Two Tuesday, Stashbuster #9 and Granny Squares

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Two things I'm grateful for:

1. My job. I really like what I do. It's fun to get dressed up, play in jewelry and eat snacks. And when it's all over, someone has new bling for free. Of course, it has it's problems, too (what job doesn't), but it enables me to be a stay at home mom and homeschool Hope, two things I will always be grateful for.

2. Shopping with Hope. This one's because of number 1; before we met with one of my hostesses today, Hope and I went to Kohl's for a quick shopping trip. She picked up a new shirt and pair of pants. I didn't find anything I liked, but it was still a lot of fun.

Two patterns I think are neat:

1.Crochet Shamrock Garland from Skip to My Lou.
2. Four Leaf Clover Throw from Red Heart.

Stashbuster #9

I finished the Subway Scarf last night ( pattern here). I have to admit it came out pretty good; I had my reservations about how it would look. I didn't do the last repeat because I thought it was wide enough, and I made the fringe in color B instead of A. I just hope my friend likes it; his birthday is tomorrow, so we'll see :-) I used one skein of Loops and Threads Impeccable in Amethyst and a little over 1 skein in True Grey.

Granny Square a Week

I'm almost caught up on these. I've decided to give them numbers instead of dates; the closer I get to 52, the closer I get to finishing.

Granny Square #4

Sunburst Granny Square

This pattern from Priscilla's Crochet was fun to make, and I got to practice making the puff stitch. It kind of looks like a chrysanthemum. More flowers!

Granny Square #5

Rippling Loops Square

This pattern from DragonFlyMomof2Designs was interesting. She gives very detailed directions, so it was pretty easy. I like the lacy look it has. The neat thing is, I think you could easily continue working the square until it becomes a blanket.

Granny Square #6

Wiggles Square

This pattern comes from one of my favorite blogs, Dly's Hooks and Yarns. It's been on my to make pile forever, and I'm really glad I finally got to it. It was very quick and easy to make, and a lot of fun, too.

Thanks for reading!

Blessings :-)

Daily Inspiration

Catching Up

I'm back :-) At least, I hope I am. I've been off and on sick for the last week and a half. I had a nasty sinus infection followed by a bad cold. The worst part is I'd be sick for a day or two, be fine for a day, be sick for a day, be fine for two, and so on. Can't shake it completely. I still have my cold but am able to sort of function.

Due to my fuzzy head, I've been unable to follow any patterns that require more than two different stitches. I tried, and frogged, several projects over the last week and a half. I did finish a couple things on my good days.

The A La Mode Boa Scarf:

Here's a closeup of the chains:

I finished the Cascade Scarf:

I found a tutorial online and made T-shirt yarn from a T-shirt I got at a yard sale for 10 cents. Then I turned the yarn into a trivet.

I'm past the halfway point on my Stashbuster project and will reveal it soon. No one's guessed what it is yet, although I've enjoyed all the guesses.

I made 3 more Ruffled Scarves from Sashay yarn, but haven't taken any pictures.

I haven't done any mini projects for the week or any dishcloths since last week because I've been sick. I'm hoping to catch up on those soon; well, as soon as I can follow a pattern again!

I hope you're all doing well and staying healthy :-)

Dishcloth a Day #19

Shells in a Row Dishcloth
This one was fun. I'd never tried the FPDC and BPDC before.

Dishcloth a Day #20

Granny's Path Dishcloth
This was a nice combination of traditional granny and solid granny.

Dishcloth a Day #21

Daydreaming DishclothAnother nice, textured one from Heather at The Good Life.

Dishcloth a Day #22

 Garden Flower Dishcloth
This pattern from Bernat is almost too pretty to be a dishcloth. It would make a nice doily instead.

Granny Square Saturday January 19, 2013

(I still need to make one for this past Saturday, the 26th)

Peace Sign Granny Square

This was not as hard as I thought it would be. Round 2 was definitely tricky, and it was a new experience working with 2 colors at once and inserting them at different stitches. But, on the whole, I really liked this one. Hope really likes it; she's into peace signs right now. She's asked for a blanket of these for her birthday in April, all different colors. I'll have to get moving on that.

Photo a Day January 18, 2013

Finally got my Shadow picture. This is Hope at the Museum of Science and Industry. She's playing in their shadow room; the butterflies are supposed to land on your shadow. There's another screen where fish will chase your shadow, and another one where little rocks will fall on your shadow and bury you. Fun.

Photo a Day January 19, 2013

The prompt was Delicious. What I liked was it didn't have to be food; it could be anything you thought was delicious. I love antique furniture; I love to look at it, touch it, imagine what I could do with it and where I could put it. I find it delicious.

