March 24, 2015 · 7:55 pm

Three Cabled Boot Cuffs

I have completed the boot cuff pattern, and in fact ended up with three patters in one!  It is now available for sale on Ravelry here.

Three Cuffs

Straight Cable and Button StrapUsing three different cable stitches and an optional decorative strap and button, a total of six different boot cuffs can be created with this pattern!

Pattern features one easy, one intermediate, and one advanced cable pattern.

Includes pictures and written crochet instructions.

I would love to see pictures of your finished project! Email them to me at the address on the pattern.

Twisted Cable

Celtic Knot

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March 23, 2015 · 10:02 pm

The Granny Square Project Complete

I am so excited to be posting this.  I have finished The Granny Square Project!  I got the pictures I wanted of the final afghan taken today, and now it is all packaged up and ready to ship out tomorrow!

TGSP

 

Of course, when I was packing it up I realized that my tissue paper has been moved over to the new house. So I wrapped it up in an old doily instead and I ended up liking that more anyway.20150323_211609_2_1

I can’t wait for the surprise recipient to get this!

yarnball

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March 15, 2015 · 11:29 am

Make Me a Pillow

When your 3-year-old daughter asks you to crochet her a pillow, you stop your other projects and crochet her a pillow.

PillowI had a pillow I had used for nursing when she got too big for the Boppy.  Once we weaned, she commandeered it for herself. It was just a rectangular gold-velvet pillow I had picked up at a thrift store to support my back in my desk chair at work while I was pregnant for her.  It was actually pretty tacky looking.  I meant to take a picture of it before I covered it, but got excited about finishing the cover and forgot until I’d already had the cover closed around it.

I used the same yarn that I did on her Easter Cardigan from my super special stash of free yarn that my sister obtained for me.  I had always wanted to try the Catherine Wheel stitch, so I dug out one of my stitch books 101 Stitches for Afghans by Jean Leinhauser.  The Catherine Wheel is stitch number 75.  Of course, there are many tutorials and free patterns on the internet as well.  I made two panels the size of the pillow and then joined them with a round of single crochets through both layers all the way around.  Then I did a round of reverse single crochets, or the crab stitch to add a nice rolled edge.

I finished the pillow about 11 o’clock last night and she was already asleep.  So I was just going to leave it next to her on the bed when I kissed her goodnight before I went to bed.  But she woke up when I went in and saw that I had left the pillow next to her.  She wrapped her arm around it (she had watched me working on it so knew it was coming) and went back to sleep with a great big smile on her face.  It was so cute.

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March 9, 2015 · 8:39 am

Easter Cardigan

I never understand why they make sleeveless Christmas and Easter dresses for babies and toddlers.  It’s generally not warm during those times of year.  So I had to make my daughter a sweater to go with her Easter dress this year.

20150308_104004_1_resizedThis is the first chance I’ve gotten to dip into a HUGE stash of free yarn that my sister brought to me after a de-stash event she  participated in.  My daughter’s favorite color is purple and there were several skeins of a nice soft purple yarn in one of the  FOUR boxes of my sister brought me.  There were also several skeins of dark purple fun fur that my daughter has particularly had her eye on, so I used that to fancy up the edging once I finished the sweater.

I used this pattern for the sweater, which is only sized to 18 months by changing yarn weight and hook sized.  I needed closer to a 3T so I tried a much larger J hook.  I worked up the yoke and tried it on her and it was just the smallest tad too tight, so I frogged it and tried again with my K hook.  This worked much better.  The sweater has a pretty picot edging on the hem and the sleeves, but left the collar and the sides plain, so that’s where I added the fun fur.

My daughter was so excited when she saw the finished sweater, particularly because of the fun fur.  It will look very cute on her for Easter!

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March 8, 2015 · 11:24 am

The Granny Square Twist

I have a twist to The Granny Square Project!  During the past year as I’ve been making the two squares for each month, I’ve actually been making four squares – two of each.

My initial plan was to make two separate afghans to give to two different people.  But as I worked on it over the year I realized that I wanted to keep the second one for myself as a keepsake because I had made it during my son’s first year.

So now I am blocking the squares for the second afghan.  As soon as I’ve got them all joined and edged I’ll get a picture of them together and finish this project up!

Alternate Squares

Most of the squares were exact duplicates. However, I made alternate squares for some of them by switching up colors or just the order that I used them in.  I love the differences-some of them very subtle, others quite bold!

July 13

July – Square Thirteen

July - Square Fourteen

July – Square Fourteen

August – Square Sixteen

October - Square

October – Square Twenty

November – Square Twenty-one

November – Square Twenty-one

November – Square Twenty-two

November – Square Twenty-two

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March 4, 2015 · 2:51 pm

THE MONTHLY GOALS LINK-UP: March 2015 Goals

I currently have 16 projects on my Evernote Crochet To-Do list.  Sixteen!  That doesn’t include all the things on my Crochet Ideas Pinterest Board that I would like to make.

