Crocodile Stitch Christmas Tree

I dove into my stash the other day and found a skein of green Encore yarn (from Plymouth Yarns), and I set out to make a crocodile stitch Christmas tree with it.  I used up every last bit of the 200 yard skein.  It is a very easy pattern, but it is a yarn eater.  

When I finished it, I glued red sequins on each leaf with some tacky glue. 

There are a lot of star patterns out there, but this one seemed to be the right size and look that I wanted.  It really was the perfect star to top this tree.  Here is the free pattern for it.

A few people in my crochet classes are making this tree, and I am going to be teaching a 2 part class on how to make it in November... Just in time for Christmas.

Striped Ball Bobble Square

The mini challenge in the Disney Adventures ravelry group this month is the Pixar short Jack Jack Attack.  While re-watching this fun companion to the movie The Incredibles, I noticed a hidden Mickey in it.  Among the toys that Jack Jack has to play with is the Pixar ball (a yellow ball with a blue stripe and a red star).  I used this baseball bobble chart and tweaked it a bit so that the bobbles formed a stripe down the center of it, just like the Pixar ball.  Now I have 4 bobble squares for the afghan, and I still have plenty of yarn left over to make 1 or 2 more squares out of each color (green and blue).  

Apple and Car Bobble Squares

Here are 2 more crochet bobble squares for the afghan that I am making for my son.  

Apple bobble chart

Cat bobble chart

Both squares use a size H hook and Plymouth Encore yarn.

Crochet Bobble Apple Afghan Square

This week I decided that I wanted to make an afghan out of the different crochet bobble patterns that I have instead of dishcloths.  I've made a bunch of cotton dishcloth ones already this year.  Because they are so quick and easy to make, I should be able to make a nice size afghan rather quickly (within a year's time).  The type of images that I want to make kind of scream out kid's blanket, so I will be making it for my youngest son.  Shhh, don't tell him.  So I picked out 2 colors of Plymouth Encore yarn to start off with.  First I picked a nice rich blue color, because he love the darker blues.  However a few of the patterns that I want to make will look better in green, so I also got some green. I figure that as I make more than I can add in other shades of blue and green as well as some purples.  I'll just add as needed.  Because of this loose plan I will wait to sew the squares together when I have enough to make the afghan, that way I can arrange all the different colored squares in a visually pleasing way.

One of the Disney Adventures challenges (ravelry) this month is for Disney Legend Steve Jobs.  He was the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple Inc., so I want to make an apple bobble square for this challenge.  This pattern can be made in less than an hour.  I also started the other bobble apple from the pattern charts as well.

Sock Afghan, White Chevron Afghan, and Crochet Shawl

I've been making some good progress on my garter stitched sock yarn afghan (free pattern).  It seems like I get at least 2 stripes made a day.  That's because I work on it while waiting for my kids to get out of school (sitting in the school's parking lot).

I finished crocheting the white chevron baby afghan that I was hired to finish.  Do you see where my finger is in the photo?  From that point and above is what I worked on.  There was little over a skein that I needed to use up before it would be finished.  The lady who hired me picked up the 2 finished afghans last Tuesday.   I'm happy that I could finish her mother's work for her so that she would have some treasured keepsakes.

Now that I am no longer working on those 2 afghans I can concentrate on things that I want to make.  One of those things is a crochet shawl.  This photo was taken a week ago on my first day of crocheting it, it is much bigger now.  I just started using the 2nd skein of the James C. Brett Moonlight Sonta yarn (500 yards per skein).  I did not use all of the 500 yards of the first skien, because when I was very close to using it up, there was a break in the yarn that the manufacturer had tied in a knot.  Not only was there a knot, but the two tied parts didn't match in color.  Thankfully one of the ends of the 2nd skein matched the yarn break that was connected to the shawl.  Problem solved, and you can't really tell where I joined the 2nd skein at.  My goal is to finish this shawl this month, using at least 800 yards of yarn.

Dolores Umbridge's Fat Bottom Bag - Finished

I finished my Dolores Umbridge inspired fat bottom bag today!  Woohoo!!!!!  I used 2 shades of pink Caron Simply Soft yarn (295 yards in total), a size H crochet hook, pink faux velvet fabric for the lining, and red sewing thread.  Here is the free pattern.  I made up the bow pattern (just 2 separate loops of crochet that were put together).

Dolores Umbridge's Fat Bottom Bag

For Quidditch in the ravelry group Harry Potter Knit and Crochet House Cup, the current challenge says: 

Match 1 – Accio Permission Slip! September 5 – September 18

Madame Umbridge left herself room to approve our clubs, teams and groups, but I would wager that a little flattery might go a long way. For this match each player will make something that would appeal to Dolores Umbridge to convince her to let your house play Quidditch. This is not a house pride match but rather we want you to make something to butter up the High Inquisitor. Cats, pink things, tea related items, evil quills ….whatever you can argue she would love is game.

Only a single project may be submitted for this round. Dolores is a quality not quantity kind of witch. Your completed turn in will earn your house 15 points.