Photo a Day January 20, 2013

The prompt was Something You Saw. We went to the Chocolate Festival at MOSI (the aforementioned museum). I took a lot of very cool pictures of what we saw; this was one of my favorites. It's an edible basket made from pretzels and modeling chocolate. Pretty cool, huh?

Photo a Day January 21, 2013

The prompt was What You Do. As a mom, I wear many hats, but the two main things I do are homeschool my daughter by day and sell jewelry by night. Now, where did I hang my cape?

Photo a Day January 22, 2013

The prompt was Corner. This is a wildflower garden planted on the corner a few blocks from our house. I love to see it in bloom each year.

 

Photo a Day January 23. 2013

The prompt was Electric. This one was tough to make interesting. I liked this Electric Fisherman I saw at Bass Pro Shops. I thought it was cute. 

Photo a Day January 24, 2013

The prompt was Stripes. A house a few blocks from ours (not the one with the garden, a different house) has Old Glory displayed proudly. Best stripes out there.

 Photo a Day January 25, 2013

The prompt was Landscape. This is out at the farm where Hope takes her horseback riding lessons. It's a very peaceful place to crochet.

Photo a Day January 26, 2013

The prompt was Together. These are Tim's favorite Muppets characters together on his computer monitor. 

Photo a Day January 27, 2013

The prompt was Sun. It was another overcast day (very warm, though), so I snapped a photo of the sun hiding in the clouds.

Photo a Day January 28, 2013

The prompt was Through. This is our bird, Tweety, through the bars of her cage. She's a little blurry in the photo because she was doing her "let me out, let me out" dance across her bar. She does that anytime I go near her cage door. She loves to sit on top of her cage and watch us without the bars in her vision.

Photo a Day January 29, 2013

Today's prompt was Grow. I took a picture of our dog, Sugar. She very quickly grew from a tiny puppy into the 80-pound beast she is now at 3 years old. She's a good dog; a little overprotective, not very bright, and totally ADHD, but a good dog.

I really enjoy the photo a day challenge, even if I have to take a few pictures a day because I get behind. It makes me really look at my surroundings and find the beauty in the ordinary.

Thanks for reading!

Blessings :-)

Mini Monday

Whew! I'm glad the weekend is over! It was great but very busy.

We had our local conference Saturday for the jewelry company I work for.

Some of the new Spring jewelry line

 It was a lot of fun but a very long day; we left the house at 7:30 am and didn't get home until 8 pm. I made my dishcloth and granny square and went to bed.

Sunday, after church, we had to buy parts to make gameboards for 4H. While Hope stayed with a friend for the day, Tim and I went to 3 Radio Shacks to get enough buzzers, light bulbs, battery packs, wire and batteries for 9 boards (that's how many kids we have in our club who are doing gameboards for the fair). After we found everything, we went to Michael's where I bought some cotton yarn. I love it when it's on sale for $1 each! 

Then we went to Ikea for a little while before coming home. I cooked and ate dinner, made my dishcloth, and went to bed.

So, here we are on Monday, and it's been nice and relaxing so far. Hope and I had school this morning. I made my dishcloth and am now working on my Stash-buster Project.

For my Mini Monday project this week, I want to make some scarves.

I have this yarn picked out for a Cascade Scarf from A Little Slice of Life.

This yarn is for a Ruffled Scarf. There's no written pattern, just a YouTube video from Maggie Weldon of Maggie's Crochet.

And this is for an A La Mode Boa Scarf from Crochet Dreamz. With the exception of the Cascade Scarf (which seems to take forever to make), these are quick scarves to crochet, so I should be able to get all three done this week.

I hope you had a wonderful weekend and a terrific Monday so far :-)

Dishcloth a Day #12

This is the Citrus Twist Dishcloth from The Good Life. It's a great pattern that works up quickly with a nice texture. Mine came out a little wonky, but I can fix that with a little blocking. I had trouble with the border; I can never seem to "single crochet evenly" down the side of anything. I'm hoping I get better with practice.

Dishcloth a Day #13

I really enjoyed making the Crocodile Scrub N Wipe Dishcloth from bestfreecrochet.com. I had never attempted the Crocodile Stitch before because it looked hard, but I found it to be pretty easy once I understood what "double crochet 4 times up the post of the next double crochet" meant. Blogger flipped my picture (again); the scales are the bottom of the dishcloth. It's meant to be folded in half; the scales do the scrubbing and the single crochets do the wiping. Neat, huh?

Dishcloth a Day #14

The SC 8 Point Round Dishcloth was fun to make today. It's a mini round ripple :-) I would advise using a stitch marker for the first couple rounds; I had a hard time seeing where each round began and ended because the single crochets don't have a lot of height.

Granny Square Saturday

I love the Spring Breeze Afghan Square from Priscilla's Crochet. I'm not sure why it looks crooked in the picture because it didn't come out that way. I made this one late on Saturday when I was really tired, and I wish I'd taken the time to make it multi-color. I think it would look like a flower square with the right color changes.

