Little crochet pup wip

Waiting

Foxy crochet slippers

It's officially fall here in Canada.

The leaves are starting to turn colours and it's time to pull out

the thick comforters and to snuggle in front of the fireplace.

It's also time to pull out my yarn and make myself some slippers.




Fox Slippers!

I haven't worn them in front of my family yet but I know the reaction I'll get.
Rolled eyes....shaking of their heads, etc.
But I ignore them...life has too many stupid rules.
And, to me, almost nothing is cuter than fox slippers.

If you want to know where to buy the pattern
(by Tara Murray)
and what yarn I used check out my Ravelry link below
Ravelry link to fox slippers

Here is a pic of the foxes in progress:

Almost finished my chanson en crochet

This lovely shawl is called Chanson en crochet.
The free pattern info and errata can be found
here.
 I decided to block it before finishing it

so that I could gauge if it needed to be lengthened.

This yarn (Patons SWS in Natural Berry) is beautiful

 but it is a nightmare to rip out.

The colour is off in the photo...it is, in person
a lovely deep ruby red.

Crocheting backwards without tripping

I've made a bit more progress on my gloves.
The colour pattern on the decreases isn't perfect
but since they will be worn
by an imperfect person (me, me, me)
 I'm happy.

I've reached the wrist stage which means

I'll no longer be working in the round,

I'll now be working in rows back and forth.

This means that I will need to use 

another technique that's new to me:

backwards crochet.

The little piece at the bottom is my

practice piece.

Athough they sound similar 

backward crochet is not the same as reverse crochet.

Reverse crochet or crabstitch is worked

with the right side facing you and results

in a twisted stitch.

Backward crochet is a little harder to explain.

Basically this technique 

makes sure that the wrist (worked in rows)

will look like the rest of the glove (worked in rounds).

edit:
I forgot to distinguish which rows were made by which technique.
The glove itself was made with jacquard,
which is a colorwork technique where you
work the different colours and carry the
unused colour along the wrong side (in strands).

I used both jacquard and backwards crochet
in the red sample.
The jacquard is the green and red rows
worked on the right sides.
This is alternated with straight red rows
that are worked in backward crochet
on the wrong sides.

Tackling jacquard crochet

It's halfway through January and I thought

by now I'd have done a lot of yarn work.

But I do have a good excuse why that didn't happen.

My oldest son has been home for the holidays,

and I drop everything anytime I've got my whole family together.

Things have now returned to normal so

I've picked up my hook again 

and tackled a project that I've had on hold.

since 2009 (2 years!!)

This pattern is made mainly using a technique
called jacquard crochet.
It's basically a technique that works with
strands of colours hooked into the back loop.

When I first tried it I was having a lot of difficulty
with the tension since jacquard crochet

is much tighter and less stretchy than regular crochet.
I'm a tight crocheter as it is so
that didn't help.

I also found all the new techniques

a little overwhelming so I

put it aside until I felt more confident.

 I've decided to start completely over again.

Here is a picture of how far I've gotten.

I'd love to say that the stitches are quickly sliding off my hook,

I won't even tell you 

how many hours I've spent on this so far,

but what's different now is that it's a bit 

easier and I now see it as doable.

Some things I'm still struggling with

and I'll post more specifics 

about them in a later post in case 

you want to give this a go yourself.

A crochet monkey, a vintage curtain and ginko leaves

Even though monkey is only partly finished

I thought he would enjoy going outside to

enjoy a beautiful autumn day.

Although monkey and I have spent only

a little time together, he and I have bonded.

Maybe it's because we have similar tastes..

obviously he likes vintage fabrics and

we are both fascinated by ginko trees.

But he is more impatient than I am.

I'm enjoying watching how his shape unfolds

as I make changes here and there.

But he is constantly rushing me to finish,

not concerned whether his legs curve

slightly inward, 

or if his shirt should be striped or plain.

But I forgive his restlessness,

for he is young.

The beginning of Hobbes

Hobbes
Originally uploaded by sukigirl74

Since we are now in November I thought
it was high time that I get started
on my son's Xmas present.

A Knitted Cosy fit for a teapot

Although this isn't a great picture I
thought I'd post my finished cosy.



I feel fairly happy about it,
I didn't drop any stitches,
it didn't end up half finished
stuck in a drawer somewhere
and it fits my teapot.
Not too shabby.

At first I did make it way too tall
so I managed to rip back a few rows
and make it shorter.

I used 4mm circs and one
skein of Noro Kureyon 163
and this lovely free
pattern by aemmeleia
.
I actually made this for my
sister for Xmas but it may
be too dark for her.
Also, the last time she visited
I asked her if she wanted tea and
she said "oh good god no!"

WIP...... Wall-e in crochet

I've been working on this for far too long.
I'll add the details when I post the finished little guy.




Not perfect but close enough.
Hopefully I'll post the finished Wall-e soon, then I can finally start something new.
Link to finished Wall-e

From Garter stitch to lace

I'm very happy to see how far I have come in my knitting class in 7 classes.
On the right is my homework for my first class...a strip of garter stitch (straight knitting).
On the left is actually 2 classes...the lower part is a snowflake that I made from a chart, and the upper part is 2 pattern repeats of a lace pattern.

Fingerless gloves in crochet jacquard and a little basketweave

I'm working on 2 things.
On the left is my my knitting homework from last week,
which is the basketweave stitch. It's cute isn't it and quite easy.
On the right is the beginning of the most beautiful fingerless gloves that I've ever seen.

I fell in love with these gloves by Danielle Kassner
the minute I laid eyes on them
I had never seen crochet done like this before.
So I bought the pattern and some wool
(unfortunately I had no 'scraps of sock or fingering weight yarn').
It took me a few tries but I finally found a hook that would give me gauge (I crochet loosely so I had to find a 2 mm hook).

These are done in crochet jacquard and backwards crochet, both totally new techniques for me.
(great free tutorials here).
I decided to use greens and blues as the main colours with bits of grey, white and red.

I'm only 8 rows in, but I hope to gather speed as I get better at the technique.
I'm ridiculously excited about them.
I just hope that I finish them before spring.

Year-end balancing the books -craft wips

***2008***

was a good crochet year for
me so I thought I'd finish it
off by posting all my wips
as a statement that they would
indeed get done...eventually.

I only have 4... which I think is
a respectable number.

#1: Sew together the knitted horse
mum made me and also crochet
it's blanket of flowers.

#2: Finish the second %$#^&
knitted sock using dpn.

#3: Finish my applique

#4: Finish designing my crocheted
sheep teacosy

Happy New Year Everyone
I wish you health and happiness!!!

Crochet sheep cozy

Not much to look at now but this is
my attempt at designing a sheep's
head for a tea cozy.

It is a little wider than my sketch
because it is amigurumi style
so when I add a bit of stuffing
it should be the right width.
Patons SWS charcoal colour
using a 4.5mm hook.

WIP capelet

This is the first garment
that I have ever tackled in crochet.
I found the free pattern on Craftster through Ravelry
and so far I am loving it.
It is totally beginner friendly and really easy
to adapt to your own size.
In fact I randomly pulled out the biggest hook (N)
that I had and some pale green worsted yarn
from my stash just to see if
I could figure out the pattern.
I really expected it to be way off in the sizing and
that I would frog it back
but so far it is fitting me beautifully!
(In the picture the one side is just pulled
down lower....the sides are
in reality even.)