Blanket Repair

 Ok so this pink and blue blanket is 3 years old its one of the first blankets I ever made.

This is the first repair I have needed to make to it.   I was/am a bit under the weather so the day they pulled it out of the laundry and saw this the text's and phone calls poured in.  My niece is really attached to her blankets (White and pink is #1, pink and blue #2 and the others are just at random) and I just spent most of christmas fixing her white and pink blanket (you can see it below) which semi traumatized her because she thought I was going to take it away forever.  Now that #2 needed repair and I couldnt take it home to fix it so she sat next to me on the floor the whole time she wasnt on her moms lap just to make sure it wouldnt leave the house.

I started out by picking up the bottom loops of the blue row, and leaving them on a strand of the original pink yarn,  There was not quiet enough of the original yarn left to fix it as the point it broke was badly frayed.

This was a pretty easy fix, as the row that came undone was just a mix of  * sc, ch 3 (had to do this threw the bottom of the blue loops), sc * all in the same chain space, then skip a st.


 You can see in the photo, I took my hook out of the working stitch, slipped it threw the bottom loops of the next row, worked a ch/slst on the bottom of the first stitch, chained, then worked an other ch/slst, and sc'd on either side.

I did not have a matching pink so you can see the patch row stand out quiet a bit.  Due to alot of streatching and wear the stitchs are all worn out and stretched so my patch will take a while to match the gauge of the rest of the blanket.     
               
After fixing this one, I did some small work on the pink and white blanket tucking in some tails that I forgot to do at christmas.

Then the blanket I made her for christmas needed a fix.

I am not quiet sure what happened, well no I know what happened I am just not sure how it happened.

The pink and black blanket is made with this wobbly yarn that goes from super bulky to lace weight thin.  I worked it in a basic never ending granny, and some how my starting round unraveled.

The mystory here is I could not find the end of the yarn where it unraveled.  Aparntly it had been in the dresser since christmas, and when #2 broke they pulled it out and soon noticed this hole.

I know I started this blanket with a magic ring, that I weaved the tail into at least twice around.  Now there is no starting tail or any loose end, so I took a scrap of pink that I used on the other blanket, and as with the other blanket I picked up the bottom of the stitches and cinched the opening closed making sure to secure the round in 3 places before attempting to hide off my tails.

The new pink matched the pink in this pink and black yarn very well so I didnt even notice after tucking the tail's where they where hidden.

Here is the blanket monster herself.
Miss Jordan clutching onto blanket #1 for dear life, with blanket #2 tucked under and behind her.

She was so happy it was fix she give me this great big grin.

I managed to get an other grin out of her when I got the pink and black blanket finished and passed off to her as well.

She is lucky she is so cute.  I still need to fix my moms blanket.  Sorry mom!!  I promise I will get to it next!

Baby Boy Blanket

This is a gift for one of my cousins who is having a boy.  Its a circular chevron in the round in the colors baby blue, and chocolate. 

I wouldn't recommend this for anyone who has not attempted both a circular blanket, and done chevron before.  I had a few issues while working it with rippling but I manage to work most of them out, by doing a round with no increases (the brown rounds).  I also started my rounds in a bad spot, where my joins where on top of a skip/decrease section and it floated to right after and my count got messed up so on the next color change I just cut the yarn and did a standing DC start 3 stitch's from the tip of the point before my previous join.

I do not have a pattern, as I worked on this on the go at a friends, and during new years at a party and didnt write down what I did but it should be similar to any of these patterns on Ravelry.   FYI if you dont have a Rav account make one now, its free, they wont spam you with emails, and there are ton's of patterns including some of mine you can find with there customizable search tools.

Aloha April Finished -Pattern-

Aloha April Contest Entry

This is the project I have been working on to enter in a contest being held over at r/crochet.

I wanted to be able to take the sham off with out having to destry it so it can be washed, and when fall comes I can pack it away and maybe make a more fall themed sham.  I just tie off the top of the motif to the top of the motif on the other side with  a yard of yarn folded over  to make those little bows.

This also goes to show how lighting can realy change a picture.  It is over cast outside and raining off an on but I was able to get that bottom shot off.  Inside I took the top picture with 2 lights on (one behind and one in front) with what little natural light I could get from the window.  Funny thing is the indoor photo has the closest to true yarn color to the actual color then the outdoor photo and normally its the opposite, how ever the pillow's orange color is truer to the outdoor shot.

