Square-A-Day: The final 3!

I know it's mid-June, but I'm on my own creative calendar with these crochet squares: the deadline-free, do-it-for-fun kind of calendar.  So here we go with the FINAL THREE!!  Yippee!

Day 28:

So this is anything but a peace sign.  I simply followed the stitch pattern and ignored the color changes.  It took me a few tries, but I figured out JudyK's RVS (reverse v-stitch).  I really like how that formed the corners of the square, but now that I am looking at my square I'm noticing an error.  Can you see it?  I knew it was a bit off, but I was rushing to get it finished to include in this post.

Peace Sign by Judy K {pattern here}

 Day 29:

 This was one of my faves.  I love the scallop edges and the dimension.  And I learned the proper way of doing a BP double and single crochet!

Yarn Clouds by Amelia Beebe {pattern here}

 And a look at the beautiful texture:

 

Day 30:

 Of course I loved this one--it's a flower.  This one was deceptively easy and was simple to convert to the smaller size.   I especially love the hexagon center and the texture created on the base of the block (green on mine).

Kaleidoscope Blossom by Chris Simon {pattern here}

The Crochet-A-Long is over but my blanket is not big enough for a real blanket.  My goal is to make it about twin-bed sized.  I'm a little more than halfway there.  So I've searched through Ravelry and fave'd some of the squares I'll be making in the coming months.  This project has no deadline (it's a present for myself), which may not be a good thing.  I'm going to shoot for winter so I 'll have something to snuggle up under while cozying up with a good book and some cocoa.  

Here's the first block I've completed:

Popcorn Parade by Melinda Miller {pattern here}

Sorry for the totally messed-up photo.  The block is not this crooked in real life, honest!

Thanks so much for checking out my blocks during this C-A-L.  I had tons of fun.  And a huge thanks to Melissa for organizing it all for us!

Square-a-Day: 23 through 26 {and a work in progress}

May is over, June is here and I am nearly done with my squares.  Some of these last ones hung me up as I tried to resize them. Here we go:

Versailles by Melinda Miller {pattern here}

 It's hard to pick a favorite, but this one is definitely in the running.  I just love the way it came out: the sun burst inside the circle and the shell border.  Not sure how much I'll be loving those shells when it comes time to  join this square to the blanket. 

Bright and Cheery by Dayna Audirsch {pattern here}

This was a fun square that worked up quickly.

Birthday Flower by Chris Simon {pattern here}

This one took a bit of finagling to resize.  This is another one for my list of squares to make in 12" size.

Blooming Lace by Melinda Miller {pattern here}

 I think I said it before, but I really love Melinda's patterns.  I'm sad that this one didn't have room for the beautiful lace.  Another one to make 12".

I'll leave this post with a work in progress shot:

Granny's More Complex Star by Tiggerbee  {pattern here}

This is day 27, a beautiful square, but I'm trying to decide what to do: do I follow the pattern and end up with a square too big for my blanket, or do I try to turn this hexagon into a square...hmmm.  This crochet business is not as easy as it looks!

Square-a-Day: one week of catch-up

Wow, have I really fallen this far behind?  My squares are coming right along, it's the rest of the posting process that hangs me up!  Here we go:

Lemony Lime Citrus by SmoothFox {pattern here}

This was a fun one, and I love the little arches that showed up in the corners on the green round.

Starburst Flower by SmoothFox {pattern here}

Can you tell I had run out of blue yarn when I made this one?!  The starburst came out bigger than I thought it would, so I didn't have room to add any blue or white.  This is another one I would like to make in its full 12" size.  Hmm do I feel another blanket coming on?

Ladybug Square by Amelia Beebe {pattern here}

Honestly, this was one square I thought I would be ditching--just didn't think I wanted a ladybug on my blanket.  But it just might be one of my favorites.  And I think it will add jut the right touch of whimsy!  I used french knots for the spots--so fun!

Eye of the Beholder by Jessica Gil {pattern here}

This one went really quickly.  I'm sad that my smaller size omitted the little stripes of color between the outer rows.

George's Granny by Jessica Gil {pattern here}

Another super fast square, and I love how easy Jessica's pattern's are to follow.

