Tardy blogging, Christmas, and more scarves

Crikey it's been almost a year since I last blogged, which is a pretty poor effort by anyone's standards. I'd like to say it's because the last year has been non-stop crazy funtimes, but in truth I think I've just been a bit slack. I have been taking photos of my makes though, so it's not all bad.

I've got a mammoth post to do about an owl and a pussycat, and a few other bits and pieces I've made, but for now I thought I'd dip my toe in the water with a post about a few scarves.

In November I found some amazing yarn in a wool shop in Folkestone which was perfect for a scarf for my eldest niece. I'm a sucker for a wool shop anywhere I go, and at this time I was meant to be getting ready for a friend's wedding (the reason I was in Folkestone), but this little shop was calling to me and had some pretty nifty and cheap wool. I got some really pretty black wool with purple glitter thread running throughout it, which was ideal for my niece as she's approaching the age where the stuff she wears has to be cool rather than pink (hooray!). I also found some stripey grey, black and white wool which I thought would be good for my nephew. I already had some popcorn yarn in bubblegum pink at home which would do nicely for a third scarf for my smallest niece.

I started crocheting the first scarf at the end of November, thinking I could easily have them ready by Christmas. I'm a bit of a terror for leaving things until the last minute and then rushing through them whilst cursing myself for being such a pillock. This is pretty much the way I approached the two dissertations at the end of my degree too, so it's good to see I still haven't learnt my lesson.

The first scarf for my eldest niece (who will be 10 this year) went nicely but took longer than expected - 2 weeks in total. I guess I didn't account for having a social life in December. I did a shells and chain pattern which I'd been wanting to try for a while.

I liked it a lot, although the wool did have a tendency to split as I hooked it. There was enough left over to put a fringe on it, which I've never done before, so that was fun to try.

Forgive the crap photos, they were taken in a bit of a hurry

Now in mid-December I got round to starting the popcorn wool scarf for my youngest niece who just turned 5. I had no experience of using this type of yarn and wasn't sure quite how it was going to work. I started off trying a tester square with double crochet. Then triple crochet. Then I pulled the wool around and around the hook frantically whilst swearing and getting irate. Then I rage tweeted about how it wasn't working and how much I hated this yarn.

Then I had the fact that you can't crochet with this type of wool explained to me by Twitter friends. 

Ooops.

I still haven't learnt to knit (it's on my to-do list I swear), so I roped in my mum to take one for the team and make this one for me. She did a pretty good job too I reckon.

The final scarf for my 8 year old nephew I started on the 23rd December. What did I say about leaving things until the last minute? I wasn't seeing the kids until Boxing Day, so I'd set myself 3 days to make it - one of them being Christmas Day, when I was planning on consuming a lot of wine.

I found a male scarf pattern on Ravelry (this was my first male specific pattern, but I knew he would freak out if it was anything flowery or frilly) and got to work. It turned out that male patterns are a lot denser than the kind I'm used to (what, men don't like holes in their scarves?!) and it was slooooooooow progress. After the first day it was about an inch wide. Unlike any other scarf pattern I'd made before, you had to crochet sideways along the length of the scarf, so for a while I thought I was going to have to present him with what looked like a karate belt.

By the time Christmas Day came around I was still crocheting it. Luckily it was a really simple pattern, so I could watch telly and drink booze and crochet all at the same time (multitasker extraordinaire). Towards the end I realised that the numbness I get in my little fingers when I crochet too much had become quite frighteningly bad and I was getting shooting pains in my finger joints. So for this Christmas I probably gave myself the gift of RSI. Hooray!

I finished it in the early evening and suddenly had the horrific realisation that it needed to be blocked, as all of the edges were curling up. I've never done blocking before either, and did possibly the most half-arsed job of blocking anyone's ever attempted; sprinkling a bit of water on it, spreading it out on the floor under the radiator, and sticking a towel and a load of heavy books on top of it. By the time it came to wrapping it on Boxing Day morning it was still a bit damp. Ooops again.

Anyway, here it is...

It has ridges in it which look nice, I forgot to mention that.

So the kids were all very happy with them and put them on immediately. I suspect that my nephew's one was still a little bit damp but he didn't say anything because he's ace and a bit oblivious to that sort of thing.


A good blogger would have probably taken photos of the kids wearing them to include at this point, but surprisingly I forgot (I'd probably had a lot of wine by that point too)...

...so instead I leave you with this

Happy er... Christmas

A scarf for Marth(a) (it does rhyme dammit!)

