Five on Friday

Hello all you lovely people I hope that you have all had a good week, time to relax now and chill over the weekend, this a bit of a rushed post today because I'm all of a flutter, will tell you why right at the end but first

1. Mini Rings Progress

This week I worked rounds 33-35 so that I can move on to the next colour with round 36.
Using stylecraft special chunky 
Round 33 -  shade 1061 Plum
Rounds 34 - 35 shade 1064 Meadow
The picture was taken on a very dull day and the colours look..well dull, they are much nicer in real life.

The mini rings of change Cal is hosted by Kate and you can find out all about it here

2. Snowdrops

I found some snowdrops hidden under my lavender bushes, I had to actually go out and search for them, I knew they were there somewhere it's such a shame that they are hidden like this, I must transplant them for next Spring, I love snowdrops.

3. New Books
My boyfriend is an avid reader I mean he really loves books all four walls in his spare room have been shelved from floor to ceiling and they literally groan with the weight of the books standing on them in fact there are books on top of books, he can't get rid of a book even if he's read it dozens of times.  One day there will be no room for him in his home the books will take over! and so everytime he see's a craft book he has to buy it for me, this time he bought me these...

I don't mean to sound ungrateful but I do like to choose my own knitting/crochet books because not everything appeals to me and most of these books have the same stuff in them anyway, I will make use of the first one but not the second and it upsets me to think that he has wasted his money.  Do you think that I'm awful? I have tried to be diplomatic and say don't buy me any craft books because I might have them already or check with me first but it falls on deaf ears he says he likes to surprise me, I am an ungrateful bitch go on you can say it haha.

4. Stash Busting

Just a reminder for all of you stash busters it's the end of the month but you still have time to link up all your February stash busting projects the February party will close Saturday midnight.  For those who are counting please leave me your totals and thank you to those of you who have done already I will be updating at the weekend.

The March stash link Party will be up and running on Sunday and I will be showing all your January favourites

5. The Appointment

Yes the dreaded appointment came through at least one of them anyway, I have to go for the MRI scan today at 5pm.  I only got to know yesterday so they certainly haven't given me much notice maybe just as well this way I won't have too long to dwell on it. I'm a little claustrophobic so I'm hoping that I can tolerate lying inside a metal cylinder for half an hour wish me luck!

Just adding this here, thank you for all your good wishes, MRI went fine now just waiting for results and next scan. :) 
Have a great weekend!

Joining with Amy for her five on Friday

Progress

The making of blocks from the book 200 Crochet Blocks continues quietly in the background.

Block 76 Granny Stripes

 A lovely block to make I love it to bits, I have always liked granny stripes and of course a granny stripe blanket is always pretty.  The only negative is the ends of course all that weaving in, I have made eight of these for the current project I'm working on so I'm using the ends to sew them together.

Block 6 Textures Bluebells (in this case red bells)

I love this one too so easy and it has a great texture, I have made five of these they go so well with the granny stripes.

So there you have it, I'm determined to make as many projects as I can out of the book this one is about half way through and I'm still not sure if it will work, I'm going to try and get it completed by the middle of March I need to add another two different blocks to complete the puzzle and I have already chosen them I will need just three more altogether one of one and two of the other then I will try and put it all together fingers crossed. :) 

Yesterday's clue three for the mystery CAL is even more crazy than the last, I will be showing you when they are done.

Linking with

Waiting.

Once again I'm just in time this time for this weeks clue it always seems to be last minute for me. If you remember because I am utterly addicted to CALs I had  decided to do the 2015 Mystery Afghan CAL hosted by the Crochet Crowd.  It was already into it's second week, the first week was crocheting 20 granny squares but it was the second week that really piqued my interest layering on top of the granny's...

What do you think? to be honest I really don't know what to think at this stage but I'm intrigued and quite excited to be moving into uncharted territory as it were..

as you can see I'm all caught up and waiting with baited breath for the next clue! have you noticed top right granny is winking at you?

Four little piles all stacked up and waiting for what ?????

Have great day! :)


linking with...

Five on Friday

I hope that you have all had a great week mine has been quite a good one.

