Crib Cover

This has been a bit of a mixed week, I have spent it finishing off and revisiting. I started this little crib blanket at the beginning of June.  I wanted a portable project and this really fit the bill as it has been all over with me.  I was in no hurry to finish it because it was lovely to make and quite interesting because it gave me the opportunity to use one of the techniques used in the Beyond the square motifs #60 and #121. Making this little cover meant that I could either, crochet, pull up the loops or weave in the ends or a bit of each depending how the mood took me.  Speaking of ends there were lots of them but I try to weave as I go, I do hate having them all to do at the end.  So here it is a pretty little crib blanket which could be used for a boy or a girl and best of all it’s a free pattern which can be found here. 

Now for the revisiting bit, I started making a blanket back in February and naughty thing that I am put it to one side in favor of other things that took my fancy, I'm terrible like that.  I should have kept on with it even if it was just one square a day but no the poor thing was shoved into a bag and stuffed under the bed well I have resurrected it and am now wondering why I pushed it out of sight because it’s lovely to make.  I think the problem is it has lots of colours in it so it’s not very portable, you can hardly carry 16 balls of wool around with you can you, so even though this time I will keep on with it till it’s finished, I am on the lookout for another portable project something with maybe just one or two colours now let me see.........

Crochet Dungaree Pattern

Making things for babies and toddlers is always a pleasure for me,  I love searching the web for new patterns and idea’s. There are so many beautiful free patterns to be found but most of them are for little girls, I always find it harder to find nice boy patterns especially in crochet so I have made this pattern for the little boys, but of course they would be fine for little girls too. 

This is a very simple pattern and very easy and quick to work up, I have included all measurements so that if your tension is different it won’t matter so much.

Measurements
To fit child 1 year-18 months.

Length: - 41cm from beg

Width:-25cm across beg of armhole shaping.

Materials

Size 4mm hook

Approximately 100grm Dk wool, I used Robin DK and extra yarn in another shade for the trims.  It took exactly 100grm for the main shade so if you are making these in one colour you will need an extra ball of yarn. 

Abbreviations

(The pattern is written in UK terms)          

Ch= chain                                                                           

Dc= double crochet (sc US terms)

Htr= half double treble (hdc US terms

Front and back work two alike

First Leg

Ch 26,

Row 1:- htr in 3^rd ch from hook and in each chain across =24 htr

Continue until 6 rows have been worked 2 chain turn.

Row 7:- htr in first st, 2 htr in next stitch, htr to end (25 htr)

Work until 10^th row has been completed. (8cm) fasten off.

Second Leg

Work as for first leg to 7^th row, hdtr to last 2 sts, 2htr in next st, htr in last st. ( 25 htr)

Work until 10^th row has been completed 2ch turn

Row 11:-htr across all sts,  ch1, then all sts on first leg (ensuring straight sides are on the outside and shaping on the inside) =51 htr

Work straight until 32 rows have been completed and work measures 25cm from beg

Row 33:- dec 1 st at each end of next row (49htr)

Dec at each end of next following 4^th row twice (45htr)41 rows.

Cont until 43 Rows have been completed and work measures 34cm.

Armholes.

Row 44:-Turn, ss into next 4 htr, work to last 4htr and leave unworked (37htr) 2ch turn

Row 45:-Dec 2 sts at beg and end of next row =33htr

Work one row

Row 47:-Dec 2 sts at beg and end of next row = 29htr

Work one row

Row 49:-Dec 1st at beg and end of next row = 27htr

Work one row

Row 51:-Dec 1^st at beg and end of next row = 25htr

Work 3 rows

Armholes should measure 8cms.

Work 3 rows in dc using contrast colour making two button holes in 2^nd row thus

Work 2 dc, ch2, miss 2 dc, dc to last 4 dc, ch 2, miss next 2 dc, dc in last 2 dc, 1ch turn

Dc to end fasten off. 

Finished measurement= 41 cm from beg.

Pockets

Chain 15

Htr in 3^rd chain from hook htr in each chain to end (13 htr)

Work 9 Rows htr and one Row dc to finish off, in contrasting shade if liked.

Straps make two.

7 ch, htr in 2^nd ch from hook, htr across (5 htr) work 20 rows each strap should measure 15cm.

To Complete

Place pockets 14 rows up from the bottom and approx 6 htr from the centre and sew into place.

Join leg and side seams.

With contrasting shade, front right side facing beg at armhole join, dc up first side of armhole, 3 dc in corner, dc across top of dungarees 3 dc in corner then around armhole, 3dc in corner dc across top back of dungarees, 3 dc in corner, dc down armhole, ss into first dc and break yarn.
Sew straps onto back and add buttons.

You can embellish these little dungarees in any way you please or just leave them plain.  There are all sorts of free beautiful crochet appliqué to be found. The link for the little car appliqué can be found here

The little dog appliqué is in chart form and can be found here (I have added it below as it was hard to find on Le blog de Anna)

I do hope some of you will try these out and give some feedback and don't forget to show me photo’s of any that you make.  If you have any queries or if you find any mistakes please leave me a comment.

