The Dance of the 20 Bobbles

There has been some happy dancing happening in the house!  My mixed stitch stripey bobbled blanket and I are now the best of friends.  Yes, I won the battle and my blanket has bobbles!!  Yippeeeeeee.

There's a bit of a new routine around this neck of the woods.  My girls are currently on school holidays, and hubby is at home a lot, still in recovery-phase and I have set up a morning "office" in bed!!  I grab a bowl of cereal, unplug my laptop, get my crochet blanket and hop back into bed for ohhhh a couple of hours!!  I know, it's utterly disgraceful (other Very Important Things are not getting done), but it is such a snoozy, fabulous way to start the day and I'm making the most of it because I know it won't last!!

Want to see another photo?  We haven't spent quite enough time looking at these bobbles yet have we?

Okay, so some are a little less "bobbly" than others.  I'll let you in on a little secret, after I had finished my complete row of bobbles and the next row, I did in fact notice a slight mistake with each and every bobble.  Yes, each and every one, which means at least it's consistent, and I have decided not to undo the rows and look on this as a learning curve, or a learning bobble.

The good thing here is that I am learning new stitches, undoing where there must be undoing and most importantly, being okay about things that are okay but not perfect.  I think I'm growing!!!  There would have been a time when less-than-perfect would have been rolled up in a ball and shoved under the bed never to be seen or heard of again.

Okay, I'm off to learn the outline cluster pattern.  Wish me luck.
Hope you have a very happy, bobbly kind of day.
Trudy

A Bit of Crochet

There has been a bit of crochet happening around here on my mixed stitch stripey blanket.  Truth be told, there has also been a bit of un-doing and re-doing of the mixed stitch stripey blanket.  So, all in all, not a great deal of progress, but a lot of improvement.

Can you see a bit of a wave there?  Let's pan out a bit and have a really good look at what was happening.  Are you ready for this ... beware, this is scary crochet, this is the horror story of straight rows of crochet.  It may shock!!

Yes, I could put my crochet on the table and it formed a perfect circle!!  At this point I thought I should just keep going and make a skirt of the mixed stitch stripey kind but I'm not sure my little town is ready for crochet garments!

My problem seemed to be with my tension.  Tension of the blanket, which soon became tension of the person holding onto the hook.  So, best solution?  Undo.  Lots and lots of rows came undone to get back to the problem.  I don't think any amount of blocking was going to help this baby (not that I've ever blocked any work, I've always let the weight of a blanket and the use of a blanket be my blocking process).

Anyway I'm happy to announce that the circular look of the blanket is behind me, it's still a little wavy but I can live with a little wavy and I will, for the first time ever, block my work.  I'll need your help on this at the end of the project.  Lots of hints and tips please!!

So this is where I'm up to now. The next stitch to come is the bobble stitch and the very idea of it is scaring the pants off me!!

 

 

If you never see any reference to this blanket again then you'll know the bobble won.
Have a lovely weekend.

Trudy

Mixed Stitch Stripey Blanket Update

These colours are so luscious to work with, I just had to share some colour with you today!

 

  

That's all.

Just colours.

And crochet.

And new-to-me stitches.

 

Wishing you a lovely mid-week day.

Trudy

Little Woollie Crochet-a-long

Do you know Julie, over at Little Woollie?  She's having a crochet-a-long of the mixed stitch stripey blanket kind.  I thought that as we were coming out of Winter and as I had just finished a major crochet blanket that I would screw up my eyes and put my fingers in my ears so I wouldn't be tempted by this fabulous project, but I have no will power and here I am about ready to jump right in!!

We are very lucky in our little country town that we have a shop that sells wool, and very lucky that the owner of this shop is happy to order in any colours that I need/want/love!  So while I had decided a little while ago to join in this project, I've been waiting for the wool to come in and now it has.

These are my colours.  These colours call to me all the time.  Very different to Julie's bright and cheery colours, which are gorgeous, but these are my colours and the colours I will love to work with.  I'm using Australian 8 ply wool by Cleckheaton 'Country' and Shepherd 'Colour 4 Me'.  They are just so scrum-diddly-umptious that I can't wait to get started!!

This year was my year for focusing on finishing all those unfinished projects I have piling up, finishing one a month (which reminds me that August is almost over and I've not been working on one of those projects, opps!) and here I am starting something brand, spanking new, but there you go, that's just the kind of girl I am!!  Oh, and while I'm confessing to new projects I'm knitting my hubby a scarf too ...

Any confessions of the crafty kind you want to get off your chest?
Have a lovely day, Trudy

While we're on the subject of Blankets

I think I have time for just one more blankety-blanket post before Winter is nudged aside by Spring, and the blankets are put away again until next year.  Thought I might offer you a bit of a showcase of woolly bits.  That is, blankets knitted and crocheted.  A feast of colour, as it were.