Many of the projects on my actual To-Do list are Christmas Presents for next year.  Well, I guess I mean this year.  I have several afghans that I want to make and several projects for my family, including finally making Christmas stockings and a tree skirt for us.  I think I may also end up adding a few projects to my list once we get moved into our new house because with all the hardwood floors we have we are going to need some spectacular area rugs.  Of course, I want to crochet them.  I totally wish I could quit my job and just crochet full-time.  I also have a few patterns that I would like to write up that I want to fit in there somewhere.

But with working full-time and two kids, and trying to do all the remodeling on the new house, my crochet time is limited.  I had a little more time when I was still pumping milk for my son at work and could multitask by using that time to crochet.  But that’s done and for the most part now I only get to crochet over lunch.  Once the kids are in bed at night all I want to do is to fall into bed myself!

So I’m going to join this link-up for goals and accountability. I’m going to go a step further though and tentatively plan out my projects for the rest of the year.  The only thing is, I have no idea when I might receive an order for a finished product on Etsy so I’m going to have to go easy on myself. I think this plan is pretty ambitious.  I’ve never really planned out what I intend to make for the year. I’ve always just had an idea in my head of the next few projects that I plan to do.  I always feel like I’m trying to catch up with what I want to make!

Monthly Goals

March

  1. Finish The Granny Square Project
  2. Sephy’s Easter Sweater
  3. BONUS: Start Parasol

April

  1. Parasol
  2. BONUS: Write Boot Cuffs Pattern
  3. BONUS: Write Boots the Monkey Hat Pattern

May

  1. Finish writing Cuffs and Monkey Patterns
  2. Christmas Stockings for Family (4)

June

  1. Finish Christmas Stockings
  2. Christmas Tree Skirt

July – Finish Christmas Tree Skirt

August – Afghan Christmas Present #1

September – Afghan Christmas Present #2

October – Afghan Christmas Present #3

November

  1. Happypotamusses for Sephy and Greyson
  2. BONUS: Start Sweet 16 Afghan

December

  1. Finish Sweet 16 Afghan
  2. Mitten Ornaments

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February 27, 2015 · 10:27 am

Granny Assembly

I got a lot done on the assembly for  The Granny Square Project last night.

Placement

Placement

First I laid all my squares out on the table in the planned 4×6 order and started swapping them around to determine placement.  I didn’t want similar colors or squares with the same yarn too close to each other.  I stood there moving squares for about 45 minutes and then asked my husband to come take a look and we made a few more adjustments.

Join2

Joining

 

 

 

Then I started joining.  I used the slip stitch method of joining on the wrong side in the two outside loops of the last round of the square.  There is a good tutorial here for this and I really like how it looks on the front side.  I’ll get a close-up of that tonight.

Join3

Vertical Edges Joined

I finished joining all of the vertical sides and tonight I’ll go back and do the horizontal edges.  Then I’ll do a few rounds of single crochet edging to finish it out.  I really do like the continuity the grey yarn has brought to the squares.

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February 26, 2015 · 12:55 pm

Blocking Squares

I’ve had to pause only slightly on the Granny Square Project because I got another Etsy order for the Very Hungry Caterpillar Cocoon and Beanie.  But it really hasn’t set me back much for two reasons.

Blocking

Blocking

  1. I’ve actually been blocking my squares and haven’t really been having to crochet much anyway.  I found this great idea for blocking on Pinterest where you drill holes in a board (plywood in this case) and use small knitting needles to shape the squares. It has worked perfectly! So most of my time on the project lately has been waiting for the squares to dry.
  2. When I went to get the yarn for the cocoon, I found that I already had a completed beanie and a half completed cocoon!  So all I had to do was finish the cocoon and make the pieces for the eyes, nose and antennae and assemble them!

    Very Hungry Caterpillar Cocoon and Beanie

    Very Hungry Caterpillar Cocoon and Beanie

The blocking is all finished now and the last squares came off the block this morning.  So I am very excited that tonight I will be able to lay all the squares out and start deciding placement!

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February 19, 2015 · 5:05 am

Twenty-four Squares

Squares

Squares with Edging

I’m getting very close on this project. Here are most of the squares with two rounds of light grey edging on them.

After I snapped this, I decided that I wanted to actually do four rounds of edging so I am currently going back and adding two more rounds. And I was right. They look much better with more around them. I think it will give the finished afghan more uniformity.

two squaresIt is not taking too long to do this and I’m getting ready to block all of the finished squares!

yarnball

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February 18, 2015 · 10:23 pm

St. Patrick’s Day Shamrock Garland

It’s that time of year again. Do you need some St. Patrick’s day decoration? Visit my Etsy shop and order this shamrock garland now!

Stitched In Love Crocheting's avatarStitched In Love Crocheting

St. Patrick's Day Shamrock Garland St. Patrick’s Day Shamrock Garland

$7 on Etsy! Decorate your front door, kid’s bedroom, or even your cubicle at work for St. Patrick’s Day with this delightful strand of festive shamrock garland. Seven lucky shamrock’s adorn this 48″ hand crocheted strand of garland. Click on the picture to purchase on Etsy!

Shamrock

This garland is made with variegated yarn therefore each strand will be completely unique.

Price INCLUDES first class shipping via USPS to the United States.

Need something longer with more shamrocks? Contact me and we can talk!

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