Recent Crochet Items

I purchased some really cheap yarn and I really don't like it, but I did finish it up in two projects.

The first is this premie hat.  I'm hoping that it will soften up after it gets washed.  

If it doesn't .. then ... 

I will just have to use it to hold hot cocoa mix pouches :) 

I also made this scarf.  The pattern starts at one end and finishes at the end.  Problem was that the beginning didn't look as good as the finish.

So I added a little to the 'beginning' and now the two ends look a lot a like.

Here's a shot of Peaches trying the hat on ;)

Here's her trying to try the scarf while I was laying it out to photograph it ...

Here's the scarf all laid out.

Today, Yesterday, and . . .

Howdy and Hi :)

It's been a busy couple of days.  I was out of the house most of Monday with a ACBC Women's Ministry Meeting and a CGB PTO meeting as well.  Both meetings involved planning events, so they were jam packed with information.  I enjoyed both of them :)  For the PTO I will be volunteering, but not heading up anything.  They are planning on a bowling tournament to be held at the community center (aka bowling alley/bar/pool table place) here in town.  You can see more details on their blog.  For the ACBC thing, I'm actually going to be leading the planning for a Keepers At Home group to start March 7th and be the 1st Wednesday morning for a few months before Summer, and then hopefully continue as park dates this summer and picking back up in the fall.  Contact me if you are in the Belgium, WI area and would like to attend. 

The other day when Seth made his corn cake, Joel baked as well.  He made a Devil's Food Cake from scratch and added a few secret ingredients to it.  The one I remember is Root Beer Extract.  I actually didn't taste anything different.  It was just plain good devil's food cake! :) Yum!  Thanks Joel!

 This morning as I was rushing around trying to get things done before heading off on errands, I saw this chickadee outside.  I love these little birds, but they hardly ever sit still for long so it's very difficult to get a good picture!  This was the best I could take at the time.

 Last night I finished these two hats (below).  They are both crocheted.  The one on the right I had actually started the brim and the colored part quite a while ago.  I had run out of that particular white and couldnt' find anything to finish off the hat with.  I ended up using a white sport weight yarn and just using it doubled.  I don't think the difference is all that noticeable.  I was glad to get one more item finished :)

 One of my errands today was to drop off the red scarves that I had made in January.  I dropped by Aurora hospital in Grafton, WI and dropped these off with the Director of Volunteer Services.  We had a nice little chat as well.  I think she was very pleased with these and said the scarves were timely as they have a few people ready to graduate their cardiac rehab, and so they need these scarves in the next week or so.  :)  I'm so glad they will be used!

So on to another project :)  The Grafton hospital is starting up a chemo wing in the coming months, so they will have an increased need for prayer shawls.  Perhaps I'll try to quilt a few prayer shawls as well as knit or crochet them.  My goal for 2012 is to seriously decrease my stash so it doesn't take up so much room in the bedroom.  Here's hoping anyway!

Quilting and Snow

Lots to show you today, so it will be a picture heavy post.  Enjoy your walk through my ... life :)

I got a new thermometer for the backyard, and a set of two birdfeeders last weekend.  It is put on a hook thing that my dad made (several years ago).  My dad has been very good to me :) This pic was taken as the snow was starting yesterday morning.

 I worked on a bit of quilting.  The following photos show my process through taking some dresdan blades that someone had given me, and making them into something useful.  It's very much a "use it up" project, as the blades don't match, and the background piece is a poly blend, and I used small scraps of batting.

one piece quilted

second piece basted

Quilted & Trimmed neatly

Starting to come together . . .

It was meant for Peaches, but ...

She just doesnt' seem interested in it, . . .

 So I've taken it for putting behind me on the couch :)  You snooze you lose! :) lol.

Here's some pictures of the yard as the snow was starting . . .

 And here's the red scarf I finished last night.  This is for the Grafton Hospital.

 The following are pictures from this morning.

Beautiful Mourning Dove.

Another Mounring Dove

Backyard

 Don't know if you can see, but something walked through our backyard last night.  Not sure what it was, possibly a deer?

New Thermometer set up ...