This is the pattern I originally posted for the flower motif--

1-ROW Ch 8, slst 1 in first ch.
2-ROW Ch 1, sc 16 into the loop.
3-ROW Ch 1, sc 2 over second and first rows (into the loop), ch 9 picot (ch 9, ss in first ch), sc 4 over second and first rows (into the loop), ch 9 picot (ch 9, ss in first ch), repeat from to 4 more times, sc 2 into the loop, ss 1 in first sc in this row.
4-ROW  *ln next ch 9 picot: sc 2, hdc 2, dc 2, tr 3, ch 3 picot, tr 2, dc 2, hdc 2, sc 2: skip 1 sc in 3rd row (loop), ss 1 in next sc', repeat from * to * 5 more times (except make last ss in the first sc of this row).

I wound up only needing 18 motifs (3 rows of 6 motifs) to fit my pillow. 

To connect as you work (recomended) for the first row, work one motif, then work the 2nd motife  but on peddle 2, when you make your picot instead of ch 3 work -ch 1, slst into picot on 6th peddle of previous motif, ch 1- peddle 3 will connect to the previous motifs peddle 5.   The 3rd-5th will all be worked the same. 6th motif you will be using to close the ring, work 1st peddle, connect the next two as previous with 2-5, work 4th peddle (no connecting), now in the 5th peddle work its picot into the 3rd picot from the 1st motif, 6th peddle into the picot of the 2nd peddle of the 1st motif.

For the second row, you will be working 2 peddles, then join the next into the 4th peddle from previous row (just pick a spot to start), then working counter clockwise connect your next peddle into the joint where peddles 5 and 3 joined. work next peddle into 4th peddle of that 2nd motif (going clock wise), work last peddle.   Repeat this for the next motif (add the next motif to the right of previous), but the last peddle will be worked into the 5th peddle of previous motif (the one to the left).   For the last motife of the row work one peddle, then connect to the FIRST motif of the row first -- 2nd peddle into FM's 3rd, 3rd, into FM  2nd/4th join (going counter clock wise) and so on.

I repeated the second rows join method for my third row then just tied off the tops of each motif to the ones on the other side.

I found it helped for me to think of one point as the top (1st peddle) and bottom (4th peddle) when connecting,

Christmas Hual

I don't know what you all celebrate but we do Christmas in my family.  This Christmas I got a big haul of yarn from my family.  My grandma gifted with with all the yarn left over from her stash.  My Brother-in-law and sister got me the yarn on my wish list from Iceyarns.com.
I think one of the top gifts I revived with from my husband.  It is a project organizer for yarn, it is a bag that has sections, one side of the section of spaces where you can place 6 skeins of yarn in individual pockets and pull the ends threw the top of the  bag ensuring your skeins don't get tangled up or roll around on the floor/couch. The other size has enough space for a full size blanket worth of skeins.

I have already put it to  work, stitching up a blanket for my brother-in-law.  We picked out this yarn off the web site but I did not realize it bobbled from lace weight to worst weight so the blanket is looking very rustic.

I have been wanting for a long time to try out some of this ice yarn and it works up nicely.  I know there was yarn snobs out there who turn there nose up at 'cheap' yarn, thinking if its cheap the yarn has to be trash.  Well I have been working with it for a few days and it holds up nicely compared to the more expensive stuff that I eventually shelled out a load of money for its just as easy to work with and feel great.

Lastly, yes that is a rubber band loom.  Its really fun to play with, but if you want to make adult sized bracelets you need multiple looms.  For the original price of the name brand loom I got 4 of this loom.  It works just the same way except they connect together by the side and not from underneath so you can have them side by side or staggered like in the image.   My friends got there oldest boy the name brand loom and I can not see a difference between bracelets made on his, and ones made on mine.

Ice yarn

granny yarn

Hubbys gifts

rubberband loom

Baby {doll} Blankie -Update- Finished!

I was asked to make a baby doll blanket to acompany a gift for my niece.  One of her grannies is getting her a baby doll set but she wanted it to come with a blankie she knew Jordan would love.  I am using a skein that I picked up at a yard sale, its very soft, Lion Brand Homespun in the color Waterfalls.  Is an amazing shade of blue that has shine to it with out looking metallic.

It is just the basic granny squar pattern only with out color changes so I just slip to the next space to chain up

Pattern-
Chain 4, DC in 4th ch from hook, chain 2, *dc2, ch 2* repeat 3 times

slst into the top st of the starting chain, slst over to the chain sp working in the space chain up 3, dc2, ch 2, dc3 , with out chainging- dc3 into the next ch sp, ch 2, dc 3- repeat 3 times

sl st into the top of the starting chain, and work 3dc into each space and on the corners -3dc,ch 2, 3dc-
going as big as you like

I plan on stopping at about 16-18 inches wide as its for a baby doll that will be pretty small. If anyone has any issues working one up let me know and I will try to help out!

