aidin, finished

After setting this down for vacation, it took me a few weeks to pick it back up again when we got back. Of course, in the meantime my nephew was born giving me the ‘ooh better get this done’ moment I needed. All I had left were the long side borders and it didn’t take me long once I got hookin’! This was a free pattern on Ravelry, and I have to say I’m thankful to the designer who put all the work into this and then shared it. It makes such a nice piece.

It ended up being a good size, about 36 x 44 and quite a hefty weight, which I am really pleased with. Crochet fabrics are denser compared to knitting as it is, and the mosaic crochet adds more density per square inch making for a nice thick and sturdy fabric. That said, this cotton yarn from Scheepjes is not as stiff as the usual balls I get from other brands and that makes for more drape in the finished project. It was a little splitty to work with, but what cotton isn’t? I definitely appreciated the wide range of colors I had to choose from, and I love this combination, which is a slant rhyme to nautical colors and hopefully will stand up to wear and tear. At least being cotton it will be easy to throw in the wash. 

I’m hoping the high contrast in the zig zag section will be good for the little munchkin’s eyes and give him something interesting to stare at as he explores the world around him. Rather than doing the last round in the teal as the pattern called for, I used the gold since I was running low on teal and had the most gold left. I squeaked by using up the last of gold and just a few yards of the English tea. I only have about 20 yards each of the teal and tea leftover, so I’d say I made a good choice!

I’m very happy with this finish and am looking forward to seeing my nephew bundled up in this as he grows up.

Pattern: One Step Beyond Blanket (my Ravelry page)
Yarn: Scheepjes Cahlista in ‘ginger gold’, ‘dark teal’, and ‘English tea’
Hook: H (5 mm)
Size: 36”x44”

a unicorn birthday hoop

Yesterday I took a trip over to Michael's to get some aida cloth for an idea that popped into my head. I've really been enjoying cross stitching lately, and I've been spending way too much time on Pinterest looking at witty sayings in embroidery hoops. Combine those facts with a friend's birthday this weekend and you have this quick little project. 

DMC has a lot of free embroidery and cross stitch patterns on their website. I've spent the spring downloading flower and succulent patterns, which made me wonder if they wouldn't have a unicorn simple enough to make in a couple of days. 

Ta da! I didn't follow the colors in the pattern, though I'm pretty close. I have a pretty large thread stash that doesn't need to get bigger right now, and many of these colors fell under the "close enough" category. I also modified the horn, which was supposed to be a rainbow, to be a swirl of yellow and peach, which I like better. The original pattern also has some starbursts and hearts in the background but all I really wanted was the unicorn head. So there we have it. 

I finished the last stitching and final touches this morning and it is so very cute. I would totally keep it for myself, but it's perfect for the birthday girl. The hoop is a bright yellow plastic one I also got at Michael's. I finished off the back by tidying up the aida cloth with a trim and cinching it closed with a running stitch using white thread. I considered but ultimately abandoned a felt backing because this particular hoop design makes it difficult to stitch on and I did not want to use hot glue on the plastic. 

I envision peppering my walls with little hooped vignettes now... it's probably a good thing that I have a lot of other projects going or else that might actually happen! Hopefully at least a few more will make their way out of my imagination and into real form because this was a really fun and really quick project. 

Now back to the last rows on that mosaic baby blanket.... 

a vacation project

At the end of April we headed east to Kentucky for a week and a half. I was pretty far along on my mosaic baby blanket and it was too big to really take on the plane and be comfortable. Soooo as has become vacation tradition, I started a new project the night before we left! Pack, start new knitting project. Makes sense, right?

I made a lot of progress on the plane and then had many relaxing moments during our stay in Kentucky to get all but the last lace panel done. I finished up a couple of days ago, about a week after we got back so that makes two and a half weeks from cast on to bind off. Whaaaat. That amazed me. I was always wondering how some of the folks on Ravelry could finish big projects in like two weeks. Now I know.... lots of time to sit and knit. 

I love the stripes but you know what that means.... ends! So many ends to weave in. Were I a more motivated human being I would have that done and this blocked already, but I want to work some more on that mosaic blanket before I tackle this mess. 

Kepler made very important contributions to the last sections of this project by keeping my yarn warm as I worked in the evenings after we returned home. I wonder if I can get him to help me weave in all those ends???