Free Pattern Friday: Baby Blankets!

I have two co-workers I have promised baby blankets to. One is a brand new daddy with his first ever baby being born at the beginning of September. He’s been on paternity leave, and he’ll be back when I get back from vacation. I’m hoping the blanket is big enough since he hasn’t told anyone any details about the baby yet.

His blanket is made using Baby Bee Adore-A=Ball in Happy Face. I used 6 balls of yarn and a size M/N(9mm) hook.:

The paw belongs to my son’s orange and white tabby, Butterscotch.

My other co-worker is going to be a brand new granddad with his first grandchild expected in December. He doesn’t know the gender of the baby yet, so I went with white.

This baby blanket is also made with Baby Bee Adore-A-Ball but it’s called Angel:

I’m also using the M/N (9mm) hook for this one too.

I haven’t measured either one but when I do, I’ll update this post.

While I like how this “yarn” feels, I don’t really care for working with it. It’s like homespun only slicker. I won’t be using it for any future projects.

See you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel and sonic screwdriver!!!

YouTube Tuesday: Sally Pointer

I’m finally able to sit down and watch some YouTube videos, and I found this lovely creative in my suggestion list while I was watching the newest video from Darkest Raven’s Movie Minis.

I call myself a fiber artist, but this woman has really opened my horizons!! Did you know you can make thread and yarn from stinging nettles, brambles and burdock??? I didn’t, and neither did anyone else I asked. It must be a Northern thing or something – not sure. I’m from the South, and we do a lot of cotton thread and yarn by hand.

I’ve since watched a great many of Sally Pointer’s fantastic videos, and she provides historical background and information along with the different techniques and processes she discusses. She processes the fibers she’s going to use, cleans them, spins or twists them depending on what she’s doing and weaves and sews with the end result.

You can find her entire playlist of videos here : Sally Pointer

My current favorite is:

This video is an introduction to different natural fibers, and she has more detailed videos on her channel which I highly recommend.

Let me know what you think of this and anything else you’ve seen on my blog. I’d love to hear from you!

See you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel and sonic screwdriver!!!

Free Pattern Friday! : Potholder and Dishcloth

This is a crochet pattern I’ve used in the past to make housewarming gifts. It’s a fun little pattern!

Simple Border Potholder and Dishcloth

This pattern uses cotton yard because it’s the best for pot holders and dishcloths. If you use a special heat resistant fabric in combination, you could use other types of yarn as well. I’d just be mindful of how flammable the yarn is or how easily it might melt.

Enjoy!!

See you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel and sonic screwdriver!!

Cute Vanity Tray – Project #6

I have realized I don’t take very good photos. Please forgive me as this isn’t really a field that holds much interest for me except for sharing. I’ll try to do better.

This little tray is something I made myself without a pattern. It turned out better than expected even though it was off the cuff. I made it using Red Heart Super Saver yarn in white and some cardboard I cut to size and covered with some fabric remnants I had leftover after lining a purse I made some time ago.

I hope you enjoy this! I know it’s made a welcome addition to my bathroom!

See you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel and sonic screwdriver!!

Pretty Gray Pillowghan – Project #5

This project didn’t turn out quite as well as I’d hoped, but what is wrong is a quick fix. I’ve decided to go ahead and share it. I found this pattern on a blog called Crochet Parfait over on Blogspot ages ago, but I’d never worked it up until this week. You can find the pattern here.

I used Heather Gray and White yarns from Red Heart. I ended up using one skein of the white, Super Saver size and five skeins of the gray yarn in Super Saver size. I didn’t know I had that much of the gray when I started, but I’m glad I did!

Hope you enjoyed this post as much as I enjoyed making the project. Let me know what you think please!

See you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel and sonic screwdriver!!

Scrap Yarn Throw – Project #3

Every so often I get all my left over yarn, the scraps, and I make something out of it. These projects usually differ in size, shape and even what they are. A while back, I decided to do something easy that would take a while to complete. It stands to reason it would since I use only scraps on it.

Anyway, this project is now complete as I took the time to gather up all my scrap yarn once again and found some time to work on the throw I’d begun work on months ago. I try very hard not to repeat the yarn I use but sometimes, it happens. The nice thing about this project is I can always add on to it when I want to make it bigger, and I don’t have to do anything more than get out my scraps.

This throw is long enough lengthwise to take up the entire futon, but it’s not wide enough from top to bottom to cover the entire thing. 🙂 Still, it makes a great cover up when I’m reading or watching television but don’t want a full blanket on me. I’ll be draping it over the back of the futon so it will be handy whenever I need it.

Let me know what you think!

I’ll see you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel and sonic screwdriver!!

Baby Pink – Project #2

A friend of mine has a lovely bedroom she’s doing in shades of pink and red with lace and frills – a Victorian style room according to her. Anyway, she commissioned me to create something to drape over the end of her bed, not a full blanket, more like a quarter of one. She gave me some bulky baby pink yarn to work with at the beginning and gave me the red yarn for roses when the main piece was nearly done.

The baby pink part was designed by me without a pattern. I just winged it with some simple yet lacy looking so it would go with the rest of the room. It took 12 skeins of yarn because the skeins weren’t that big, and the yarn is bulky. I got the rose pattern from Cre8tioncrochet.com. Fair warning: Her pages are loaded with animated ads which could eat up your temp memory while you’re trying to work up the pattern. I made 8 roses with one skein of yarn, and the roses are about 3 inches wide, roughly.

That is my futon in my livingroom it’s draped across. My friend’s bed is a queen size, and the edges only drape over the sides about 4 inches – if that. I didn’t measure the piece before I made it or before I posted this, sorry. I know it’s 240 stitches across with a J hook and size 3 yarn. 🙂

Since I’m moving to 12 hour shifts tomorrow (Monday) night, I won’t be getting any of my other projects done in the near future – except maybe the body pillow I’m working on. I just need to do a little sewing. Other than that, the others will take time to get done. I hope you all can wait.

See you on the flipside and don’t forget your towel and sonic screwdriver!!!

Loopies cat – Project #1

I thought I’d share one of my many craft projects I have going on as I complete them. I mostly crochet, but I do other needlecrafts and whatnot as well. It relaxes me, and I can think of other things while I’m working on my projects. At least with crocheting I can. This one, not so much.

I found this kit on clearance at Wal-Mart. It’s supposed to be for kids as well as adults but unless the kids have a lot of patience, this isn’t going to be much fun for them. Parts of it were a bit annoying even for me.

This project is supposed to be a simple pillow. The pillow part is already made, you just have to add yarn loops to give the cat “fur”. Prepping the yarn was easy. It’s a soft thick yarn and cuts easily. There’s a crochet needle included in the kit, along with the yarn. You pull loops through a mesh like you do latch hook but without all the extra bother of latch hooking.

Getting it started in the tail was annoying because the yarn didn’t want to be grabbed. The hook is also small so if you’re not careful, it will go through other mesh squares while you’re trying to grab yarn. Once it gets going though, it’s easy to do. Adding the felt is super easy, you just use loops to hold it on. It took me a couple of hours to do because I was doing other things as well.

This is not a toy for little kids to play with because they could easily pull the loops out. Not for animals for sure since the yarn is a choking hazard for them. For small children as well, if they can manage to get the yarn out of the pillow enough to try to swallow it.

Overall, I think it came out well, and it will now sit happily on the futon in my livingroom. 🙂

See you all on the flipside and don’t forget your towel and sonic screwdriver!!