Friday, June 30, 2017

Ten



This beaded crochet rope has a circumference of 10 beads, the biggest I've done so far. It's a bit stiff. I think that must be because my thread was too thick for the size of the beads. I guess it's stating the obvious, but a rope this big eats up beads at a furious rate! I found the pattern on Pinterest, but this time I managed to track the website down. It's a Russian page, called Lbeads, which can be found here.

Tuesday, June 27, 2017

Circumference


Using more beads in the circumference of a crochet beaded rope gives greater scope for design. Early in my learning process I tried a pattern with a circumference of 16 beads, but soon realised that I couldn't manage it. Since then I've largely used patterns with 6 beads. But I think I'm ready to move on a bit, so yesterday I made a bracelet with a circumference of 8 beads. With more beads, the centre is hollow and the working beads tend to collapse inwards a bit, which means that you must pay more attention to make sure you're working into the correct stitch. I hope that's the secret I was looking for! I found the pattern on Pinterest.

Do Over

We had two little visitors on Sunday who came for lunch with their Nana. I thought they'd be the perfect candidates to try out the little bracelets for me, make sure they would go over the hand and then stay on the wrist. They do. The little girls tussled over them for a while and they withstood that, so that was a good test too. Of course the little girls went home with them, so yesterday I made some more for my friend's granddaughters. I'll deliver them on Thursday.

Monday, June 26, 2017

Isabel's Place



These butterflies are less subtle than the one I gave up on, but boldness has its own beauty!  Isabel's place mat is now done and ready to be posted off to her.

Thursday, June 22, 2017

Making Progress

Aha, a butterfly is emerging at last. I'm enjoying this pattern. I may even do two butterflies. The pattern is given in two colourways, it would be fun to try them both.

Wednesday, June 21, 2017

I Give Up

OK, I'm tired of peering at a tiny graph and trying to distinguish between two very similar shades. I know from experience that if you put a cross stitch in the wrong place you throw everything out. Why on earth I thought I could wing it in 'freestyle' I don't know. When I came to put light pink in, it didn't fit at all. I couldn't even make it fit.  I'm going to use this much clearer graph from a book I've had for many years. First I must sort out the new phone I bought yesterday, put in contacts and so on, which is also likely to be frustrating!

Monday, June 19, 2017

Beret Progress

This is my second attempt, I had to make adjustments because my yarn is a bit thinner than the designer used. I'm not absolutely sure about this, so I've left the yarn attached and will show it to the experts at the next craft group meeting. It will also need blocking; I'll have to get advice on that.

Butterfly Begun

The printed pattern is tiny, but I hope that being able to zoom in on the e-version will help me make sense of it. Since it's a very 'free style' pattern, I don't think the odd stitch in the wrong shade will make too much difference. I downloaded the pattern, which has no 'distinguishing marks', so I don't know who the designer is.

Saturday, June 17, 2017

Beret Begun

I'm making good progress on the beret. The written pattern, Peach Spring Beret by Wika, doesn't explain the 'bobble stitch', so I had to look at the video that goes with the pattern. I try to avoid videos because my internet connection isn't really up to the job and they tend to keep 'freezing', and because they use up my data allowance in double quick time. But it is  possible for me to watch one, so I clicked on the link and learnt how to work the petals in 'bobble stitch'.

Thursday, June 15, 2017

On Pause

I have a couple of projects on the horizon, but I haven't got stuck into anything yet. Isabel would like a butterfly on her place mat, so I've been looking at cross stitch patterns. I have material and I'm sure I can find the right colours in embroidery thread in my stash.  I've also been looking at crochet patterns for next year's competition. The brief is a beret and scarf. I found a couple that might do and showed them to my craft group who agreed that Peach Spring Beret by Wika Crochet would be the best bet. I found it on Ravelry, but it's also on Craftsy.  I'll have to make up the scarf pattern to match. Yesterday I bought some yarn for that project. The lady in the yarn shop was very helpful, pointing out that the yarn I first chose was too thick for the pattern - the pattern gives weight and yardage, thank you Wika! The shop owner also shone her torch on the seed beads ( there was a power cut in the town and the little shop is very dark) so I could choose some for future crochet rope projects.



Wednesday, June 14, 2017

Again

I had another go at tatting Jon's Daisy Picot Star using two colours. This time I was careful to use Cebelia 20 on both shuttles. Yesterday I tried a two colour version using green Cebelia and Milford 20 for the 'flowers'. Milford is more tightly spun than Cebelia, so the green had a tendency to show through. This looks better. Here it is together with the single colour version:
 

Tuesday, June 13, 2017

Jon's Daisy Star

I was looking through my bookmarked web pages and remembered I meant to try Jon Yusoff's Daisy Picot Star.  It's quite tricky. I started off using two colours, as in Jon's example, but it looked so messy that I decided to start with just one thread. There was another false start because I joined the 'leaf' rings all wrong:
The third attempt is not perfect, but completed!  I don't think I have all the chains facing the correct directions. I might have another go at using two colours, which emphasises the flower look, though I like how the single colour version looks 'spiky'.

Monday, June 12, 2017

Unbiased




A friend of mine asked me to make two beaded crochet bracelets for her granddaughters. Sure, be happy to. The interesting thing about the first one is that the designer, Vinjuleve, has worked to counteract the way beaded crochet spirals. In the chart, which I found on Pinterest, looking at a specific bead will show how the pattern repeat has been staggered. In the final product, the motifs line up. Clever. The top two pictures show the two sides of the bracelet. Both bracelets have interesting side views too. The chart for the other bracelet is here on Pinterest. The designer is Marass.

I've been wanting to try an invisible join in beaded crochet rope and this seemed like a good opportunity to give it a go. I used a tutorial from fusion beads, which has very clear diagrams. My joins are not absolutely invisible, but not bad for a first attempt.

Friday, June 9, 2017

Corner Daisy Square Blanket

After sorting out the misaligned square and doing the edging, the blanket is finished. I got a bit carried away with the edging, doing four rows where I intended to do one or two, but I'm happy with the result.
 The pattern is called Corner Daisy Square, but Marrietta.ru. Here is a Link.  I found it on Pinterest. The yarn is handspun wool, handdyed by me. 

Thursday, June 8, 2017

Spot The Mistake


I spread the blanket out on a table to make sure it's big enough before I start the edging, (it is) and left it there while I prepared breakfast. While I was eating breakfast, I glanced across at the blanket and a misaligned square leapt out at me! Oops.  Jack reckoned I should leave it to show the blanket wasn't made by a machine, but once I'd seen it, I knew it would bother me until I corrected it. It didn't take too long to sort out, that's it with a contrast thread attached.


Wednesday, June 7, 2017

Square By Square

I'm still joining blanket squares. I never do learn - these jobs always take longer than I expect! I did have to spin a bit more wool. I hope I have enough spun now to work the edging when I've finished joining all the squares.

Monday, June 5, 2017

Coming Together


I'm joining the squares of Annika's blanket. There are a number of variations on this way of joining, you can join from the front or the back, through the front loops or the bottom loops.... It goes quite quickly.  The good thing is that you can match the two sides stitch by stitch to get a neat effect.

Saturday, June 3, 2017

Annika's Place

I have duly completed Annika's place mat. It's possible that Isabel might like one too....