 Isn't it pretty with the dogwood bush behind it? :)

So hope you enjoyed your little "walk".  Comments welcome!

Peaches, Knitting, & Crochet

Let me open with a few pictures of our cat Peaches.  She has taken to moving around the house and catching sunshine where she can find it.  During the middle of the day, it's been dh & my bed.

Isn't she cute? :)

Here's the red scarves I've completed for the hospital in Grafton.  I hope to get two more done before I deliver to them at the end of this month.

Also - here are a few dishcloths I've crocheted in the last few evenings.  Actually all but one of these was done in one evening, a couple of days ago .. I am just now getting a picture of them posted...

Yesterday I spent some time in my sewing area .. and found some old dresdan plate blades that someone had given me.  They are of older fabric, and so Ijust started sewing some of them together.  I've got some fused and sewn on to squares of whitish fabric (also old, probably poly blend .. ) and I plan on making them into a pad meant for Peaches to lay on .. I hope to finish it this weekend ..

Random thoughts - & Special Olympics Scarf #18

I haven't posted in a few days, so here's just a few random thoughts and such ..

If you ever wanted to learn how to do a bargello quilt, this website has a tutorial started on it.  They are really much easier than they first appear!

I added a pic on my sidebar for the Quilting Is Murder shop hop.  It's a bit of a different take on the internet shop hop.  You still go to quilt fabric websites, and click on the clue, and get entered for the prize .. but there is also a murder mystery story that you get to read chapters of each week and each week you get a mini puzzle to solve, submit your answer and enter for a smaller prize.  It's quite fun!  Check it out. :)

I got the Special Olympics box mailed off on Friday morning.  It was so neat, and such a God-thing .. I had collected $12 for shipping from the other members of the group, and the cost of the postage with a delivery confirmation was $12.05! lol... worked out perfectly!  We ended up sending in 31 scarves. 

Here is My scarf number 18.  I was able to finish it and include it in the 31 that got mailed.


Wisconsin Special Olympics  is reported as having received 455 as of January 5th, so our 31 will go a ways to getting them to their goal of 600.  I just checked the tracking number and it was delivered on Saturday. the 7th.  :)

Now I'm trying to work on a few red scarves for the hospital in Grafton, WI.  They want to give their Cardiac patients a scarf when they "graduate" :).  I have one done, and one almost done.  I also have enough red yarn to make two more.  I'll also be sending in as many premie hats as I can get done the end of this month.  I'll try to get pictures of these scarves and the hats before I deliver them.

Special Olympics Update - 2 more scarves

Just thought I'd share a quick photo of two scarves that I recieved from NH yesterday.  She did a great job! :)

This is NH's 2nd and 3rd scarves for the Special Olympics project .. That makes 29 that we are sending in, with 1 more on my needles that I should be able to finish today.

Special Olympics Scarves 16 & 17

Okay, well, ds2 did not finish his scarf, we ended up unraveling the 12 inches or so that he had done .. but that means that I had more yarn to use, so I went ahead and made up two more scarves .. using some of the yarn ET had given me and the skein that ds2 had.

So here is my scarf number 16 - it's granny squares .. I had some leftover from my earlier granny square scarf, (Hey that was #6 - this one is 16 .. kind of neat!) so I just made some more to finish this one off.

And my number 17 is another lemonade stitch scarf like my number 4 scarf and like my number 13 as well.  I love this stitch, it's very fast and gives a nice texture.

Our knitting and crochet group has one more meeting this Thursday before I mail the box on Friday.  I may even try to mail it on Thursday if I can squeeze it in between the meeting and ds2's piano lesson.

Special Olympic Scarf Update

Hello! :)

We had a meeting of our knit and crochet group yesterday .. and lots going on!  Several members finished scarves and so we've increased our total! :)

3rd Scarf by FH

1st Scarf by FH's sister, EH

1st Scarf by NH

1st Scarf by ET

Aren't they great?  That brings our total up to ....

