A sense of achievement

Remember I wrote recently about how my crafting had gone rather crazy?

Well, I've finished one project - hooray!! - and am pretty close to finishing a second.

The completed one is the rainbow lap quilt. I have to say that quilting experts would probably shake their heads over certain aspects of the manufacture of it, (I am not a quilting perfectionist, by any means; I cut corners, my cutting isn't 100% accurate, my stitching's a bit wonky sometimes...) but I like it, and it's just the right size for having over my knees when I'm typing in the lounge on a cold day.

Have to give a shout out to the fab staff at Quorn Country Crafts, who helped me to decide how to edge the rainbow square centre. If it wasn't for them, I wouldn't have ended up with the rather lovely rainbow batik strip border - even though they were a pig to sew, because they kept slipping on the machine and bits weren't 'caught' by the stitching on the right side. A nifty bit of hand stitching later, and any missed raw edges were hidden...

Loved that there were enough colours in the batik pack
for me to roughly match the border colours to the
central panel squares closest to them

They (the staff at QCC) are also a whizz at working out how much fabric you need to back the quilt, too, with only the minimum of excess material. I chose a teeny-tiny harlequin print in grey and white to give a neutral backing;

I have a few of the batik strips left over, so it's created a new project for me - a cushion cover, I think. Though I won't be starting it any time soon... And in the meantime, I might change my mind completely and do a scraps quilt - who knows?

The second project should be complete by the end of today: my socks.

I caught up on Strictly (Come Dancing) last night and managed to do all but the toe shaping on the second sock. I still think it's a really unusual colour combo - pinks, purples, orange and red - but you can never tell until you start knitting up what the self-pattern will look like. Once these are completely finished, my sister's asked me to knit her a pair, but as socks are much quicker to produce than a quilt, I might get those started.

So that's two crafty projects knocked off the list - and I'm afraid I added another one.

I know, I'm a glutton for punishment, but I was given a crocheted Christmas tree pattern by Knotty Knits and Kreative Krafts that I'd like to try. I bought glittery random wool in red, green, and white to have a go at it. Only problem is, I need Squidgeling J to teach me how to do the stitches before I can begin...

I don't think I'll ever be able to say I've got nothing crafty on the go, do you?

Crochet collaboration

I seem to be making a habit out of blogging weekly at the minute...mainly because the writing's not going so well, the weather's finally improved so I'm outside a bit more, and I've a got a few creative projects on the go that involve media other than words.

So here's another of my non-wordy projects that's finally been completed. Remember this one? 
All about how Squidgeling J and I taught ourselves how to crochet. More specifically, how we mastered the art of Granny Squares. Yay!

Over the Easter week that the entire family was ill with a dreadful lurgy, J and I made 35 Granny squares between us. The aim was to make a knee blanket for my father-in-law, in the hope that it will brighten up his room in the residential home. All went well with the blanket, although the one thing no youtube crochet tutorial tells you about is sewing in the ends... There were hundreds of the darned things, especially as (as you'd expect from a colour-loving Squidge) there were at least three colours in every square. And yes, there is a rainbow square, slap bang in the middle of the blanket - but it wasn't me who made it.

The best bit was delving into the bagful of double knitting from my stash and putting it together in all sorts of different colour combos. It turned out to be quite addictive.

Anyway, squares made, ends sewn in - we were ready to join them up. We had to look up how to do it - if it'd been left to me, I'd have simply sewn them, but J found proper instructions on how to use crochet stitches, so we did it the 'proper' way instead. J's really neat - much neater than me! - so we made a deal. She'd stitch the seams and I got to sew in the ends...then she'd add the border.

And here's the finished blanket - ta-daa! Next time we're up in Yorkshire to see the in-laws, we'll take it...

The best thing about this little project? Not the fact that I've learnt a new skill, but the fact that I've collaborated with my daughter on something. Talking over the colour combos and working out the final layout and having a bit of a competition about how quickly we could get a square crocheted was time spent together that we might not otherwise have got.

And it got me thinking. See the square with the yellow middle, then red and orange fading into maroon? Three across from the left on the second row up? I found myself wondering what it'd be like to get the rainbow colours and blend in different graduating combos of four colours, so you get yellow, green, aqua, blue or maroon, red, orange, yellow, or pink, purple, red, orange... Maybe that's a project for the future. I've got far too many other creative things on the go at the moment to start another.

But watch this space, see if it happens!

Creativity continues...

I said the other day that I'd been creating. Well now, I can share some photos, because the baby jackets have arrived at their destination! And there are a whole load of other things I've been playing with to tell you about too... Here we go:

Knitting!

Two cute baby jackets...

The multi-coloured one was the mum-to-be's choice of wool, and I found buttons in exactly the right shades of orange, green and turquoise to complement it.

This one was a pattern I saw when I was choosing fabric for my next patchwork project (more of that in a mo). I fell in love with it and decided to knit it as a surprise. I've now got to knit the helmet and bootees that go with it, and two more of the same for another friend who's expecting.

Crochet!

I follow a blog written by Liz (who I used to sing with in the choir when we were both much, much younger!) called In Stitches Daily. Liz is a fellow crafter - spins her own wool, knits, crochets, sews clothes and furnishings - and she happened to write a post about crotchet and how easy it was after I'd commented on something different. Crochet is something I've never mastered...but Liz inspired me to have a go. I knew a basic chain, double and triple stitch, but that's it.

I rooted out a very ancient Twilley's 'How to crochet' book for instructions on how to make a granny square and went for it.

Couldn't understand a bloomin' word.

Resorted to the internet and found some pictures, which helped, and began to crochet. It took a few goes, but I'm pleased to say that I've knitted two Granny squares. Hooray! Quite what I'm going to do with them, I have no idea...but I now know how they are made. Hope Liz'll be impressed, anyway!

Patchwork!

I suppose this bit ought to be called Patchwork Tales Part 4, because it deals with the choosing of materials. I'm going to be doing a course to make a confetti quilt and I've always wanted to make a rainbow quilt...so I've bought fabric that I hope will work to do both. If you want to have a look at one version of a confetti quilt, take a look at this one by Lady Havantine... The example in Quorn Country Crafts is a white base too, but I have an idea to try it with black, in the hope that it will look a bit like stained glass...

Here are the colours I've chosen so far, all cut into 5x5 inch squares to match the charm pack size which the course uses.

I'm hoping that seven colours will be enough, but the beauty of doing the course on site at the shop means I can nip out and choose something extra if I'm short.

Flowers!

Today, we decorated church for Easter, so I even managed a flower arrangement... Here's the link to the St Mary in Charnwood Flower blog, though it won't be posted until Easter Sunday, as I like to keep the flowers a surprise until the first Easter service...

Now all I have to do is finish off the odds-and-sods socks that I was knitting prior to the baby jackets, and I'll be all creativitied out!