And last but not least:

Impossible Hexagon by Stramenda {pattern here}

I had such high hopes for this one, but it was made to be a 12 incher, and I lost the beautiful effect of the lace work of the white.  I only did two rounds of the lacy white part (rounds 5 & 6), and when I skipped down to round 9 it all went wonky.  I'm going to do this one again as a 12 incher--it would make a beautiful accent pillow cover.

Haven't started today's square yet, but I'll be back later in the week with more squares.  Wish me luck!

Square-a-Day: 12, thirteen, 4-teen, 15

Still at it!  More than halfway through a Square-a-Day for May and I am still hanging in there.  Yippee!

I thought Day 12 was going to do me in.  I had a really hard time following this pattern, lots of tearing out, re-doing, and tearing out again.  I was trying to follow two sets of written instructions, and now am just wondering if I would have been better off following the author's diagrams.  I've never crocheted from a diagram, but for this one I bet I should have. 

Grandma's Heart by Carola Wijma {pattern here}

Just now as I look at my photo, I see that I did the picot round in the completely wrong place.  Uggh!  I really loved the look Carola's block and was so disappointed in my feeble crochet skills when I couldn't replicate it.  I am not giving up on this one!

Day 13 brought some relief.  This square was quick and easy and I love the solid look the double crochets create (not to mention how fast those guys stitch up!).

Flower Square by Fiona Kelly {pattern here}

This block is much more lacy--I love all the variety in the squares Melissa chose.

Violet Block by Jacqui Goulbourn {pattern here}

I think this next one is one of my favorites.  I will be making this one again and using Melinda's full 12" pattern.  Because I am re-sizing my blocks to 7", I missed out on getting the rounds of v's in my block.  And I think the center of this one makes great flowers/doilies, too.

More V's Please by Melinda Miller {pattern here}

Day 16 is nearly finished, just need to add a round of white sc's.  

Thanks for checking out my squares!

Square-a-Day: eLeVeN

I met my Aunt for tea/coffee this morning and we went through some of her old crochet patterns.  She gave me a bunch, and I am hoping to be able to incorporate some of the granny patterns into my blanket.  There's even a triangle pattern that would work perfectly as a bunting.  Fun stuff!

Today's square from Melissa's CAL:

Flowery Square by Adaiha {pattern here}

 If it's flowery, it's for me!  I had attempted these layered flowers before and haven't had the greatest success.  It must have been the way Adaiha wrote her directions, or her technique of attaching a chain to the back stitches of the previous flower, but it clicked for me.  I'm not saying I did it correctly (honestly I think my two larger flowers are facing the wrong way), but it worked! 

And I finally caught onto photographing  my square from the side to show the texture (hey it's only day 11!):

 Isn't that Bee-you-Tee-ful?!

Square-a-Day: TEN!

Framed Flower by Sally Ives {pattern here}

I'll admit, this square had me a little nervous.  Round 4 where you "dc around ch into top of cluster in rnd 2".  Ummm, yeah, I had no idea what that meant, so I winged it.  Maybe I did it the way Sally intended, maybe I didn't.  Either way, I think it came out beautifully.  I love the round of blue where you crochet in the back loops--gives it a nice pop of texture (can't tell from the photo).

I'm working on a lengthy post about my stUdio space.  Hope to have it finished sometime this week.  But for now I will leave you with this photo of our menu board.  Why? Because I am random.  Because I grocery shopped today and planned our meals for the week. Because the boys like my silly little drawings.

A bit of Monday randomness.

We're into week two of May and I'm still sticking with this little project.  I've been wondering what makes this daily project different than others I've attempted in the past and all I can come up with is "crochet is portable".  I can throw it in a bag and bring it to swimming, church, soccer, the doctor's, and on car trips.  I bring it outside while the kids are playing, and I throw on another round while I wait for water to boil on the stove.  I don't like to be idle for long, and crochet is the perfect thing to while away the minutes.  And these blocks whip up really quickly and look beautiful.

So here's day 9:

Falling Star by Melinda Miller {pattern here}

 There are quite a few of Melinda's blocks being used for this CAL (crochet-a-long) and I love them all!

Here's a peek at my progress as of last Thursday.  I think I love it!  I keep telling the boys this blanket is going to be mine all mine, after all I am the only girl in the house!

