The sock blanket is finished and I love it.

I spent so long deciding the placement of the squares; randomly, tonally from the centre, tonally from a corner, opposing… Then I crocheted them all together in the sort of pale sea blue colour, finished the edging in the grey and realised the blue made it look more disjointed.  So carefully unpicked the joins (with the edging till in place) and re crocheted the joins in the grey.  Much better.  The colours are fairly random, being left over oddments from numerous projects and I think the grey does bring some sort of cohesion to it all, and I love the lacy edging, just what I’d pictured in my head.

With it being sock wool it is really quite soft and lacy to the touch, I love it and want to do another one with lots of different patterns again, but all in cream, that would be lush!

What else…

Another good friend is pregnant so I am crocheting a blanket.  For some reason I couldn’tfind a pattern I liked or a stitch.  After lots of samples I decided on this one.

I wanted a pattern that was lacy but not too lacy, not flowery, not too simple or too complicated, and found this in my old copy of Vogue dictionary of crochet stitches.  It doesn’t have a name but is a fairly simple 4 row pattern.  I’m doing it in a lovely and soft 4 ply, 3.5mm hook. 

I want to do this: (link here)

in this wool:

those eagle eyed will spot 2 balls re wound.  I did 2 lines to test the tension and hook size, though the 4mm was too big so went down to a 3 1/4.  I gotdown to the armholes and it was too small, aaarrrggghhhh!  But like I say, every cloud… so it means I can get on and finish the baby blanket without any distractions, as I want to do the cardy!!

Lastly for today, we are away camping next week for the school holidays and everytime we go I pack all our clothes/bedding/towels in bin bags as space is a premium and proper bags take up space.  So I made 4 large bags out of an old duvet cover, they fold up small and carry a suprising amount and are washable so can carry the muddy and dirty returns back home too – sorted!

I plumped for Joel Dewberry’s gingseng spade damask in mulberry in the end, so what do you think?

I love it!  I got the zip in this time a bit lower than last time so it fits a lot better, with a hook and eye at the top its much neater.  Though the facing is still too short by a good 5cm either side.  I don’t know what I’m doing wrong,  but fortunatly its just for me and I can sort of hand stitch the ends down so it doesn’t fray, but its not right.  I added some bias binding to the bottom edge to, well, add a bit more really, but I really like it, I think it finishes it off nicely.

Also, because I had a bit of fabric left over I made a bag too!  I joined in Septembers ATC swap the theme was ’space’ but have been a bit distracted so not only have I not blogged about it but also not photographed it – duh!  However, Andrea of the wonderul Indigo Blue Designs sent me a lovely one and while reading her blog I saw she did quite a few recyled makes.  One of them is this fantastic scarf to bag make, so I followed her tutorial here and ta-dar…

Fab isn’t it!  I changed a couple of things, I wanted it bigger so doubled up on the sizes and I like  bag to go over my shoulder so I sewed another piece of fabric to to make it a bit longer.  There are some great bits on Andrea’s blog so if I was you I’d make a cup of tea and settle down for a good read (and thanks for the atc card too!).  I sent mine to Victoria of giddy stuff who I also swapped with on the necklace roundrobin a few months ago.  Check out her blog as she has put a picture of her atc and its fab, a tardis that opens!

First up is the shocking pink, organic, fair trade scarf.  I saw this on Ruffles And Stuff’s blog, from a link on crafteroo and fell in love immediately with it.  So simple, so recycled and plain fab!  I used an old top of mine that I’d ear marked for this exact project ages ago and seeing as Emma likes bright colours, and I have like a gazillion scarves, I thought I should make it for her instead!

What do you think?  (excuse the face, It was 7.30am and Rich was rushing to work, the boys were trying to sort out their breakfasts, mornings aren’t generally good etc etc…)

It is such a simple pattern, and coming in at 158 inches makes for lots of drape!

