Giant Granny Square Bag

Thursday I spotted a very unusual colour combination, which I could not wait to try.

As soon as I got home I started crocheting a Giant Granny Square (well it would end up that way!).   As it grew, so did the idea of a big floppy Giant Granny Square Bag.

I was all but obsessed with these new lovely colours and the idea of the big floppy bag! 
  

I just kept on crocheting - 25 rows and it was a rather large square (oops I had better stop - I want to make a bag not a sack!)

As usual there are a hundred versions of the same thing on the internet!     After a bit of research I decided I liked this JAPANESE Version!

I did not really follow the pattern (only sort of) - I am lazy that way!!

A FEW TWEAKS I MADE:

Single Strand of DK
Used Jan Eaton's Squared Target pattern as the basis for my square, except I just kept going in DC
Only did 25 rows

Gathered the sides by doing sc into every second dc

At this point I had one of those "oh-no-this-is-never-going-to-work" moments - one seriously misshapen piece of fabric.

Started decreasing the top (over a few rows so that it did not pucker too much) - and that was when it actually started looking like a bag,   

There are no less than three bags in my WIP's basket - they are almost finished, even the ends are worked in - but I still have to do the straps (UGH!!   hate that even more than working in ends!).   This bag was about to become number four when I had a brainwave.      

Youngest had thrown out a faux leather handbag I had passed on to her, and which was now looking decidedly worse for wear.   After a bit of "surgery" performed with a craft knife I managed to remove parts of the straps and four buckles

I had to improvise a bit - made four tabs for the buckles in sc and sewed them onto the bag (very untidily *embarrassed*)

 Buckled the straps in and secured them with tassles

 Added a big flower to cover up the "securings" and VOILA!!

Photo taken indoors

and VOILA!!

Photo taken outdoors

I love this bag!     I have two odd balls of variegated cotton blend in my stash -  am so making another one!

How About THOSE Colours!?

I am always on the lookout for Colour Ideas!

Spotted some scatter cushions in a rather unusual colour combo while at the mall this morning. When I got home I quickly put away the cold stuff (the rest of the shopping is still standing on the kitchen table) - I just had to see what THOSE colours would look like in crochet!!

Grabbed a hook and the colours I needed (Lime, Aqua, Jade, Teal, Beige and Coral) and started to crochet!  

This is a very easy and quick square, of which I have seen quite a few versions.   Mine is based on the pattern "Square Target" which can be found in  Jan Eaton's 200 Crochet Blocks for Blankets, Throws and Afghans. The book is very reasonably priced and is an absolute delight to own!

Observe the colours please people - try to ignore the rather untidy crochet done with a too big hook!

Its a weird combo - but I think I like it!........

So much so that instead of actually paying attention to my WIP's (packing the shopping away being primary here) I am hooking away some more at my sloppy square (well you can't really get the full picture until you have at least done one repeat of the colours!!)

And as the square grows a silly little idea starts to form in my head!     A beach house bag!    Something soft and floppy into which I could bundle a few balls of yarn and a hook or two for a bit of impromptu hooky when the opportunity arises....

But for now I really really have to stop for a bit.     Have a bite to eat (oops forgot about lunch), have a cuppa and pack away the shopping!

But, for now........

How about THOSE colours!?

Crochet Mood Blanket 2014: Day 28

28 Days in and still having fun with the Crochet Mood Blanket.

I was thinking of changing out my colours at the start of  February - crocheting the centres in the light colour and the petals in the darker colour.     This way I will easily be able to differentiate the months!

Linking this post at HAZEL'S CROCHET

Beach House Throw: Good Ol' Granny Squares

I love Granny Squares!

Can't get enough of granny squares - they are just so perfect to make when you want to indulge in completely stress free crochet!

I have had a couple of  those days lately - just not up to anything requiring too much thought or effort.

A few days ago I made a heap of RAINBOW MOTIFS AND GRANNY SQUARES.

I will share my plans for the Rainbow Motifs in another post - this is all about the Grannies!

I was too lazy to fetch yarn out of my stash and so had just been using the yarn I had put aside for my CROCHET MOOD BLANKET!

While I was making the Rainbow Motifs and idea popped into my head for a beach house throw using the spectrum from green through to violet (representing sea and dune vegetation), add a bit of white (representing surf) and edging with a sandy colour (representing beach and dunes)

I did not have the widest selection of colours so I tried to rotate them to get as many different squares as possible.

Still looking a bit untidy in the above photo!

These are the colours I used: Bright Green, Apple Green, Jade, Snowmoon (grey green), teal, aqua, turqoise, baby blue, cornflower blue, cloud blue, indigo, crocus, purple, white and gravel (beige)

 I have got quite a nice mix of squares now and have started edging them all with the gravel (stone) - and starting to look much neater!