And now for a little scrapbooking, and I mean little.  Might be the change of seasons or the busy-ness of spring in general around here, but not much was done in the way of scrapbooking last month.  I've learned to just roll with this...sometimes it's just like that...it will all come around again.

background: vinyl shelf liner in wood grain; mat: paper towel leftover from Easter egg coloring attached with masking tape; circle accents: spirograph over patterned paper

I took a photo of my crazy threesome after they had had a free-for-all with the body markers.  What started as a harmless bit of stamp tattooing quickly turned into a full-blown, all-out marker assault on each other.  Yeah, they thought they were so cool.

This is a framed page I donated for a charity auction.  Sorry about the fuzzy faces, but I wanted to protect these little cuties. 

This was such a fun page to create, especially the handmade embellishments:

And a few flowers I'm playing around with for a crop coming up next week at Scrapbook Heaven.  Stay tuned for the deets!

Alrighty, I'm off to a Mother's Day Tea at my youngest's class.  I told you this was a bunch of randomness!

Happy Monday!

Granny-a-Day: five-six-seven-eight

I've been crocheting right along this month (even a bit ahead of myself), but just not able to get these posts up.  My li'l ole puter is taking f..o..r..e..v..e..r to run Photoshop.  So today I am taking advantage of my Mother's Day gift from my kiddos (being good boys all day) and catching up.  Here we go!

Starfire by Melinda {pattern here}

I think the inner most part of this square would make the cutest little snowflake ornaments, don't you?  

Really loved crocheting this one.

Victorian Dream by Cindy Arman {pattern here}

I really liked this square, but I lost some of its beauty by down-sizing it to 7".  I might need to make 12" squares next so I can use the full pattern.

Passion for Purple by April Moreland {pattern here}

 I took a few liberties with this beautiful pattern.  Since the blanket I am working on is mostly flowers, I wanted to try turning April's pattern into a flower motif.  It worked!

On the Huh by Jacqui Goulbourn {pattern here}

I wasn't sure how this one was going to turn out and if it would fit in with the blanket I'm working on.  I think I like it and it adds an interesting geometric block to all the girliness.

That's it for today.  Happy Mother's Day!

Square-a-Day: 3 & 4

As I type this, my first four grannies are blocking (first time I've ever blocked anything--I am learning an enormous amount on this project), and I am in the last round of Granny # 5.  Woohoo!

One thing I want to mention about my squares: size.  Melissa chose squares that would measure 12", and since I had already crocheted a bunch of squares at a 7" size, I am altering the patterns slightly so that my squares will come out to 7".  It really hasn't been an issue at all so far. Since grannies are worked in rounds, in most cases I am simply omitting some of the last rounds of the pattern, or leaving out a couple of rounds and finishing with the pattern's last round (to add a nice finished edge).  So far so good.

Here are days 3 & 4:

Maggie's Square by The Crochet Dude {pattern here}

Blooming Granny by Melinda Miller {pattern here}

Just looking at these pre-blocked photos I can tell the blocking is going to make a huge difference.

Square A Day: 1 and 2

Happy May!  Hope you all had a great weekend!

I'm off to a great start with my grannies (ha--see me in about a week!).  I'm not sure I want to post them every day--might kinda get on the nerves of my email subscribers (and I love my subscribers--mmmwahh!).  Think I'll put them up on FB every day, and do a post here every few days.  But I didn't want you to think I had flaked already on this little project.

Amethyst Square by SmoothFox  {pattern here}

Kata by Penny {pattern here}

I probably should have taken some notes when I was making these so I could give you a few pointers.  My crochet skills are, umm...still developing, and I often have to tear out and redo (sometimes frequently) with any given pattern.  Maybe that's what I love so much about crochet--it's very forgiving and mistakes just get torn out and no one ever has to know!

A Granny a Day in May

I'm committed.  I'm doing it.  I'm making a Granny a Day in May.  

Melissa over at Hooked on Handmade has organized a little group and since I was tossing around 

the idea of doing this very thing for the month of May, I decided to take the plunge 

and join her group--nothing like a little accountability to keep you on track, right?

I already have my colors picked out and a few squares completed

(umm, let's just pretend that one in the upper left isn't there--no idea what happened to that poor guy)

 My kids may go unfed, the laundry may stay dirty, but by golly I'll be 30 granny squares closer to a blanket by the end of May!  

If you would like to join in on the Granny Square fun, hop on over to Melissa's blog up there and check it all out.  Hope to see you there!