This first one is a knitted blanket, and the joy of this blanket is that many hands went into making it.  It was knitted, not only by me, but also four very special people in my life.  It was quite a few years back now, and I'm not sure how it came about that I was given such a helping hand.  I possibly bit off more than I could chew in the knitting department, felt overwhelmed and was saved by my Mum.  She stepped in and was the first to say she would do a few blocks.  Then my Aunt.  Then my best buddy.  Then, not to be outdone by the bevy of knitting women around him, my Dad did a block for me.  Yes, my Dad can knit.  Can knit, but doesn't make a habit of it.

This is a big, weighty blanket and is on my bed right now, ready for when it's time to snuggle under it.  I love the eclectic mix of colours, the mish-mash, the "let's finish this ball of wool, did I make you a jumper in this?"

This next one is a more recent addition to the blanket stack.  This one was made a couple of years ago.  Purpose-bought colours, and notice the grey and red?  This is more of a knee rug, in fact it's on my knees right now!!  Oh, now see what I've done ... I was calling them blankets, but deep down I want to say rugs!  I was brought up with the word rug, and just recently it seems they've become blankets.  Anyone else want to call them rugs?!!

Next up in the showcase of blanket-rugs is one I've shared before, but wanted to pop it in anyway.  This is the one I affectionately call the Nanny McPhee Granny, or the Nanny Granny.  Love those hundred squares.  Very uninspired by the sewing-up process at the end.

And now, a peek at my current work-in-progress.  Flowers!  I made a shawl in this design and enjoyed making the flowers so much that thought a whole blanket-rug in them would be quite something.  This is a project that's just jiggling along in the background of all the other projects I'm working on.  Not rushing this one, just enjoying the process, and enjoying using up all the left over wool.

I'm off to "Bedfordshire" to dream under some woolly stripes.
'night, Trudy

Finished Project for June

The reason some of these unfinished projects of mine are sitting unfinished - this knitting project, for example, has sat practically since woman first put wool around a long stick and called it knitting - is that my interest wanes.  And what can one do with waning interest, you may ask?  Turn what was to be something into something a little different.  Turn what was going to take a lot more knitting hours into something which could be cast off immediately.

So here is this month's finished project which started out with huge potential.

This was going to be a Seriously Long Scarf.  See my knitting skills are sitting pretty low on the scale of knitting skills, none-the-less a brilliant idea later and scarf becomes neck worm.  And neck worm is very happy snuggling around neck of Girl 1.  Inside-out mind you, and with her giving us her best spy look.

The downside of cutting off a project mid-potential is that there is Wool Left-Over, and Girl 2 has shown interest in having a neck worm too.  Of course.

Hope you're all enjoying a little bit of sunshine today.
Trudy

Rosy Posy Brooch

This is the easiest thing to make with knitting needles, without knitting a stitch.  Anyone would think I was a knitter looking at this assortment of needles, but this was my Mum's collection, and I dipped into it to find a couple of size 8mm needles, which seemed to do exactly what was asked of them.

I first stumbled over this little project at Henhouse, so thank you Hen for this rosy posy brooch idea, a brooch that can be made in the blink of an eye, a flick of a wrist!  No turning of the heel or working with four needles or knitting into the back of the stitch or psso, no sir-ee, just plain old simple winding.  Here is the end product, this is Hen's.  Do visit her blog, it has a lovely vintage feel to it.  And look, aren't these just the bees knees?

All you need are some scraps of wool, those pesky, little bits that you don't know what to do with but can't quite bring yourself to simply throw away.

And maybe a small smackerel of something, in case of tricky, patience-testing moments.  Crafting is always more fun with tea and a little something, especially if that little something is home-baked biscotti by a nine year old girl.

Now comes the winding part, wind around and around the needles about eight times, then with a contrasting bit of wool tie a knot around it's middle and there you have it, a little woolly flower.

And then lots of woolly flowers.  Stitch them onto a backing of choice.  I chose a piece of wool felt, then glued it to a piece of cardboard, then onto another piece of wool felt for a bit of colour interest.  A brooch-pin stitched to the back and it's done.

It was decided by all who first looked at my brooch that the wonky cutting of the circles was more endearing than shabby and showed a true home-baked product!!

What have you been making at your house?

Do you throw away those little ends of wool?

Do you have another idea for using up the leftovers?

Trudy

Moments

Moments.

A week made up of moments.

Special moments, in amongst all the other moments.

Being inspired by Japanese illustrator, Ryoko Ishii.

Watching my daughter hanging upside-down on the Queen's Birthday Holiday.

Snuggling under blankets watching old episodes of "I Dream of Jeannie".

Feeling the warmth of the sun.

Feeling so cold that a wheat pack is offered.

Summonsing my inner-hairdresser for Girl 1 to turn into Princess Leia at her band concert.

Whisking hubby away from work for a cuppa in the cafe.

Playing with wool and wishing this basketful was mine, not Rowan's.

Playing with fabric.

An extended family meal and the telling of well-known stories.

Sneaking off to the movies in the daytime with a friend.

Catching up on some missed "Offspring" episodes on the computer.

Taking delivery of a New Couch, still in its plastic even now.

It was a week made up of special moments.
What's your favourite moment from your week?
Trudy