No idea how I am going to pull this off yet - just having sooo much fun!

Quickly going to make spaghetti bolonaise (luckily when it is so hot the family prefers to eat much later) and then hopefully I can start to form a plan to assemble them......    soo excited!

Flower Granny Stripe Scarves

I completed two more FLOWER GRANNY SCARVES a while back, but with the heap of  WIPs I have been busy with recently (and the unbearable heat)  I almost forgot about these little projects:

A rather strange colour combination - grey, brown, mustard and violet (acrylic / wool blend)

Added a fringe with some teeny tiny flowers (crocheted on with a slip stitch from fringe to flower), some buttons and a few pansies.

I only had a small amount of grey left and so decided to turn this violet strip into a cowl!

Just a little show and tell then!    Off to make some tea and then back to the heap of WIPs ......

Crochet Mood Blanket: Update and New WIP's

The first row of my Crochet Mood Blanket is done - 19 lovely little moody squares for the first nineteen days of 2014!    Linking at HAZEL'S CROCHET  - so hop on over to her Blog and add your progress!

We have been experiencing a heatwave here in Johannesburg (another one!  SIGH!)     It has been so hot that my CPU (brain) has started to melt!

I sit by the pool all day with a huge jug of  iced tea and, being completely incapable of just sitting, found some crochet to keep my hands busy!

First it was a little heap of teeny tiny scraps lying in my basket which I hooked into an odd collection of  motifs.

An idea popped into my head for a sunflower hexagon bag -  I have seen a lot of hexagon bags (my favourite one by the amaaazingly talented  FIONA) but have not found one with a pattern - I would have to wing it!  There would be quite a lot of  frogging involved in the making of the first bag and  I did not want to mess up my delightful little sunflower hexagons.

Sunflower Hexagons

Not feeling in the least bit sorry for the scrappy motifs they were quickly turned into hexagons by crocheting around them with what my son says is an "irredeemably ugly" colour and joining them as I went - until my little bag took shape.    The handles were a nightmare -  the strongest handle made the bag look a bit like a bulletproof vest (not really a good look for a bag).    Eventually after about 6 tryouts and feeling really hot and bothered I just made these and decided to be done with it.

The Sunflower bag is on hold for now until a better solution for the handles comes to mind!

After that frustration,  I was not in the least bit inclined to attempt to finish my other WIP's and so indulged in a bit of mindless crochet .....

making a rainbow of hexagons, squares and circles
 

Rainbow Crochet Motifs

And a pile of granny squares which are destined to become a beach house throw

Quite a productive week in spite of the heat!!

Crochet Mood Blanket 2014: My Square Pattern

I had a request for the pattern I am using for my Crochet Mood Blanket 2014:

My Mood Square

4ch, ss to form ring

Row 1:  4 ch (counts as 1dc 1ch), 1dc 1ch into ring (repeat 11 times) (12 x 1dc, 1ch groups) ss to close

Row 2:  Into any 1ch sp,  2ch 2dc cluster, 3ch;   *3dc cluster, 3ch* crochet *to* 11x (12 clusters), ss to close

Note:   a 3dc cluster is formed as follows - yarn over hook, work the first part of the stitch leaving 2 loops on your hook, repeat this twice more (four loops on hook) Yarn over hook and draw through the loops on the hook to form your cluster

This is what your motif looks like once you have completed the second row:

Row 3:  Into any 3ch sp crochet 3ch, 2dc;   3dc into next 3ch sp;   *3tr, 3ch, 3tr (corner) into next 3ch sp; 3dc into next two 3ch spaces* 3 x from * to*;   3tr, 3ch, 3tr into last 3ch space;   ss to close:

I used the  JOIN-AS-YOU-GO METHOD method to connect my squares

This project linking at Hazel's Crochet

Crochet Mood Blanket 2014 Update: Day 13

Just completed square 13 for my Crochet Mood Blanket 2014:    Green - feeling inspired!

I am still really happy with the COLOURS  I chose.

I had some misgivings about the randomness of the project but I think that these colours  work well together.

At the start of the project I  thought about using something fancier or more colourful.

I made a few test squares while trying to get my thoughts in order.    9 x popcorn stitch flower squares, 9 x simple double crochet squares and 3 x prototype of my final choice.    There were enough squares to make a cushion (which is not really spectacular but it kind of grows on you!):

The 9 x popcorn flower squares make up the front.

The 9 x double crochet squares make up the back and the other 3 I used for the flap, fastened down with odd buttons.

Double Crochet Stripe Afghan

At some point during 2013 a whole stash of Elle Charity Chunky was purchased on a whim!