Second up is a little pot I crocheted, from an old music tape from my long and distant carefree youth (the Prodigy if you were interested!), no pattern, just sort of made it up as I went along.  Although a little squeaky to work with, it is so soft when crocheted and has a fabulous sheen to it so it almost looks like woven metal.  Topped off with a button from my stash.  Look at the gorgeous shadows it makes

I also added some buttons in an upcycled paper bag ( an idea I complety pinched from Rachel of contented who I did the pincushion swap with and will use again and again as it was fab!), some ribbon and a lush bar of fairtrade chocolate.  With it being a completely green swap I made a couple of boxes from a cereal box to pack everything in that were very bright and quirky and I like them!

Luckily Emma loves her scarf and pot and I’m sure the chocolate has gone down a treat!  For this swap I was organised for a change and sent it early, with us being away last week, so when Emma sends her bits through I’ll let you have a peek!

Isn’t it magnificent!  But this isn’t any light box, oh no, its a cardboard box with a large window cut out of the top and sides with white tissue paper stuck on and a sheet of white card proped up in the back!  Fantastic and best of all, it does make a difference AND it only cost me 2 bars of chocolate, love you dad!

And if that wasn’t enough to make me into the next David Bailey, this brilliant tutorial was linked to the ukhandmade blog.  It is so useful, simply written with great tips and there is a competition for the best photo which I may well enter now – so what do you think of the results of yesterdays photography session:

You may recognise the last one, It wasn’t quite right before, but I think its better now.  So this is what I’ve been working on for the last few days.   I’m really enjoying combining several techniques and working with patterns and bright colours.  As always this has led to more ideas – I’m thinking sort of sculptural.

That requires more thought though, and I need to post these on my Folksy shop and get on with my Art Trading Card’s, more about that later!

So no more!  I have ‘experimented’ with my last new idea, I am only going to explore ideas I have already set in motion, like this one I started yesterday…

Its made from scraps of Amy Butler fabric I’ve had for a while, a bit of an old dress, an old shirt and a favourite but broken necklace, and of course a bit of crochet, a double shell trim that I extended to fit the flap.

I boxed the corners and lined it with interlining to give it some stiffness so it retains its shape.  I’m now envisaging a whole range of them, all the same shape but with different fabrics and crochet bits SO I’M NOT GOING TO LOOK IN OR WRITE IN MY IDEAS BOOK.  I’m going to work on this for a while, and my curtain ring jewellery, I think that can go a lot further too.

So it is written down I am only going to work on those two ideas, although its half term next week so If I manage to do anything it will be a miracle!

On a last note, the latest issue of that fab magazine Beads and Beyond has a tutorial for my Miyuki earrings.  Those flowers are what I made that evening necklace and my beautiful green bracelet from as well – ooh – another idea I need to pursue…

I’ve finished the bag, using those fab handles.  I tried a few swatches of chunky and aran type crochet stitches, but none seemed quite right.  So I got all my wools out (and let my mind luxuriate in all the colourful beauty of it) then, because I obviously have patchwork on my mind at the minute, I came up with this:

I am really pleased with it, the colours and textures go together well, and it was fun to do, almost like painting.  This is definatly a direction I want to explore further.

I’ve lined the bag in brown cord, and vileane so that it is quite solid, with a magnetic snap closure.  Unfortunatly the weather here is wet and grey, no good for photos, so I took a couple for here, but will take some better ones for the shop, hopefully soon!

I’ve also finished the squares for the granny square swap,

I’ll post some picures when Sam and Izabella have recived them, I really hope they like them!

Finally, I experimented with the Silver Egyptian square, but I need some silver wire, the colours I have don’t go, so I had a little play with what I intended to experiment with at another time, combining buttons, seams, crocheted edgings and fabrics.

The fabric is off a top I customised, and the buttons are made from bits in my fabric box.  The edging is called a Double Shell Trim, and is really simple to do.  I’m quite excited about the posibilities with this, i’ll keep you updated!