ONE
I'm feeling really great since I cut out all the eating of chocolate, cakes and biscuits, I have been leaning more towards fruit and nutty nibbles and do you know what I'm enjoying it, I'm hoping that when I do eventually have my MRI scan those pesky gallstones will have melted away haha not likely I know but one can hope. I also started a new exercise class this week it's called step fit and it's so much fun have you tried it?

TWO
My mini rings progress for this week

This week we worked rows 30 and 31 however I did row 32 too because it was curling really badly after row 31 probably because there are no increases in these two rows to compensate for the increase in size, I even contemplated pulling it back and adding an extra chain increase in row 31.  I decided to stretch the work instead by giving each chain space a little tug, it was still curling so I decided to work row 32 to see if that would help and it did, there is still a slight curl but it will even out with the next rows. 

Round 30 - Stylecraft special chunky inshade 1425 Emperor
Rounds 31, 32 - sirdar bonus chunky in shade 884 neon

THREE
I had a fun time trying to tidy my stash this week, it was great emptying bags and bags of yarn onto the bed, it took me absolutely ages to get it into some sort of order but can you remember my Ikea visit? I was quite taken with the cube storage system, I loved the little boxes that fit inside and so when my friend went to Ikea herself last week I asked her to get me some.  I realised I had lots of unutilised space on top of my wardrobe, so I cleared all of the rubbish sorry I forgot to take a picture of the before but take my word for it, it was unsightly. Here it is now

each box is filled to the brim with yarn, first two are full balls of DK yarn the middle one is Aran and the other two are baby yarn, please don't think for one minute that thats the whole of my stash I could fill another five boxes and there would still be some left over.

This is just some of the stuff I took down from the top of the wardrobe!

FOUR
Another great thing that happened this week remember this....

well here it is now

It took Eddie ages to get it finished because the weather has been against him, also it's harder putting an old fence up than starting from scratch with a new one, a lot of the wood had rotted and needed replacing probably because my neighbours hadn't bothered painting their side of the fence, that makes me so angry but they don't care probably because they weren't paying for it.  

Once the weather is better I'm going to paint it again and I'll ask the neighbours if I can paint their side too, I'm just glad it's up again and I asked Eddie to put extra posts to give it extra support so hopefully it won't blow down again.

FIVE
I have decided to do the  Mystery Afghan CAL you must have known I would buckle and give in, I can't resist a CAL. Clue 2 has been revealed already so I have some catching up to do the first clue is 20 granny squares....

I have done eight so far, clue 2 is layering on top of the granny squares that's what made me decide to go for it because I haven't done anything like this before I think it's going to be very interesting'

My colours are pale lemon, blue, white and green, I had to buy the green but the other is from my stash of Dk, I'm hoping to be all caught up by Tuesday ready for clue 3 is anyone else doing this? I would love to see your progress.


This wasn't really intended but once I wrote this post I realised that there are five things so I'm joining Amy with her Five on Friday feature do pop along and see her new Five on Friday Link Up.

Have a great weekend! 

With a Baby Boy in Mind.

This is the first large project I have made using the 200 Crochet Squares Book by Jan Eaton

A sweet little baby blanket...

I had such fun planning this blanket and watching it take shape

It's quite magical watching the pieces slowly dropping into place just like a jigsaw puzzle 

As always the sewing up was the worst bit, but I sewed  each block onto the blanket as I made it and weaved in the ends so once it was all complete all I needed to do was work the border...

There are some border patterns in the book but I didn't really like them some of them are made first and then sewn onto the blanket I really couldn't face that!

I always prefer simple borders especially for a baby's blanket, this one is a three round border ... one round of dc one round htr and then a final round of my favourite stitch crab stitch or reversed dc.(All in English terms)

I used 

Block 141 Quartet   (four)

Block 40 Granny with a twist (12)

Block 5 Twin Stripes (16)

Block 121 Coral Seas (4)

I used Dk yarn out of my stash and it took 412 grams
The blanket measures 102 cms square

All ready to be placed into the box for Operation Orphan to keep a sweet little baby boy warm.

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