My blogging has been a bit sporadic of late - as has my crafting. I looked long and hard at making the little bride and groom dolls but eventually decided against it; mostly because I couldn't find one of my bags of materials which has fabrics for the bride's dress - but also because I couldn't find the right shade of grey felt for the groom's suit anywhere.

In a fit of sewing frustration I started looking for crochet patterns to start instead. I had two balls of chunky knit wool which I've been dying to do something with for absolutely ages, but it meant finding a nice loose pattern or anything I made with them would be too hot and itchy. As luck would have it I found exactly the right pattern and at the same time suddenly realised that it was my friend @CornishCalzone's 30th birthday in a couple of weeks. The pattern and colour of the yarn seemed perfect for her (and obviously a scarf is a really seasonal summer gift!) so I picked up my crochet hook and off I went...

It suddenly became very apparent that the pattern was wrong.

The diagram of the pattern looked right, but the stitches listed didn't correspond with the picture. I fannied about with it for a while before calling in the big guns - by way of my friend @CrochetedZombie. Lisa is an absolute badass with a crochet hook. I once asked her about a pattern I'd been working on for 45 minutes and it took her 5 minutes to get to the same point as me. The woman is a genius. If you doubt me then you've clearly never seen her projects on Ravelry.

Within a couple of minutes Lisa had fixed me up a pattern and I was good to go. For those who crochet, this is Lisa's take on the pattern:

Part 1. Ch 26, turn.
Part 2. Sc 2nd ch from hook, (ch 5, skip 5, Tr in next st, ch 5, skip 5, sc in next) repeat once.
Part 3. Ch 9, sc into top of tr, (ch 5, tr in to top of sc, Ch 5, sc in to top of tr) repeat once.

 

It was quick and easy (it's basically just made up of chain stitches) and I found it really easy to pick up whenever I had a spare few minutes. The hardest part was probably not taking it along to our weekly Stitch and Bitch sessions because Martha would see it! I'm not very good at having more than one project on the go (which I gather is unusual for crocheters) so I had to just sit on my hands instead for a couple of weeks!

 

It grew really rapidly, but being as I wasn't following a pattern I wasn't sure when to stop. I kept trying it on, but I wasn't sure how she'd wear scarves and so I thought it was far better to overestimate than end up with a too short scarf. The end product was p r e t t y  l o n g (you'll see later)!

I finished sewing in the ends on the night before Martha's birthday. Perfect I thought! Now I can wrap it up.

The ends were annoying me a bit though. They kept curling over back on themselves and I didn't really have time to block it. What it really needed was a bit of weight on it...

...I had a sudden brainwave. Recently I'd been admiring the brilliant Lucy from Attic24's May Roses. I'd previously made her Crochet Flowers and was looking for an excuse to give the roses a go.

(If any of you are crocheters and are looking for some dead easy-to-follow patterns for flowers then these are both brilliant - as are all of Lucy's patterns to be honest)

So I got cracking with the first rose and found it nice and simple. Attaching it was easy too.

I was really pleased with the result. By now it had well gone 9pm and I suddenly realised that I needed to make and attach three more of these badboys... plus wrap it up! I had to step it up a crochet notch!

This photo was taken after midnight with bleary eyes and my first ever crochet blister on my thumb! That's the sign of a true crocheter that is. Now for attaching...

Remember that I told you it was a bit long earlier? I definitely went overboard on the length. She can wrap it round herself several times over!

Superlong!

I finished it around 1 a.m. and was dead pleased with the results! @CornishCalzone seemed to love it too, so I was pleased with that.

Oh and I can definitely say that I learnt a valuable lesson - if you are going to do detailing then allow time in which to do it on top of the time you need for the bulk of the project. Don't be a dilbert and try and do it in a couple of hours like me!

Precioussssss(es)

This one isn't a particularly crafty post, but it's full of pretties nonetheless...

On Monday I came into to work after having had a couple of days off sick. It's always a bit grotty returning to hundreds of emails and catching up with what you've missed when you've been away.

Almost as soon as I got in and said my hellos my friend who sits opposite me presented me with a little 'glad you're back and better' present, all wrapped up in a pretty little flowery paper bag. Inside was this...

I was delighted! What an absolute sweetheart. I am a complete and utter sucker for necklaces. To be honest I go pretty ga-ga for any kind of jewellery... earrings, bracelets, rings, brooches... I've got hundreds of them. But necklaces are my number one vice. I must have spent an absolute fortune on them over the years, despite the fact that the ones I buy are always fairly cheap. I'm too fickle in my fancies to go for a 'proper' expensive piece of jewellery. I wouldn't want to have to wear it all the time - not when there are so many other options to choose from.