Find pattern for newborn to 3 months here

Dungaree Galleries

Thank you to piehan17 from Ravelry for giving me permission to show photo's of her completed dungarees.

 Here is her sweet little baby modelling them for us, so cute :)

Thank you to Allisonfc  for allowing me to show you her daughter modelling her dungaree's

So cute! Allison made these for a Halloween costume her sweet little daughter is 13 months old.

Show me your picture's when you have completed yours so that I can add them here.

Box of Squares

Well it's been quite a week first being nominated for the sunshine award and now I have just discovered that I have had my Purple Suns Blanket featured over on lifemultithreaded. It's always nice to know that the things you make are admired and give inspiration to others. 

As for this week I have been trying to make that little crochet dungaree pattern I mentioned in my Cute Dungarees post and I am pleased to announce that I have actually managed to make the dungarees and I am pleased with the result.  I have written down exacly what iv'e done but... actually writing it all out in legible pattern format will be a challenge but one I will try to complete for next week. 

I have been meaning to post about that huge box of squares I received way back in March, just in case you were wondering about what I  managed to make with all those squares all is now finally revealed.

One baby blanket 

made with six inch squares joined with sc and

.

 

finished with a pretty border.

36 squares

Three poncho's

find out about it here

find out about it here

find out about it here

16 squares each = 48 squares

Blanket made up of twelve inch squares, joined and edged with sc

  12 squares

Blanket made with mixed twelve inch squares

12 squares

Blanket made with  mixture of crochet and knitted six inch squares

30 Squares

Small blanket made of mixed sized squares in crochet

15 Squares

Huge blanket made out of six inch knitted squares

81 Squares

I also made two pet blankets with odd squares but for some reason I can't get the pictures from flickr onto this blog so here are the links

Pet blanket one made with six inch knitted squares  here

36 squares

Pet blanket two made with odd six inch knitted squares here

25 squares

So thats a total of 295 squares.  

I did enjoy sewing them up but I just did it slowly between other projects.  These blankets have now been sent off to Lou at Loving Hands where she can send them on to worthy causes. Here they are all ready to be sent off.

  I know what you are thinking ......I bet she is glad they are all sewn up ha ha well would you like a peep into the box

I can actually see the bottom of the box wahey!! but as you can see there is still a good blanket or two's worth in there.  These are the very challenging one's that are left, all different sizes and textures and I'm going to have to have a lot of time and patience to put them together, if and when that happens I will show you the finished result and the empty box.  :)

Now I'm off to invite the ladies of Loving Hands to take a peek and see if any of them can recognise their squares.  

Have a lovely weekend everyone.

Cute Little Dungarees

First of all I have to say a huge thank you to everyone who left such lovely comments about my Poncho, it was such fun to make, I recommend everyone should make at least one poncho, you will see how simple and quick they are to do.

I'm having problems with my thumb joints at the moment it really hurts when I write or crochet so I thought I would try some knitting for a change and I have to admit it didn't hurt quite so much.  My family think I'm having problems because I'm crocheting too much but I think it's because of the amount of paper work we have to do at work these days, it can't be because of the crochet, I refuse to believe it is anyway, can you imagine a life without crochet, doesn't bear thinking about.

 I really enjoyed making these little Dungarees and because it was Jubilee weekend I thought it only right to make them with this patriotic coloured yarn, I love the way they have turned out.  My daughter has nabbed them already and wants me to put them in my future granny drawer ha ha.  These little pants took me three days to make on and off of course and I couldn't help thinking they would have been done in half the time if they had been crocheted and so I am in the process of making a dungaree crochet pattern, I have never done this before and it may not work but if it does I will share it with you.

This is the link to the knitting pattern.
The wool was Robin paintbox yarn it's acrylic and lovely to work with.

Granny Rose Poncho 2

If you remember a few weeks ago I found this yarn in my stash and I decided to make a poncho for myself  for Sucrettes CAL.  Well I did finish it a while ago but haven't had time to show you all till now, this is the finished result. 

 As you can see my addiction to Astri's granny roses is still very much alive and well. I made ten granny rose squares joined them into a v shape for the neck and then just crocheted around them and continued until it was the size I wanted.  The yarn wasn't that easy to crochet with however because there were bobbles in it, and me crochet and bobbles usually do not get on but I persevered with it until....... horror of horror's I was nearly finished but I was so scared there wouldn't be enough wool to finish it, I know you have all been there almost afraid to continue in case you would run out just before the end with no way of buying any more yarn to complete it, but as you can see there was just enough.   

It's lovely and thick, soft and luxurious to wear and I was going to put it away for the winter, but after a week of beautiful sunshine, it's raining, miserable and cold in the North East of England once again so I think I will leave it out  for now. :)