Wednesday, April 27, 2011

It's Harvest Time in the Cabbage Patch!

Four women in my family are either pregnant or recently gave birth. Winter was pretty mild, so I have no idea what happened nine months ago to start this little baby boom but the results are starting to appear!

The gender of all these babies has not been revealed, so I've been stitching up blankets and afghans with whatever colors make me happy.  Last night I finished up Baby Boy #1 afghan. 



What a beast!  Afghans for boys are sooooo difficult, because every stitch I like looks ridiculously feminine when paired with boyish colors.  The scallops and swirls and lace I'm drawn to just don't work.  This particular yarn was crocheted into SIX different designs before I settled on this one.  Luckily my husband finds pure joy in frogging a project (frogging = ripping apart in knit/crochet world.  I have no idea why), so while I agonized over crochet internet forums and stitch guides looking for something suitable, he calmly dis-assembled the work in progress and wound the yarn into balls for me.  Gotta love him.



The pattern is a free one from Caron Yarns, called Cerulean Harmony.  I made my border a tiny bit narrower, and I added a picot edging just for fun.  The checkerboard part is true to the pattern as written.  The yarn is Snowflake Wool Blend blend from Hobby Lobby's Yarn Bee brand which is a mix of 56% wool and 44% polyester.  It's snuggly warm because of the wool, but soft and machine washable because of the polyester.  Colors are Limelight and Orangeade.

Oh, and I decided the rest of the babies (should they be boys) will get booties or hats.

Sunday, April 17, 2011

T-Shirt Recycling

Ruffles are on everything this spring.  It seems like every major fashion designer has gone ruffle-crazy.  This is good because I love girly clothes, but bad because I covet every ruffled cardigan I see. 

Guess what?

I found a solution that's much easier on the ol' bank account.

Step 1: Find an old t-shirt.  This one has been in the back of my closet for a couple of years.  I rarely wore it because it just didn't fit quite right.

Step 2: I forgot to take pictures of this step - sorry!  Neatly cut off the bottom hem.  Then cut off the bottom 6 inches of your shirt.  Cut the 6 inch piece in half, and in half again, so you have 4 strips that are 1.5 inches wide.  Cut one side seam of each so they are flat pieces, not a tube. 

Step 3: line up the shoulder and edge seams of your shirt, with the front centered.  Draw a curved line from the bottom up to the collar.  Cut on this line, totally removing the collar and opening up the front.


Step 4: Lay out your shirt and make sure it's symetrical.  Trim more if necessary.


Step 5: Sew 3 of the 1.5" strips together, forming a large circle.  If you have a serger, run one edge of this through and hold back while you feed it through so it makes a ruffle.  You can also do this with a regular sewing machine on a zig-zag stitch over the edge.  I only had two cones of red thread for the serger, so I put black through the needles.  It made a cool unplanned accent with the black stripe. 

Step 6:  Pin the ruffle around your shirt, right sides together and raw edges aligning.   Sew around the whole thing with a 1/4" seam allowance.  (Adjust if necessary: if your shirt is larger than the ruffled piece, trim a bit more off the curved front.  If the ruffle is too long, ease it in or shorten it a bit.)

 Step 7:  Topstitch 1/8" from where the ruffle meets the shirt, making sure to catch the raw edges on the backside.  This will keep the ruffle from folding back as well as keeping the raw edges flat.
 
Step 8: Cut the remaining 1.5" strip in half, and sew the short edges together making two small circles.  Ruffle one edge of the circles as you did for the large ruffle.  Cut the hemmed part off the two sleeves, attach the small ruffled circles right sides together, sew, and topstitch as you did before.



Step 9: The perfect sundress topper!  You could add a button or hook to the front if you want.  I can't decide if I should use a black or red button on mine.


 If you make one one of these I would love to see.  Click the email me link at left and send a picture!

Thursday, April 14, 2011

Ruffles and Lace

I have a weakness for all things girly.  One of the main reasons I learned to crochet was so I could make those ridiculously lacy shrugs and sweaters.  I finished up the Chloe Cardigan last night, and it is stuffed full of lace and ruffle goodness.


The front edges actually do line up.  They look goofy here because I'm trying to take my own picture, in flourescent lighting no less because it's pouring rain outside and the day is gloomy.  So the pictures don't show off how beautiful this sweater truly is in person, but I didn't want to wait for sunshine to show it to you.



Dontcha just love the sleeve detail that tapers then expands to a bell ruffle?  It's so feminine and sweet.

And, I gotta tell ya, the bamboo yarn is pure delight to wear.  It's insanely soft.  If it came in more colors I'd use this for every sweater and never look back.

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Feeling Crochet-y

Sorry about the unplanned blogging hiatus.  It's been a crazy busy couple of weeks and I haven't even turned the sewing machine on for two weeks.  *GASP*  Fear not, however, because I did find a few moments here and there to crochet. 

I finished up this delightful baby afghan, modified from the original large-sized version found in Afghans By The Pound.  This one was really fun, because it looks like ordinary stripes on the back while the front has a fun zig-zag.


I've also been coveting the Chloe Cardigan on the cover of Interweave Crochet's Spring 2010 issue for awhile now.  I'm doing mine in a steel gray shade of Caron Spa yarn (color is called Dark Driftwood).  It has a touch of bamboo in it and is oh-so-soft.  I want to get this completed pronto, before it's too warm to wear it.  In Iowa, it seems like winter is 8 months long but spring only lasts 3 weeks or so and then BLAM - it's hot and sticky summertime.



I also used some leftover scraps to make a Carnation Bouquet square for the charity afghan project (look up there at top for details).  This square uses a surprisingly large amount of yarn, so I don't have enough left of any one color to make a second square.  Bummer.