 

I like them cute and a bit, well... quirky I guess is probably the best word for them. I remember someone on Twitter ridiculing teapot necklaces recently, but I like it, so I don't give a damn!

I rather like windmills.

I very quickly ran out of storage space for them and they were all getting tangled up together when I was keeping them in bags and boxes (I'd estimate that I have about 100... at least!). So I got a coat-peg rack, screwed it to the inside of my wardrobe and now I hang them from that! It's much easier to find what I'm looking for this way, and they get less tangled.

This one is a working harmonica. I added the bead from a different necklace.

I've got a bit of a thing for owls.

Actually, make that a thing for birds...

Birds are cool.

That last one is one of my new favourites and was actually also a present. The brilliant, wonderful and rather ravishing @Tweak81 sent it to me in a little bundle of jewellery goodies.

I love it.

 

So there's my dirty little secret out in the open - I'm a necklace-aholic! I do have to ration myself and at times be quite tough - especially as there isn't really any room to squeeze any more of them onto the coat-pegs.

There are loads more I want to photograph and show you, but I won't... for now!

Soft people

I have a good friend who is getting married in July. I have been thinking lately that it'd be pretty cool to make her something for it (I'll be giving her money towards a new sofa too - I'm not a tightwad)!

So I'm considering making a little cloth doll bride and groom version of her and her husband-to-be (she's cute and I reckon she'd like it). I've been doing some sketches and considering materials and this got me thinking about the dolls I'd already made...

This isn't my first foray into making cloth dolls see. My first one - a birthday present for a friend - was of the wonderful Eric Morecambe...

He is meant to be doing that famous skipping walk which he and Ernie used to do (his statue in Lancashire is posed in the same way).

(I don't know what was wrong with my camera at the time, for some reason it was really blurry)

To make Eric I drew my patterns onto bits of paper and pinned them to the material, before cutting them out and sewing him together by hand. He's stuffed with machine washable, polyester toy stuffing. I'm not sure that I'd bung him in the machine though! One of my favourite things about him is his hair. I used thick brown wool to make it look a bit thin on top. I don't think the photos properly show this, but more scalp shows through at the top of his head.

His shoes are blue because the only leather material I had (and still have!) is blue. But I think they look pretty cool anyway.

I actually cut out his glasses from black material and then embroidered all the way round them. It actually probably would've been just as quick to embroider them straight onto his face!

I had a lot of problems arise when making this chappy and learnt the hard way on a couple of things. Firstly NEVER use a thin material for a face. I had to double it up and still could see through it. So any bits of thread on the other side showed through - as did the pen I stupidly used (because I'm a complete moron) to mark out where I would be stitching features. ALWAYS use dressmakers chalk is the lesson learnt here.

The other thing I had problems with was his shirt. I insisted on using cotton shirt material for it - including the collar. Here's what I learnt...

- Cotton frays -

- Hemming a teeny tiny collar is difficult -

- See also: trying to make a miniature tie from cotton material -

In future it's felt all the way. His suit is made from felt and I love the little lapels and the buttons I sewed on.

Mostly I love him. I think he's ace. And he taught me a lot about making dolls....

The next one I made was the bloody marvellous Tommy Cooper. Unfortunately I only have one photo of this badboy I'm afraid! He was made in exactly the same way as Eric was - they were both entirely hand sewn - even though a machine would probably would have sped up the process somewhat.

This pose is meant to be him laughing, shoulders raised... but I'm still not that happy with the shoulders. The thing is that you have to over-exaggerate body parts and poses in the cutting stage because otherwise they can get quite lost when you come to sewing it together and stuffing it. Here is a fine example of me going a bit O.T.T. on exaggerating a pose! I'm dead happy with the legs though. Nice and chunky.

I *think* I used felt for his face, but to be honest with you I can't entirely remember. It may not be (the photo doesn't seem to be jogging my memory!), but I certainly can't remember having the same problems with the face as I did with Eric. I definitely used felt for his mouth and eyes which I was really happy with - as an added bonus it meant no pen marks too! I got some black furry material for his hair, which covers the back of his head and is actually sewn in under the fez. The fez was my favourite thing to make - I used black embroidery thread for the tassel, which I threaded through by hand - so it's made up of all individual threads.

The bowtie, collar and hanky were probably two of the biggest challenges on this one. At some point I will learn not to use cotton for these things (silly woman)! He also has three small buttons sewn down the front of his jacket - and lapels of course. Because I'm a crazy woman I insist on cutting out the front of the jackets as two separate pieces and sewing them together with one slightly positioned over the other - so that it looks more like a jacket opening rather than a jumper. If I was less pedantic then I could probably just use the buttons to show where the opening would be - or possibly sew a line down it.