*drum roll please*

25 Scarves for Wisconsin Special Olympics!

Wow ..
Our number will get a little bit bigger, ET gave me a couple of skeins that she didn't think she'd be able to use and I'll probably get atleast 2 scarves out of that.  Also, NH is about 1/2 way through with another scarf - a really neat design by the way.  Can't wait to show you the finished product.. She's doing a great job on it.

I'll be mailing this box the first week of January.  Just wish I could see all the olympians faces when they get the scarves.  I'm sure they'll really enjoy them.

Another big happening, is that the local paper, the Ozaukee Press, came a took a photograph of our group with the scarves and did an article about us! Not sure if it is in this week's or next weeks paper, but I'm going to get a paper today to find out.  I'll let you know when I know!

Special Olympic Scarves 14 & 15 !!

Well, my Special Olympic Scarf making is coming to an end... I've completed number 14 & 15.

#14 is made with crocheting a long chain - of any number 4x + 1 ... then ch 1, sc in 2nd chain from hook, *ch 3, skip 3 ch, sc in next ch* to the end where you sc in the last ch or sc.  Here's how  14 turned out.  I did this the long way on the scarf. Every other row I changed colors.

 Here's 15 - it's the same basic pattern, only I did it the short way ..

I don't have enough yarn for another whole scarf, but I suppose I might get scraps from one of the other people in my group working on these.  I do have 3 granny squares plus a small ball of the blue. May save these for our next charity project - not sure.

So far, in our box ready to go are -
15 by me (I purchased 8 skeins, and received mom's leftovers)
2 by FH
4 by mom (Mom purchased 4 skeins)

and I know others are working on finishing theirs .. atleast 4 more that I am pretty sure will get finished.  We do have another month before we can mail these, as Wisconsin Special Olympics wants them sent after Jan 1st, but get there before Jan 21st.  So I'm aiming to mail these by Jan 4th.

I'm thinking for every 2 skeins, you can get atleast 3 scarves from them.  So from the 12 skeins that mom and I purchased, we got 19 scarves .. almost 20 (19 1/2) if you count the granny squares I have left over.

Special Olympic Scarf - #11, 12, & 13 !

Hello!

I've finally finished that Special Olympic Scarf with the cable running up the middle.  This is number 11 for me! :)

 It's pretty neat, but was very slow! I finished it a couple of days ago ...
I immediately started on the next one, which is a pretty simple knit pattern.
CO 19 (probably should have done just a couple of more, it's a bit narrow than it should be.)
Knit 5 rows
Purl 1 row (or knit left to right - backwards).
I added blue in the middle for a small section.

Here is the result .. took me about 3 days and is number 12 !  Finished it yesterday.

 Then of course I had to start another, because I'm still not out of yarn, and so I decided to do a Crochet Lemonade Stitch and alternate blue and red .. and it ended up a bit narrow so I added a simple chain border all the way around.....

Here is Scarf Number 13 ! .. a Baker's Dozen! :) It was made between 3 and 10 pm last night.

 I have started #14 as well.  It's crochet as well, and is chains held together by sc every 4th stitch.  I didn't get a picture of it yet, but it's about 1/3 of the way done .. worked on it a bit last night.  It won't be as heavy as the others, but I think it will be a neat effect.

We had the Knit & Crochet group meeting yesterday afternoon, and FH presented this scarf.  It's the second she's made.  She's doing a great job! :)

I've started bagging the scarves that I've made and collected, and we are filling a box! :)  I'm starting to wonder how much it's going to cost to mail!  I'll have to weigh and measure it soon so that I can suggest to the group the possibility of them helping to pay for postage.  I don't mind paying myself, but since it is a group project, then perhaps they would like to contribute a dollar or two towards postage.

Any thoughts?

Special Olympic Scarves

Just a couple quick pictures for you as I need to run out the door! :)

A Crochet project I finished on the road this weekend ... for the animal shelter or for a baby or something .. not sure yet.

The following picture is scarves my mom made.  She's made a total of 4 now.

This is the start of my Number 11 scarf.  It's slow going with the split / cable in the middle.

And here is a scarf from my homeschool group - a girl FH made this one.

She made up this pattern by herself .. I think she did a great job on it! :)