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.