The irony of crafting

But first, that yarn god delivery in full (after the Coventry Knit Wits have picked through it):



I snaffled 700g of peach mercerised cotton from it, and there's a grey cone of DK you'll see further down this post. Taking it to Ripping Yarns later, hopefully it'll go down a bit more!



This blanket (it's a single bed size, this is just the half you can see draped over our bannister!) has been keeping me busy since mid January. It's from Scan the cat - she calls it a fairisle or celtic afghan, the original pattern has a bird pattern on it but I decided to be lazy and just use the built in patterns from the KH950i. I tacked the vertical panels wrong sides together and joined them with the pie-crust edging on the machine - in fact, the whole thing was joined and trimmed on the machine. The verticals lean towards the centre, I should have been patient probably and waited for my finger to heal up enough so that I could crochet the panels together first. I have full mobility in that finger again now (ie I can bend it completely) but that's only been in the last day or so. I need to steam the edges but otherwise it's done. This is yarn left over from olympic cushion making so as such it's not in the Rav stash at the moment. I have enough of these to make at least one, maybe two more blankets. Not sure where this blanket is going, I didn't plan who would have it.

Now for the irony - the local clothing bank wants children sized stuff especially, so I thought I'd make some small hats. This is the criss-cross toque, an excellent primer in cables - but ignore the written instructions and use the chart, it's easier.



Interestingly enough, this hat uses what I would call a "start loop" (loop pulled up to the height of a half treble) instead of a starting chain. Which is a clever idea I've not come across before - it's invisible once done. BUT I learnt I needed to mark it with a stitch marker, because otherwise it was hard to see when getting close to the end of a round.

And - it came out too small. I think the pattern is supposed to be for an adult, and calls for worsted. I used the unknown grey DK, and although I could wear it, it's tight and only half covers my ears. Fine, I think - got a child's hat and I wasn't even trying.

So then yesterday I made this:



Boy's crocheted hat by Marty Miller. It's back loop only, short-rowed double crochets mainly (with a column of plain dcs for the brim. It was addictive to the point of making my wrists ache, but I wanted to finish it. And guess what? It fits me and is a little too large for the Cog (who clearly has less brains than I, ha!). So - tried to make a child's hat, and got an adult one.

How's that for irony?!

You know you've been crocheting a lot when you dream about it - dreamt my cat Thomas was chasing a fox, which was entirely crocheted. He moved fast for a stuffed toy though! Then I caught and was bathing an unknown black and white cat who was covered in blood but didn't seem to be injured. Very odd!

Being sent to the Netherlands for work next week so machine knitting time will be nil. Have resolved to start doing twenty minutes of exercise every day, because the weight just isn't dropping off and diet alone just isn't working. Hotel has gymn, pool and sauna, so no excuses. Trying to figure out what knitting/crochet to take - on second sleeve of the Creative Melange jumper and might just take that and hooks and a crochet book.