Wow! I Did It!

Since taking up knitting again a few years back I have learnt a lot.  Now I am pretty impressed that I have managed an "in the round" & "seamless" knit!  Woohoo!  My Ravelry friends that I hang out with monthly are to blame of course!  They point me in the right direction when ever I get stuck or need help with something or even with more inspiration to make other stuff!  

So here is my Greyson!  Knitted in Buttons yarn.  Unfortunately it's going to be discontinued this yarn.  It's really cute for kids though.  & it's a reasonable price too really when knitting for kids.  lol  

Anyway, DJ wearing his jumper...  It was hard to get a shot that wasn't blurry.  He just doesn't stay still long enough...  

Rather Pleased ... Ta-Dah!

 Finally!  Yay!  I must say this picture doesn't really do the blanket justice but you get the idea.  It's done anyway!  I am really happy with it.  Much happier than with the 2 from last year.  This one is 30 squares too.   Those were only 20 I think but I wanted this bigger to make it more useful.  I do like the colours of this one better too which is why I didn't mind making & making.  I didn't get sick of it quite so quickly.  

  

I experimented with a couple of different joins & also had planned all along to do it in white, but I know from experience at work that you 90% of the time end up with something different that what you intend!  So yes, I joined in dark green.  It made such a difference.  

Then the edge!  Well I recently saw one on a friends page on Ravelry.  It was really good & I thought it would suit this bunch of squares.  So I ordered the book from the library.  Around The Corner Crochet Borders.  I'm going to buy it.  It's awesome.  It's no. 28.  Anyway, it took a little effort as the white piece is a braid on it's own & needed to be woven in.  But I love it!  Thanks to Mary the star of the crochet square!   (if you are on Ravelry, check out her page with her link of her name...)   

So there you go!  Now I am trying to make up my mind on my new colours.  But I have a week or two.  The CAL is still running & the next square is one I have done already - shhh... it's in the blanket!  

Catch Up

These are my last squares in this colour way!  Woohoo!  I'm trying to decide how to join them all now.  Experimenting stage right now.  Can't wait to have these together.  

What is wrong with this picture?

Dress Ups

We had our first real party dress up this week!  It took some discussion before BJ would decide what character he wanted to be though.  I was really trying to avoid a Star Wars themed costume.  I have never seen a Star Wars movie so still not really sure where I would start!  He hadn't either so really was only going by what his friends like.  But since he plays Mario games sometimes it seemed like a good option & was approved of!  After a little surfing online it didn't take long to find a costume idea for that either.  After a little more surfing & voila, I had the ideas for how to construct too!  The overalls were a breeze with the info at Smashed Peas & Carrots.  The hat too was easy peasy!  All there at your finger tips these days!  A look around op shops found me nothing so I had to make!  But that's ok.  It turned out well.  I found the red fleece & blue felt in a quick trip to town.  They had exactly what I needed.  I had the hat done with in the hour of purchase & the overalls done not long after tea time!  So pleased!  The big boy was too so that was a good start.  But he did tell me he needed a star & a mushroom as of course they have those on the game.  So umm... I gave in to the challenge.  Printed out the star from online & used him as a pattern.  The mushroom I made up.  Probably a bit taller than the ones in the game but oh well.  

The costume was a success as were the additions of props.  They were "playing Mario" running around getting the stars & mushroom "collecting" points!  Quite funny to see.  Now I am hoping I can find a book on Mario.  Then we could re-use the costume for book week later in the year.  Otherwise the blue overalls may turn into a lego man costume later on instead!  

Have a great week!  

March Reflections

Happy Easter!  

But can you believe another month has gone!  That makes one quarter of the year is over already.  

March has been a busy month.  The calendar is taking a beating this year already!  

The start of the month saw me whipping up felt finger puppets again.  I think I ended up with 39 of them but one made his way to BJ's collection.  I did some of these last year but this time cut corners with less stitching & move glue.  I also added a rabbit to the list.  BJ's rabbit included a basket of eggs as he requested.  The group of puppets were for the school fair.  BJ is in school & the fair is early in the year.  I was roped into helping on the Devonshire tea stand.  But I added to the list with these little puppets too.  I think they almost all went too as I saw only a couple left not long before the end of the fair.  

