog Three Peas in a Pod Handmade. I am happy with the way it came out. I added a double crochet border in which I found the instructions on Crochet with Raymond. I think that I will definitely make another one of these and I have a ton of color combos in mind. For some wired reason it seems that my corners were a little wider than I'd liked maybe next time I won't chain two in the corner and do one instead. It was hard to decide whether to block or not. In the end I did lightly block the blanket mainly do to the corner issues and I wanted it to feel a little softer. I carried most on my ends so I only had a few ends to weave in.

I'm thinking of making this in a queen size and adding a quilt backing for my bed....we'll see. I have so many other ideas of blankets that I want to make and a large yarn stash that I need to get rid of.

Thanks for visiting,

          T. Mitchell

My Package Arrived....

I recently purchased Unexpected Afghans by Robyn Chachula and saw a nice blanket done in Tusinian crochet. I've never done this before but I like a challenge. Of course I didn't have the right hook to start the project....and when I see something that catches my eye I like to start right away. So I started my search and ended at Get Knitted where I found KnitPro Symfonie Wood Interchangeable Tunisian Crochet Hooks. The price even including shipping was reasonable I thought compared to other brands and sites that I looked at. After six days of wondering how long it would take a package to arrive from the UK I went to the mail box and there they were- my hooks had arrived. I ordered two crochet hooks sizes J/10/6.00mm and a k/101/2/6.50mm as well as two cables in approx. 31in and 47in.

KnitPro Interchangable Tunisian Crochet Hooks

Finished Chevron Baby/Toddler Blanket 

The blanket in the background of the above picture is one of the ones that I recently finished in a chevron pattern using RedHeart yarn in honeydew, delft blue, and aran. This workerd up pretty quickly using a knit chevron stich in a random pattern that included the basic k, k2tog, ssk and kfb stitches. The second picture is post blocking which helped to define the pattern more. I originally knitted this for my sister-in-law for her addition to the family. Very pleased with how this came out I am torn with whether to give or sale this one. Being that it is still warm outside and a knit blanket is not needed at the time I decided to place it for sale in my Etsy shop for know. Who knows what might happen...


Chevron in Progress

Finished Chevron Baby Blanket

 

Thanks for stopping by,

          Terra     

Recent Knit & Crochet Projects

So here is what I have been working on lately.




Breezy Winter Baby Blanket (in progress)

I found this pattern on pickles.no and loved not only the design but the colors. This took me awhile because it just seemed like it would never end. Not knowing how this would come out I used Red Heart Super Saver acrylic yarn in the closes colors I could get to the picture on the website.

Finished

 

 

 

The finished blanket knitted in brown, tan, lemon, and coral. the blanket measures approximately 42.5 in x 40 in. before blocking. I struggled with whether or not to add a border or not... The only thing I dreaded about knitting up this blanket was weaving in the ends (still not finished). Since I've learned about knitting in the ends as you go and if I ever knit this again I will knit in the ends. This item has been added to my Etsy shop.


It's been awhile!

It's been awhile since I've posted. But I'm back with a few projects that I've been working on the past few months. I have stashes upon stashes of yarn that I've collected over the years and now I have a little spare time, as much as you can get with an active three year old running around, to knit and crochet some things. I've been able to complete 2 blankets and one that I'm adding the last row of border to.

Scouring the web and many crochet and knitting sites and blogs as well as Pinterest my creative juices have started to flow again and I have many ideas..... that seem brilliant that I want to see come to light.

Pictures to come.