Photo a Day Challenge January 12, 2013

Saturday's prompt was Surprise. A tough one to capture. I took a picture of our new Spring jewelry catalog. Although it wasn't a surprise that we were getting it, it was a nice surprise to see a person modeling the jewelry on the cover. For all the years I've been a jewelry lady, our catalogs have always just had the jewelry on them.

Photo a Day Challenge January 13, 2013

Yesterday's prompt was Circle. I took a picture of my dinner (oops, cut off the corner; it doesn't look like a round plate anymore!). Yum, spaghetti and meatballs :-) I probably could have found a better picture while we were out and about, but I left my camera and prompt list at home. I have a camera on my phone, but not good Internet access. Live and learn.

Photo a Day Challenge January 14, 2013

Today's prompt is Yellow. This is Hope's cat, Oreo, laying claim to Sugar's yellow and white tug of war toy. (Sugar is Hope's dog.) Good thing Sugar was outside when I took this!

Daily Inspiration

Thanks for reading!

Blessings :-)

This and That

It's been a busy couple of days around here. Horseback riding lessons, errands, a Celebrating Home party and a Harry Potter movie marathon kept me running yesterday, and today we did housework and spent the evening in Orlando. 

I'm still plugging away on the shawl. I'm on the last 5 rows and each row takes forever (kind of like a round ripple). Hopefully, I'll be done soon.

Dishcloth a Day #4

Yesterday's dishcloth was the 29 Stitches Dishcloth from The Good Life. I like this pattern because it works up quickly and easily. I messed this one up, though; I put too many single crochets on the sides so it came out ruffly. So, rather than frogging the round, I changed the second round a little (reverse single crochet, chain 3, skip 2 stitches, reverse single crochet in the next stitch) to make the ruffly work for it. It still needs to be blocked a little but I like the effect. 

Dishcloth a Day #5

Today's was a lot of fun. I wish I had a link for you, but I couldn't find the pattern on the Lily Sugar n Cream website. I found the pattern on the cotton yarn wrapper. It was just called Dishcloth. It was quick and easy with single crochets in chain 2 spaces so it has a mesh-y look.

Granny Square Saturday

I made the first square for my Granny Square challenge this year. This is the Dream Weaver Square from Stormy'z Crochet. I love it! I can picture a whole blanket made with these; I bet different color combinations would look great. 

Photo a Day Challenge January 4, 2013

Yesterday's topic was The View From Here. I snapped a picture of Hope at her horseback riding lesson. It was a little drizzly and cold, but that never stops her from riding.

Photo a Day Challenge January 5, 2013

Today's topic was Movement. I was trying to find something interesting to shoot. This is the traffic on the Turnpike on our way to Orlando. I got a little glare from the windshield even though my flash wasn't on, but it still came out good.

Today's Inspiration

Time is the coin of your life. It is the only coin you have,

and only you can determine how it will be spend.

Be careful lest you let others spend it for you.

Carl Sandburg 

Thanks for reading!

Blessings :-)

Four Challenges

Because I'm an overachiever (read that "crazy"), I've decided to give myself 4 challenges this year.

The first is the Photo a Day Challenge. I did this a little last year and really enjoyed it. I'd like to do it all year this year. The details for January can be found here or by clicking on the Photo a Day January button on the left under Challenges.

Photo a Day January 1, 2013

Today's topic was Today. What did I do today, the first day of a new year?

I worked on the turquoise and brown yo yo blanket all day. I had 5 rows to add on and then the border.
And....

TA DA!! It's finally done!!!

The second challenge I'm doing this year is Dishcloth a Day. It's simple enough; I'll make a different cotton dishcloth each day and post a picture of it with the link to the pattern.

Dishcloth a Day #1

Today's dishcloth is the Ocean Grove Round Washcloth from Lion Brand yarn.

It came out nice although I had to block it to make it lie flat because I crochet so tightly. Before I blocked it, my sweet hubby said, "Oh, that's cute. Is it a bowl?"

The third challenge is Granny Square a Week. It's along the same lines as the dishcloth a day challenge; I'll make a different granny square each week and post it on Saturdays with the link to the pattern. At the end of the year, I'll take the 52 squares and make them into a blanket.

The fourth challenge will be Mini Monday. Each Monday, I'll start a small project, something I can finish by Friday. I haven't taken pictures of this week's project, but it's the Have a Heart Shawl from Red Heart yarn.

I'm hoping these challenges will not only use up the large amount of yarn I own (so I can buy more!), they will also help better my crocheting skills. And I'll be making gifts for friends, family, and charity. Bonus!

Thanks for reading!

Blessings :-)