Black floral granny square blanket

Today I started joining the black floral granny squares that will eventually be a house warming present for a close friend.  It will be gorgeous when it's finished (it will, believe me) but as the shop has ran out of black wool (how could they?!) and won't have more in  for at least another week, it will have to be put to one side for a while.

What, then, can I make in the meantime...hmmmm?

Catherine Wheel Square part 2

I unpicked and re-did the original catherine wheel square and it resulted in this:

I think I'll carry on with it, but add in some other colours too - because I think it looks like something you'd find in someone's creepy attic!  Very vintage, but not really my type of thing.  It may start looking better the further along I get, we'll have to wait and see.

Catherine Wheel Square

Yesterday I finally managed to get to grips with the Catherine Wheel Square.  It took a while to get the hang of, but like most crochet projects once you've got the first few rounds out of the way, it's quite straightforward...(she says - I had to keep referring back to the tutorials every time I put it down for a few minutes...).

I really like the way this stitch looks - to me it's shabby chic at its finest.  The only issue I have with this effort, though, are the colours.  I've decided I really don't like the ones I've chosen (from my stash).  So I think I'm going to have to unpick to the first 2 rounds and take another trip to the yarn shop.....I need nice Spring-like pastels to spruce it up!  

Mobile Phone Case

Taking yet another break from the blankets, I rattled off a cute mobile phone case this afternoon.  I'll probably never use it - I used my usual chunky wool and size 4 hook, so it's a bit too big, but it was fun and very quick to make.

The pattern I downloaded free after joining another great online crochet community -  Crochet Me.

The beginnings of a ripple blanket

Last night I started a colourful ripple blanket.  It's coming along quite quickly, and is quite easy to do once you get into the hang of it.  It'll make a lovely picnic blanket, don't you think?

A few bits and bobs

The vintage floral afghan is coming along nicely...well, put it this way, the squares are beginning to stack up ready for joining.  I'm really enjoying working with lots of different colours, and think the squares look lovely when they're still "round" - they'd make lovely drinks coasters.

To give myself a little break from the square production line, I had a go at a new tutorial on a Catherine Wheel Square....not very successfully I'm afraid.  It's littered with errors, but looks very sweet, I think - would make a nice embellishment but don't think I have the patience to try a whole blanket full of them!

Superstar Blanket

Well that didn't take long - just a bit of crocheting for 4 evenings, and my "superstar" son has his very own star blanket!

I love the way this blanket grows so quickly, and the finished effect is brilliant.

Black and Red Blanket

Finished at last!  The red and black gothic number I've made for my 11 year old son.  It was a real labour of love - quite hard going at times because of the black yarn and lack of natural light in our house, but it was well worth it in the end. It was made with acrylic chunky yarn and a size 5mm hook, and took 3 weeks from start to finish.

Superstar!

I've been itching to try my hand at a star afghan for ages, and finally last night got round to starting one off.  It's for my middle son, and fortunately he's not too precious about colours, so I'm using up all my spare chunky yarn.

After a couple of hours yesterday evening, it's already grown to quite a size, so I'm hopeful it'll be done in a week!  Here it is so far:

Once you get started, it's actually a lot easier than I expected.  As always, I used an online tutorial by Mikey at The Crochet Crowd.  If you fancy a go yourself, here's the link to his You Tube tuturial:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_vMJWWgyJo

Black's Back!

Remember when I started making my son's gothic red and black blanket, and I vowed never to use black as a main colour ever, EVER again?  Well, my "friend", commissioned a new blanket from me, and was very  happy with the pink, blue and brown design I presented her with.  Happy that was, until she happened to see a picture of what I admit to be a very beautiful blanket, with a flower pattern, so begged me to do that one instead.  Which is fine, except the main colour is............yep........BLACK!!

Here's the first square - I admit it looks quite striking, so I'm sure it'll be worth it in the end.

Black and Red Blanket - 2 weeks in

The labour of love which is my son's black and red blanket is coming along nicely - I can almost see the end in sight!  It's been two weeks since I started this project so thought I'd post a quick update.

In the picture you can see the first 4 rows of the blanket made up, alongside 2 towers of granny squares (26 in total), and 9 more inners waiting to be made up.  I'm hoping to get it done by next weekend, so I can start my next project!