Note to self - next year offer to help in only a set time frame of about half an hour.  An almost whole day on one stand from really, really early in the morning to much later is not necessarily a bad thing, but leaving the 2 young ones with dad for the fair was a bit hard on him I think.  So until DJ is bigger & in school I will do small portions!  

I have been crocheting still too!  Here are a few of the most recent squares...

Almost done with that blanket.  I need to do 2 more I think.  That will be the end I think at this stage.  

Also whipped up a new project bag the other day just so I could use this fabric!  We have it at work.  I think I took the long way around with the bag construction though.  Next time I will change methods.  Then it might look better.  

I also got my visiting knit finished.  This is my Sonnentau shawl/scarf that I started at the end of January as a visiting mum in hospital knit.  It was a good one to carry around.  It came up quite well, though I am sick of looking at it. I will do this one again for sure.  I enjoyed it!  

It's been an interesting month on the home front.  BJ is growing up too fast now with school.  DJ is growing up too fast just copying BJ in everything!  

Stuart is fine - now.  He had a night in hospital which was a bit of a shock.  Nothing serious but bad enough for them to keep him in when he went to the emergency section!  But again that was dealt with & a lesson learnt & he's well again.  

Me?  Well somehow I keep afloat & on top of all that needs doing much of the time.  We've just enjoyed a party of 12 for a light Easter lunch.  That was nice.  These days I prefer to have things like that at home as go out to eat!  You can make some yummy food yourself at home!  Work is fine!  Family are fine!  What more can I ask for!  

So that's March!  Done & dusty!  

Hope this finds you well too!  

Slow Days

Yes, we've had slow days.  But internet speed, not much else!  

I have been busy as usual!  We've had some really hot, sticky days.  It's meant a lot of the activities like below.  It was fun hanging out by the paddling pool.  I went armed with my crochet on a quilt under the lemon tree.  We don't have many big shady trees in the back yard so the fruit trees are it!  lol  

This is the crochet I have been working on mostly.  I showed you one square the other week that I had done.  At the time I didn't have anything in mind other than one square.  I hadn't decided then whether to do a sampler blanket again with my crochet along group squares.  But nope, I ended up doing this.  This was my first 2 rows joined.  I really wanted to try the flat braid join.  I didn't even experiment with any other joins  like I usually do.  I like it.  Whether it really belongs on this pattern square is now beside the point.  I am just working on what I hope is the last 10 squares.  I have 25 joined but it needed more.  So I will see how it looks for size when I have added these next 10.  Almost finished them for joining time!  It needs some serious blocking then!  

This is Double Treble Burst Square which was the Sunday square for our CAL.  It was fun to make.  Looks quite good really.  If I can say so myself!  It should be a nice addition to my Tulip blanket. 

I have ditched one of the squares I had made for it.  I don't like how it is sitting so I decided last night when my mind wouldn't stop while trying to sleep, that I will unravel it!  I will put the yarn to better use as there really is nothing I can do with the jolly thing to make it nice.  

OK, time to get on with the day.  

Feeling Clever

I have a few more squares that I haven't posted!  These were from umm...  maybe 2 weeks ago.  Can't remember anymore.  No, maybe the beginning of last week.  Must be, as this first one is the February square from the Julie Yeager group.  It's Another Sunflower Block.  Another good challenge for me.  I learnt a lot on this one too.  

This is Falling Star & the second block in the CAL I do each fortnight.  I just posted this new square last night.  

This one is from another book I have, 200 Crochet squares by Jan Eaton.  It's Tricolor Square.  I really like it.  I did have to add more to it as it was only a 6".  The pattern ended with where I have the light green so I made up the rest.  I like that centre design though.  It's very effective!  

Have a great week!  I love Mondays!  We have nothing on.  Just hang out & do fun stuff or whatever!  Yay!  (actually the boys both slept in this morning as it's dark & I have been sitting here at 7.30am doing some crochet!  hehehehe!)