Hint - There is a secret bonus point possibility this round if you MAKE are one of her favorites.

For this challenge I decided to make Dolores Umbridge a pink fat bottom bag.  I'm using this free pattern for it, a size H hook, and Caron's Simply Soft yarn.  When I was telling my husband about the challenge, he suggested that I use velvet for the lining of the bag.  Brilliant idea!  However the velvet that I really wanted to use was really expensive, so I settled on some fake pink velvet that was on sale.  As it turns out I have some hot pink yarn that matches it perfectly, so I am using that for the trimming and the handles.  

This pattern is really neat, because after you make the body of the bag (which is kind of flat) you can sew in the lining.  It is a lot easier making a lining for this bag than any other lining that I have ever made.  I did need to use a stretch needle on my sewing machine, because the fabric was a little stretchy.  I machine sewed all of the raw edges of the fabric so that they wouldn't unravel.  You can't really see it because of the color of the thread, but there are tiny red flowers in the stitches.  Then I hand sewed the lining to the body of the bag.  I like to hand sew the lining to the bag so that I can hide the stitches.  This way you can't see the stitches from the outside of the bag.  I am almost finished crocheting the trimming and handles, and then I'll crochet a bow for each side of the bag.  I'm hoping that this bag will be finished tomorrow.

Afghans, Baby Hats, Cat Toy, Shawl, and Fat Bottom Bag

The other day I needed to make a swatch of an amigurumi animal for my OWL proposal for the Harry Potter Knit and Crochet House Cup (HPKCHC) ravelry group (an OWL is a 3 month project - I'm making a phoenix and an afghan).  Instead of undoing the swatch, I stuffed it with fiber filling and catnip and gave it to my cats.  One of my cats loved it!  He played with it all week, carrying it around the house. From now on all of my swatches will become cat toys.

This is the last month that A Child’s Light (aka Click for Babies: Period of Purple Crying Caps) will be collecting purple baby hats for this year.  They will be handing out the hats at local hospitals in November and December.  So not only did I want to make some hats to turn in this month, but I also wanted to use up the yarn that I bought to make these hats.  For the preemie hat at the bottom, I used up the last of a skein of light purple yarn by making the stripe.  Then I wanted to play around with making a 2 color spiral hat.  I had so much fun making it that I made my first 3 colored spiral hat.  One day I want to make a 4 colored spiral afghan.

Someone in one of my ravelry groups has been making a stash-busting afghan using this free pattern. I really liked how it looked, so I started making my own using sock yarn.  I did buy 4 skeins of black sock weight yarn to use as the overall color but for my 2nd color I am using up my sock yarn stash.

One of the challenges this month in the ravelry Disney Adventures group is to make a shawl using 600 yards if knitted or 800 yards if crochet.  The challenge was inspired by the Pixar / Disney movie The Incredibles: A 600 / 800 yard dash for Dash, and a "no capes!" challenge for Edna Mode.  I'm using this free crochet pattern, which is an easy pattern to follow, and James C. Brett Moonlight Sonta yarn.  It is really soft and sparkly yarn, but it is really hard to frog when I make a mistake (the yarn catches on itself very easily).

Today I started making a Dolores Umbridge inspired Fat Bottom Bag (another HPKCHC challenge).  I've made this bag once before, but with blue cotton.  Here is the free pattern for it.   I'm using 2 shades of pink from Caron's Simply Soft collection for it.  The trimming will be a shade darker than than the body of the bag.  I'm debating if I'll add a bow or a kitten appliqué to it as well.  This bag is super easy to add a lining to, because you add the lining to the bag before the trimming and handle is crochet on.

I just signed up for Caron's mystery adventure scarf KAL/CAL.  Since I'm going to be doing it for a HPKCHC challenge, I will be starting it on September 21st instead of on the 9th (due to the rules of the challenge).  The mystery KAL/CAL will email out clues each week that will some how be different for different people due to how they answer certain questions.  Very intriguing.  It requires 2 skeins of 3 different colors of Caron's United yarn, which equals 1400 yards of yarn.  I might have to buy another skein of the purple yarn that I picked for it.  I'm going to be using a hot pink, a light purple, and a dark gray yarn for it (the 2nd of the 2 images below).

In other news I finished crocheting this chevron afghan last month.  I was hired to finish it (using up the 2 remaining skeins of Red Heart yarn).

I was also hired to finish this smaller white chevron afghan as well.  This is a photo of it after I completed one row with a new ball of Red Heart yarn.  I've been working on it for at least an hour a day so that it will be finished by the 15th of this month.

In the ravelry group Good Things Together we are doing a cold sheep challenge.  What is this? Well going cold sheep means that you will not buy any yarn / fiber during this month. You’ll only use what you have in your stash, and/or make yarn using the materials that you have around you (like from plastic bags and old clothes). If you are an avid sewer, than this also counts for your fabric stash.  I might be more of a chilly sheep instead of a cold sheep, because of the yarn crawl that I'm going to do for 4 days this month.  I've been really looking forward to it all summer.  But I am going to do my best not to buy yarn outside of those 4 days this month.