December Montage

In December I shared my pictures of my ‘violet’ garden as well as some showing what is flowering now.

I also, finally, finished the CAL blanket and showed you how it looks with my leafy edging.

There were pictures of my pre-Christmas cooking of fruit cake and stollen as well as the snowflake decorations that seem to predominate this year.

And lastly I showed you the crochet animals I had attached to key rings as presents for some of the family.

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CAL blanket: Final View

Improved photograph

The light has been so bad today that I have tried all sorts of things to get a decent picture and this is the best I can do. But rather than put off the post until the light is better (Who knows when! 🙂 ) I am using what I have.

I won’t be using it on my bed but the other bed would be much harder to photograph.

Having joined all the squares together as I showed you HERE.

I have since been working on edging the blanket.

In as much as the crochet between the squares represented paths, I wanted to continue this on the outside edge. Which I did using what I know as linen stitch.

Here you can see how it mirrors the joing to a certain extent.

I then in my fancy wanted a leafy outside edge to maybe suggest a surrounding hedge and so I devised a leafy edging that would fit evenly around.

Here is what is the best photo I took in many ways, which gives the general feel of the blanket.

A New Snowflake!

The other day I had an idea for a new project! Yes I know I don’t really need another project to add to my list. 🙂

But this one has been in the back of my mind for a long time. It is to make a crochet cloth for my pine dining table. I have collected various ideas along the way but never really fixed on any of them. Then I had the idea, since I like hexagons patterns and snowflakes are six sided, to make a cloth based on snowflakes. However I felt that I needed a snowflake pattern that was lacy, quick and easy to make and had the classic trefoil snowflake points.

I couldn’t find quite what I wanted in my ‘100 snowflakes’ book, so I ended by working up a pattern based on the second of my ‘Easy Real Snowflakes’

About the time I devised the pattern I was travelling to Aylesbury to see my daughter and granddaughter performing in a pantomime, so I practiced joining the snowflakes together on the train.

I took the fine cotton because it was easy to transport.

After this I tried using a couple of scraps of my DK cotton yarn to make a bigger one. (Probably the size I will use) – that is the one at the top.

And yesterday I tried making a few for a garland in the Stylecraft ‘Special DK’ yarn while on the bus to Romsey.

As you can see: I can’t quite decide the best way to join the snowflakes. Whether to join opposite points or ones just two away from each other. The trouble with using opposite points is that since the centre of gravity is on the joining line rather than below they are in danger of flopping forward.

If anyone has done something similar I would be glad to know how you would join them.

Making them while on the train or bus makes me feel that they aren’t taking my attention from more urgent things like Christmas presents and the CAL blanket.

The trip to Romsey was to buy one more ball of the Stylecraft yarn to finish the border of the CAL blanket since the final edging I had devised was rather yarn hungry and I had almost run out when only half way round.

November Montage

In November I spent a lot of time on my two crochet blankets: the spectrum granny ripple that I managed to finish and the CAL cottage garden one which still needs an edge.

I also crocheted a bauble for the Christmas tree. (Actually I am also doing a bit of crochetting presents but I can’t show you those till after Christmas.)

I continued my ‘Rainbow Garden’ posts with ‘green’ and ‘blue’ and made some rather crumbly flapjacks. Tasted good though. 😉

Join Along: Week six

I made a special effort this week and managed to complete three rows and thus finish the main part of the blanket.

It was so hard to photograph the whole blanket that the above picture is actually a combination of two photographs.

Then there is finishing off all those ends (I make it 234 in total) and add a border. Well I have finished about three quarters of the ends but have yet to get to the border.

The next time I show you the blanket it will be finished, whether that is one week or two or ………………….

I find it a bit overwhelming seeing it all together and I have tried it on my bed and it makes an all over single bed blanket.

Join Along: Week five

It’s been quite a struggle to complete another two rows for this week.

It is also getting harder to photograph the blanket above the centre to make it evenly rectangular, so I have given up trying.

The bigger it gets the more I like it but you have probaly seen the best of it up to now as the first two rows and last two rows contain the less interesting blocks with all my favourites in the middle.

I especially like the ones that are like flowers with raised petals.

I expect that it will take me another two weeks to have at least started the final border.

I am happy with its generally appearance even though I didn’t take the time and trouble to block the squares. Are there any people out there making one of these blankets who have blocked them? How much difference does it make?

Join Along: Week four

Another two rows completed (over half way). Lighting really bad again!!

I am really getting to quite like it.

When I first did some experimental joining.

I thought I liked the joining method as well as any other but was not sure if I was going to like the finished blanket.

Now I think that it is ‘growing’ on me! 🙂

Not sure what to do for the final edging, maybe something lacey in dark green.

October Montage

In October I shared with you the Orange and Yellow flowers of my Rainbow Garden.

I showed you my first crochet cushion cover that I had made for my son’s new flat.

I displayed a large number of the photographs I had taken on my Spanish pilgrimage “In the footsteps of St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross”.

As well as my new book: “100 Snowflakes to Crochet” and the first few snowflakes I had made while away on the pilgrimage.

I also created three posts showing you the progress I was making in joining together the CAL blocks into a blanket.

Join Along: Week three

I have completed another two rows this past week. I am pleased with how it is coming along and the general pattern.

And also the way the flat braid edging frames the individual blocks.

I am aware that I haven’t done any other post between my CAL ones but I have been very busy working on my two blankets and hope that I may finish my spectrum granny ripple one in the next week (or certainly no more than ten days).

Join Along: Week two

This is how far I have got after another week of joining. Well I am spending about half my time on it like I did when I was making the blocks.

The light was bad and there aren’t very many places where I can lay it out, so I have to apologise for the difference in light levels from left to right.

And I’ve tucked them out of sight but I haven’t finished off any of the ends yet. This is partly because it will be quicker to do a load at one sitting and partly to allow extra time for my other blanket.

As the squares are rather small on the above picture I have made another rotated so you can get a closer look if you wanted to.

I’m not sure if the places where four squares meet are equally neat but I am doing the same thing everytime so I am just not looking too closely. And I have checked the way I work them. The corner loops definitely end up like this even if it isn’t clear when you look at them.

But with the way you have to do them, since you can’t just thread them through, I suppose that makes them less clear.