Oh and you'll notice that he's got those same blue shoes as Eric! Must be a comedian thing :p

So at the moment I'm looking at ways of sewing a little bride and groom. I've drawn out some sketches already - the suit looks terrifying, I'm thinking of doing a waistcoat and cravat and a flower for the lapel and everything. I haven't even focused on what the dress will entail either. I was thinking about making them quite small, but knowing the amount of detail I will want to include this may be shooting myself in the foot.
If I actually get started with it then I'll take photos as I go.

The real ta-da moment!

Right then, here's what I really came here to tell you...

I have finally finished this beast of a blanket!

PHEW!

This one was not quite the labour of love which the last one was...

I started this project at the end of November 2011 as a present for my (now 7 year old) nephew Sam. His bedroom gets freezing in winter and he particularly liked the blanket I had crocheted for myself last summer. My sister picked the colours for his blanket (I suspect a Spiderman theme) as it is going to be a surprise for him. Every time they've come round I've stashed it away in the cupboard.

And so off I went. Crocheting slowly.

Very slowly...

I  n  c  r  e  d  i  b  l  y   s  l  o  w  l  y   i  n   f  a  c  t  .  .  .

It ended up taking me so long to do that I started to find it quite a chore rather than a fun project. All the time I was horribly aware of how long it was taking me and how he could really use this on his bed given how cold it was. And now it's almost summer and I've finished it - how's that for timing?!

This is more of a  ta-da moment spoken through gritted teeth really! 

I'm not sure why it took me so long to finish. It may have been because I'd only really just completed one, so it wasn't a 'new' project... but I suspect that it was mostly the blocks of colour. Each colour block was made up of five rows, and so I was much less inclined to work to the end of a row when I knew that it didn't mean changing to a new colour.

The pattern was the same as that used for the previous blanket - one I found on Ravelry. If you look me up (my username's BizBaz) then you should be able to find details on both projects, including the pattern. The wool I used for both projects is Stylecraft Special DK, which is lovely and soft, machine washable and comes in a really wide range of colours.

For the edging I did scalloping again but made these tighter and smaller - with only five treble crochets instead of the seven I used on the last blanket (UK terminology). I also went straight into the scalloping instead of having a couple of lines of dc. My nephew's at an age where some things can be perceived as too 'girly' so I didn't want to make the border too fussy.

Despite my griping I am actually happy with the end product! I'm hoping he's going to really like it and will keep it forever. I'd like it to be something he can pass on to his kids eventually, explaining that it was made by his mad old Auntie.

The blanket which started it all...

I set up this blog aaaaaages ago and have just left it sitting here empty, waiting for this big 'new blanket ta-da' moment. However, once I started writing today I very quickly realised that I was trying to cram two blog posts into one. I wanted to explain about the blanket which started it all off before I got round to talking about the new one, so this post can act as a drumroll to my actual ta-da moment...

Last July I started my first ever crochet project, which was also a giant granny-square blanket. I had literally just taught myself to crochet using YouTube videos and decided to take the bull by the horns, order £30 worth of wool and start a blanket right away. I found a pattern I liked on Ravelry (look me up, my username is BizBaz) and off I went! I worked on the blanket day and night, not stopping until a row was completed. It was a hot summer and the flat where I lived at the time had leather sofas. Leather sofas + a heavy woollen blanket in your lap during the month of August is not a great pleasure, let me tell you! A combination of the heat, the excitement of actually being able to crochet and the satisfaction of finishing each row drove me forwards and I completed that blanket in a month flat.

 

Just one month! It was a work of love (and involved watching many, many films and TV shows when I should've been outside enjoying the sunshine!)

 

Choosing the colours alone was a joy. I actually made a really pedantic pattern which takes a long time to explain and makes me look like I may have a teeny tiny bit of OCD, so we'll skim over that. I prefer the term METHODICAL!

I love everything about this blanket. Its colours are great. It's warm and heavy and comforting when I'm poorly. It makes my room look bright and cheery. I just love it. I don't think I've ever felt as proud of something I've created myself.

I finished it all off with two rows of double crochet* and some scalloped edging which I also learnt from YouTube. Sorry I don't have the videos to show you - I didn't make a note of them at the time.

(*I am a horror for using US terminology instead of UK, so I had to look up what that was in UK terms. The US terms make more sense in my opinion).

And so that was it! I'd got the crochet bug! I've worked on a few projects since then but this one is still definitely my favourite. I'd like to try a ripple blanket soon, but there are some more pressing sewing projects I'm going to crack on with first.