Odd angle on this shot, the blanket is square

Close up shot with flash

Close up with out flash

Never ending granny spiral

I was asked to make a blanket with rainbow colors, I suggested a granny throw and they came back at me with this pattern Rainbow Special by Michael Sellick.  There are a few things missing from the pattern, and a few typos in it so if anyone wants to make one, you need an odd number of colors. The pattern implies you need 6 colors (two balls of each) but really you need 7 because of the spiral you need an odd number of rows or your granny wont be able to turn the last corner. Why you might ask, well simply because granny's work in groups of stitches and chains, if you used and even number you will not have a chain on the turning corner when you start your next spiral round.  Also I found on the blue and green round directions there is an error and since these are to rows they tell you to repeat, it will effect your whole blanket if you don't catch it early.  It tells you to '3dc ch2 2dc in chain space' at the corner, you DON'T want to do that it will make the blanket lopsided.  Every time you get to a corner you want to do '3dc ch2 3dc in chain space' its how the diagram shows the corners done.  My last sugestion is for your hook, this pattern works best if you used the right hook for your yarn, normaly the lable of your yarn will tell you what size to use, in my case my yarn called for a size K (10 1/2 or 6.50mm) hook.   So working with a K means my blanket will come out a bit larger then the pattern says because it calls for a J hook, likewise if I went down a hook size instead of up it would turn out smaller.

Once I got started, and got all the colors going it has been pretty easy.  Even fallowing the directiosn he has for how to set up your yarn work well but I some how managed to get my red and white tangled..

Finished!!

First round of all colors complete.

Finished Juicy Fruits blanket!

So I finished!! I love how the colors seem to wiggle upwards. Now I feel like running around screaming 'I finished it!!!' My second baby blanket and this one is perfect, 40x36 inches evenly.

I would realy like to make this pattern again in black and gray only larger say 60x80.  Only thing stopping me is lack of yarn and $$$ to buy said yarn would take like 30 skeins.

Speaking of yarn my husband is so cute he came home the other day with three skeins of yarn, red/green/blue for me for no reason at all and two crochet magazines. I love that he thinks of me when he sees yarn its sweet.

Now that is this out of the way I am going to focus on what I am calling my 'Fall into Me' spiral vest.

Update time!

So I slacked off a bit with crochet and have not updated any new posts in a few weeks.  Sorry!!!

I have some news and a two WIP )works in progress( to show off.


First up, is the Juicy Fruits blanket pattern by Red Heart that I am working on.  You will notice the diffrence between mine and the original in the link above I am making mine smaller so it will be a perfect square, the pattern is worked in groups of 6 stitches so I just chained I believe 132 at the start instead of their recommended 152.  I also am using a J hook, and a variegated yarn that my sister gave to me with out a label.  I decied I didnt want to keep doing the color changes the way they are done in the pattern, firstly because weaving/hiding all those tails would take for ever, secondly I would rather work out a way to carry the color changes up so your not wasting 4 to 6 inches every change because in the end that's A LOT of yarn wasted.  I do think after I finish the blanket I am working on I will try this pattern again, but do it in black and gray's for myself and see if I cant find a better way to carry up the color change instead of wasting all that yarn.

Here is the project I have been working on since June, it took a bit of a back burner spot since I started the above pattern.  I think I am going to just turn it into a circle vest, there are still quite a few rounds left to finish this one, sadly my attempts to free form the spiral Phoenix like wings failed.  I really did try but I could not get wings to have that spiral affect and still line up and look like it was still part of the same project.

Here I will end with some happy/sad news.

Due to the person who placed first in the Stitch and Share not living with in the bounds of the contest regulations (sad news for her) they decided to pass the gift on to seconed place (happy dance news for meh).  They emailed me since I was their second place (insert more happy dance because they called me second place!!) and asked if I would like the prize.

Its 29 sample spools of artistic thread.  My favorite is that skein laying across the spools, its a beautiful teal colored Kreinik Silk Mori (4044) thats 100% silk and so soft.  I want to work it into a bracelet, but I want to honor the tread and not just make it into something to use it but make it into something beautiful.  My first thought was a granny square bracelet, I just need to find some squares that I think will do justice to this beautiful thread.

On a side note, why is it that when I get a project out to crochet on the cats migrate to it and lay on it?

Above our Black and White short hair american is Dayton, and below is our short hair Tortie Connie.