Just before Christmas I had finished up all my WIP's and was undecided what to do next.    We were having some lovely rainy weather - a good time to tackle the Chunky project.     Something quick and easy - not requiring too much thought or effort - or so I thought!  

Was I in for a surprise?

I tried hook after hook size - before finally settling on a 7.00mm.    Then I tried out pattern after pattern after pattern after .....  Nothing seemed right!

I tried squares - nope.     A big granny - nope.     A ripple - nope.    Granny stripe - nope.     Diagonal granny - nope.    Box stitch - nope.    Diagonal box stitch - nope.

At that juncture I was - extremely annoyed and worked up!

I was NOT going to pack the chunky away - I WAS going to best it (the deciding factor here was that after removing all that chunky from my yarn cupboard and rearranging the rest of my stash quite satisfactorily I had NO intention of trying to get the chunky back into the cupboard!)

Eventually out of sheer desperation I tried a plain old double crochet stripe.   Not too bad after a couple of rows.......    and then it started taking shape.     So easy and quite nicely textured.     I calmed down and started enjoying the project.

 

I worked up row after row in mauve, blue and grey.

Bordered it with a few rows of single crochet and gave it a nice  bobble fringe (about twelve hours work start to finish - what a bargain!)

Even with the border the double crochet stripe was a bit boring - and so taking inspiration from my lovely popcorn cushion, I made heaps of yellow flowers, orange flowers and lime green leaves.

Appliqued them on to the bottom and top corner:

It fits quite nicely on a 3/4 bed (had to fold it to get the flowers in the photo).

Must say I am rather delighted with it!

Popcorn Stitch Cushion

I was having way too much fun with the popcorn stitch to stop after I finished my POPCORN STITCH SQUARES BAG

Had to make a bright and cheerful cushion popcorn stitch cushion

There was quite a lot of orange, yellow, lime and light grey left over from the bag, but the dark grey was finished - decided to add a bit of blue!

For the back - a colourful square.



Four daisy squares to close the cushion, some odd buttons and a fun bobble fringe!

Popcorn Stitch Squares Bag

The popcorn stitch has been "popping" up all over Pinterest, and I was suddenly inspired to use some really bright colours I had in my stash.

I made one of these GRANNY SQUARE BAGS a while back - you only need 13 squares and the bag works up in no time at all. 

I didn't use a pattern - just made it up as I went, adding in a light grey and dark grey for contrast:

I am so totally in love with these delightfully puffy flower centres that I have used them on a whole lot of colourful projects - I cannot wait to show you what I have made!

(PS:    The pattern for the Thirteen Squares Granny Bag can be found HERE)

(PPS: Variations of the Squares used:     POPCORN FLOWERS AND LEAVES and SOLID GRANNY SQUARE)

Crochet Mood Blanket 2014

Stumbled across this Crochet Mood Blanket 2014 challenge on Facebook (started out on Instagram, which I still have not got around to using).

The Rules are simple:    Choose colours to represent your moods, then crochet 1 square a day in the colour that matches your mood for that day = 365 squares.  (Or 1 square a week = 52 squares)

I am doing one square a day in these colours, with a white border:

I shall be making a total of 360 squares (allowing the spare days for bordering and finishing) - 19 blocks x 19 rows 

I don't want this project to be too time consuming and so I will be using the same pattern throughout.  My squares consist of 3 rounds each.   Each completed square measures 8cm, which should  give me a final measurement of 152cm  x 152 cm - without the border.

Groovyghan: Little Princess Groovyghan

Way back in  July 2013 my daughter decided to crochet a GROOVYGHAN for her "bestie" (don't know who to credit with the original idea as there are so many of them on the internet.

We both love the fun mix of a variety of stripes and squares and have both made quite a few Groovyghans since June!   

Here is one that I made:

The ripple was the perfect choice for the centre panel.

The squares just evolved as I went.

Alternated the stripes between the grannies with double crochet and granny cluster stripes.

I used 6 colours - purple, lilac, cerise, pink, peach and white.

I was a bit worried about using the peach but I think it balanced the colours out quite nicely in the end

Big Circles Afghan

I made this throw mid 2013 using the Big Circle Afghan Square by Kate Jenks from Signed With An Owl.

This was one of those patterns that you have to make the minute you see it.    The circles are a brilliant way to use up those oddments of colour yarn that always seem to accumulate.

I had so much fun making the circles that I did not pay much attention to the colour combinations.

I managed to make 16 circles using up leftover yarn in red, purple, tan, dark brown, white, light blue, cornflour blue and denim.

I used beige to square the circles.

Then worked them together with Dark Brown using THIS method.

For the border I added to rows of granny clusters in beige, a row of white and a row of denim.     Then a row of single crochet in white on the reverse side and a row of denim on the right side.

I love the way the colourful circles pop against the neutral background!!