A Poncho for Joanie.

A few weeks ago my friends Mother had a very bad fall in her home and had to be admitted to hospital, she sustained a large gash to her forehead and broke her shoulder.  It was touch and go for a while for poor Joanie she's 90 years old and as you can imagine it was a huge shock to her system and she was in considerable pain, luckily she is on the mend but it's going to take a long time for her to recover.

I offered to make this poncho for her as she needed something that was practical and easy to wear. My friend told me what her favourite colours were and luckily I had enough yarn in my stash to make this.

I started by making some granny rose squares and then just used a zig zag granny stitch pattern until it was the length I needed. 

I made a crochet edging rather than a fringe as I thought it would be safer and look a lot neater too. I'm hoping that she'll like it.

You can find the Granny Rose Pattern here The pattern for the edging is the same as the one I used for my Nola Shawl and can be found here

I used 400 grams of Dk yarn and a 4mm hook

I got the inspiration from the granny rose poncho I made here  I can't believe that was more than four years ago!

Have a great week! 

Look on my right hand sidebar to see where I will be linking this week.

Getting There Slowly

What a great response from my Do you like Housework post thank you all so much for taking the trouble to leave your comments it was really interesting to hear your views, I'm going to keep it highlighted as a featured post over there on the right so if you want to join in please do if you haven't already.  I'm so relieved to hear that not one of you so far loves housework, that's so reassuring.

Just in case you're wondering how the Last Dance on the Beach Blanket is getting on you can be reassured that I am working on it very slowly.  Here are the next three squares for the blanket...

Isn't it clever? it's called seagull stitch and the pattern was designed by Nerissa from Miss Nerriss  for week 5 of the CAL, you can click here to read all about the inspiration behind the creation of this design and you can find the pattern and the video tutorial  here

I found this a fairly easy square to make but you need to count to ensure that you get the prints in the correct place mine had a kind of staggering gait a couple of times haha concentration needed.

I used Stylecraft special chunky in shade Meadow and a 5mm crochet hook each square used 52 grams of yarn and it measures 10" square.


I'm still loving the making of  this blanket although I have been sidetracked this month because of charity requests all will be revealed later.

Linking with...

It's nearly the end of the month I would love you to link up your remaining stash busting makes for October the November party will be up and running on Sunday November 6th.

Who Likes Housework?

Do tell I'm really interested to know if there's anyone out there who actually enjoys it, regular readers of my blog will know that I'm not exactly a fan and will go to great lengths to avoid it, put it this way I can always find something better to do.

Don't get me wrong my house isn't dirty but boy it's certainly untidy, when I'm in the kitchen I'm not a tidy as you go sort of person at least not always, I try to be some of the time but it has to be a concentrated effort so I usually slip back into my slovenly ways and you would think that a bomb had hit it when I've finished cooking.

I have two friends whose homes are like show homes, I know this becasue if I drop in on them unexpectedly their places are immaculate, it amazes me it really does.  One of them won't do anything else until her household chore of the day has been completed, every day of the week is marked for something like washing on Monday sort of thing, I'm not criticizing  how nice to be so organised! This is the friend who irons her knickers wow what commitment. 

 I have just been away with these two friends on holiday they shared a room I prefer a single as I suffer from insomnia and if I do manage to get to sleep I snore, anyway their tidiness didn't let up just because they were on holiday, their room was as tidy as can be in fact they even took off the dirty sheets and folded them and the towels ready for the maid to change when she came in to clean everyday.  No throw the dirty towels in the bath for those two, neatly fold them ready for the maid to pick them up and place in her laundry basket, she wouldn't stuff them particular towels in would she not when they were folded.  These friends had the bed all stripped and room pristine clean when it was time to leave. 

If one of those two friends say they are coming to visit I grab a black bag and push everything that's lying around into it, fling it into the spare room and shut the door, I then run the hoover round but only if there's visible bits of yarn left on the floor (there usually is it gets everywhere!) a quick flick of the feather duster and there you have it 10 minutes tops and I'm ready to receive my visitors and all is well unless they go to the loo and open the spare room door but they wouldn't would they?

Thankfully my other friends are a bit like me and won't even notice the mess just as I don't notice their mess when I go to visit them in fact I find it comforting somehow. 
  

You might be wondering where this is leading and what on earth that vase is doing stuffed full of folded pieces of paper, the thing is I've devised a plan, I'm trying to make housework fun haha what a laugh.  I have been through each room and wrote down one particular chore on a piece of paper, I don't mean hoover and dust that has to be done regularly I'm talking about those things that get missed like tidying drawers, washing light shades, cleaning top of wardrobe, tidying and washing shelves, then each paper has been folded and placed into the vase, I pick one out everyday or as many as I feel like doing and once I have done the task I'll put the date on it fold it up again and put it into the done jar, once everything has been done I'll swap the jars around and start again.

I'm hoping it will work because they are only tiny doable jobs that won't take up much of my time, speaking of time this post has rambled on a bit if you have managed to get this far I would love to know what you think of housework and how you manage it.  Do you like it love it or hate it? 


Have a great hopefully housework free weekend :)

My job for the day....

Coaster Love

If you think it's been a little quiet here at the crafty corner it's because I've been away on holiday for a week soaking up some well needed sun and and eating lots of yummy food.  Thank you for all your lovely comments I will be trying to catch up with you all over the next few days. 

I wasn't idle while I was away in fact it's fun to knit and crochet around the pool and on the beach, It gave me the opportunity to make these...

When I decorated my sitting room earlier in the year my coasters needed replacing because the colours didn't match my new decor, I used glass coasters for a while but many a coffee cup tipped over and spilled its contents because they weren't place squarely on the coaster. 

Up until now I haven't had the time to make any, I've made six for myself but my friends liked them so much they all want some too so I know what they will be getting for Christmas :)

There are lots of coaster patterns available but I always go back to these because they are so pretty and very easy to make, they are Ana's Bloom Coasters and you can find the pattern  here.  I made an extra round of trebles becasue I was using 4ply patons cotton and they were turning out too small, Dk weight works best.

I had the knitting needles out too while I was away and made something small and cute and will be showing you once it's blocked and I have the buttons sewn on. 

I'm trying to adjust myself to the colder weather I can't believe how much colder it is than before I went away just over a week ago, winter is rapidly approaching, how I wish I could escape the winter months and live in a place in the sun!

Hope you are all having a great week.

Linking with

Link and Share Wednesday

Beautiful Cambridge.

The time seems to go so quickly I can't believe a whole month has passed since my daughter and I went to Cambridge to visit my son. Last time I visited we toured the various colleges and drank in the beautiful architecture this time we spent most of our time just walking around the beautiful city and found hidden in its depths the amazing Botanical Gardens the perfect place to try out my new camera...

We spent the whole of the last afternoon just sitting here watching the world go by ...perfect

The day was cloudy and grey with scatterings of showers which is why some of the photos are dark but the weather was warm in fact it was perfect walking weather and in the the three days we were there we walked nearly 40 mile! my fitbit nearly overheated :)

You can see my last trip to Cambridge here

Have a great week.