African flower pot-holders

I'm not entirely sure how to spell "pot-holder". I've seen it as "pot holder", "pot-holder" and "potholder". Anyway, I've made some of those circular things you handle hot pots and pans with. :)

This project was partly to help with stash busting and partly because I genuinely need new potholders and crochet ones will be pretty and quick to make.

I started to follow a pattern for an African flower granny mandala potholder but I thought it might come out too holey. I didn’t want to risk burns, so instead I did solid treble crochet (UK) circles to surround the African flower rather than treble clusters. I had to do a bit of frogging before I got it to lie flat, but I got there after a couple of tries.

I finished off the second pot-holder yesterday. I only did African flowers on the front, so the backs are just concentric circles of pink, white and blue. For some reason, one potholder fitted together perfectly, the other needed a bit of fudging because though I was sure I’d done the increasing the same, it seemed to have far more stitches. Anyway, they’re fine for my own use and worked great when removing the pizzas from the oven yesterday. :) I joined the two circles with double crochet (UK) and then did a final round of Crab Stitch to give a nice firm edge.

I may make this pattern again, but there are some other pretty ones I want to try first.

A table runner becomes a net curtain

My 92-year-old Dad moved into residential care last autumn and my brother and I had the job of selling his bungalow. I started to make a filet crochet runner for the lovely dark wood dining room table, thinking it would help to brighten up the place while the bungalow is being viewed by potential buyers. Once the bungalow was sold, I intended to find a home for the runner in our house. However, the bungalow sold more quickly than I expected so I didn't have time to get very far with the project. In fact all I had was a number of Japanese flower style motifs joined into a strip.

The table runner languished for some months. I was busy with Christmas projects and also wanted to finish a blanket for me to use while the weather was still cold. It didn't help matters that we don't really have a suitable place to display it as a table runner, so motivation wasn't high. And then, realising the Easter bunnies and baskets (see next post) were almost complete and wondering what to make next, I had a rummage through the bags of yarn and unfinished projects and found the pretty flower motifs I had made. My first though was to finish it as a table runner, but then I had a better idea. A net curtain!

I removed a couple of motifs and managed to improvise a way of joining the filet crochet onto the floral strip. Once I'd put some different sized stitches in to level up the row, the filet part became very straightforward.

I contemplated placing the another band of motifs part way up the curtain, but then rejected that idea and instead I'll place them randomly on the net. This is a venture into the unknown for someone who, until now, has always religiously followed patterns! :)

As spring is here and sometimes -- like today! the sun streams through the window on the landing outside my study-cum-workroom, I think a new curtain should look good and it will kick start the next round of cleaning and decorating. I went round the whole house a few years ago, but the décor is looking a bit tired and grimy because it was quite a few years ago now.

Anyway, I'm delighted to have found a good use for the motifs. Progress has therefore resumed and crocheting the filet net is a nice mindless project to do for relaxation.

I seem to have another WIP!

I am trying not to start new projects willy nilly and instead have a strict, 'one out, one in' policy, but I did finish the gloves and quite a few of my other big projects are at the 90% completion point, so I thought I could sneak in another smaller and quicker one.

I'm making this pattern up, based on an idea inspired by a photo posted to the Facebook crochet group I belong to. Basically, it will be a border of Japanese flower motifs around a rectangle of filet crochet. I've never done filet crochet before, so I hope it turns out easy to do.

So far I have just one completed flower (to make sure they looked OK) and six centres. The yarn is James C Brett's Cotton On, which is nice to work with and comes in many pretty colours.

This will be a table runner for Dad’s dining room table while the bungalow is being viewed by potential buyers. After that, I’ll find a home for it in our house, perhaps on the TV table?

Finally finished the baby blanket!

I have finally finished the blanket I was crocheting for our youngest grandchild. It was supposed to be a gift for when the baby was born, but I didn't manage to finish it until last weekend. I handed it over on Tuesday and our granddaughter seemed to like it. As she is now 11 months old (oops!), you can see that it took a lot longer than I intended.

The problem was, not only did crocheting the squares create a lot of ends to weave in, but every stage after that created what felt like another 9 million ends. :( There was joining the squares together. There were the ears to put on, and the mouths to crochet and the eyes to embroider.

The other reason it took a long time was that it's the project that got me back into crocheting. My skills were rusty and I've probably speeded up now, more than twelve months on from when I started this.

In the photo below the completed blanket is on the left. Top right picture shows a close up of the funny faces after blocking. Bottom right shows the squares just after completing. You can see how much better the ears and faces look after being pulled into shape and gently steamed. However, I suspect that after the blanket has been thoroughly cuddled and sucked on, the ears are not going to stay flat for very long!

In case anyone is interested, here is the original pattern I used, which is a free download on Ravelry. As the blanket was going to be for a baby, I didn't add the bows shown on the Ravelry page. I also crocheted the ears directly onto the blanket, rather than making them separate and sewing them on. I don't trust my sewing not to come adrift. Also, I'm not as good at embroidering the features as the designer of the pattern, but I think they'll do. :)

One project finished, yarn acquired for the next project

I have finally finished the blanket for my youngest grandchild. It took somewhat longer than intended. I had planned to give it as a gift to mark the birth, but I finally handed it over yesterday -- and our little granddaughter is now 11 months old! Oops! :)

Anyway, she seemed to like it and because I did it large cot sized, not newborn crib sized, she still has time to get lots of use out of it.

As it was the first serious project I tackled in my return to crochet after many years of not doing any kind of handicrafts, I wasn't sure how much yarn it would take. I therefore bought some, used it up and then bought more. This meant that when it was finished, I had used up just about all the coloured yarn, but still had a lot of white left. Enough for another project, in fact, but I didn't want to do something that was entirely white.

It just so happens that I'm down in South Wales for a few days while my husband attends a maths education conference. Today I went exploring Newport and found the wonderful Victorian indoor market. It still seems to be thriving today, with proper butchers' stalls and greengrocers' stalls -- and a wool stall! So I now have some more balls of coloured cotton/acrylic to add to the white.

Now I just have to decide what to make next...