Category: Crochet!

Crochet! · Quilting

10.30: Coloring my world

Vicki8 Comments

It’s my friend’s birthday today & I was so worried that she’d become the newest member of The Bad Birthday Club… but, thankfully, I don’t think that will happen. It’s bleak & agonizing, though, no doubt about that. I hope that peace comes soon.

Try to be a rainbow in someone’s cloud. ~Maya Angelou

I decided last week that I wanted to make a quilt. Like, right now. I needed something to dive into, as none of my current projects is speaking to me in a satisfying way. (I may now have the reserves & bandwidth to persevere.) I returned from Nashville with a couple of Kaffe Fassett fat quarter collections, adding to the random KF FQs & other cuts that I’ve collected over the past couple of years (see image below), and it seemed silly to just put them away… so a simple quilt seemed to be the thing. Plus, we need something on our bed that actually fits, and hopefully these fabrics will help brighten my world as the dark days loom ahead.

A collection of Kaffe Fassett fabric cuttings arranged in vibrant colors on a green cutting mat.

I found a super easy/fast quilt pattern that seemed perfect for the mostly large-scale prints I wanted to use. I pulled out all the fabric, mixed it all up (accidentally), and then sorted it to find some combinations that worked.

A vibrant assortment of Kaffe Fassett fabric fat quarters spread out on a table, including various patterns and colors, alongside a small iron and craft supplies.

(In the process, other ideas were percolating!)

A colorful quilt in various large-scale floral prints, arranged in a diagonal pattern on a wooden floor.
A vibrant quilt displayed on a floor, featuring a mix of large-scale colorful prints in a patchwork design.

Naturally, I made it quite a bit bigger. And I didn’t mind the long diagonal stripes, but I liked it better broken up. Most of the prints were directional, or I’d probably have done a big chevron type thing.

A vibrant quilt layout featuring a mix of colorful fabric pieces, including floral patterns and geometric designs, arranged on a floor surface.
A colorful quilt top featuring a patchwork of large floral and patterned fabrics in vibrant hues of pink, blue, green, and red, laid out on a wooden floor.

After a bit more rearranging, everything is sewn together. I had to rip & re-sew more than a couple of seams and there are some woefully mismatched corners. I’m not sure I’d be very good at more intricate designs. I’m contemplating finished size, whether to add a border or just binding, and how to actually quilt it. I’ll be taking it to the quilt shop soon (maybe tomorrow) to get a professional opinion.

We live in a rainbow of chaos. ~Paul Cézanne

The crocheted granny square blanket is finished! After all the squares were stitched together, I went around the whole thing with a row of double crochet in each color to finish it off. There was just a small ball of each color remaining.

A colorful crocheted blanket featuring a grid of squares in various colors, including purple, red, green, yellow, and white, with a white border.

The back story of this project is that the yarn was given to me by an Airbnb guest who has stayed with me a few times over the years — the first time was when she brought her dad for his first game at Lambeau Field. She booked early and was very communicative, as her dad was undergoing treatment for cancer at the time; thankfully, his treatment was successful & he/they’ve been visitors a few times since then. The game last year was right around Christmas… she’d asked me, at one point, what my favorite colors were & I said “jewel tones” (because that can be SUCH a hard question to answer). Lo, she gave me a big skein of acrylic yarn in each of the colors you see. I added the “antique white” to pull it together. I really felt that I needed to honor her gift, even though I’d never have chosen that yarn (which wasn’t too bad, actually, outside of being just a tad splitty). I’ve talked about the rest of my process for this project before — and it really was fun, start to finish.

And I’m glad I’m finished.

I hope all is well out in blogland. I am so behind, I may have to draw a line in the sand — “mark as read” older posts and move on.

Crochet!

9.25: Sewing up

Vicki5 Comments

The original plan for this crocheted granny square throw was 5 squares wide by 7 tall. As of Tuesday night, I had 35 squares — 33 according to the chart I made, and 2 that I’d made previously.

A stack of crocheted granny squares held in one hand, showcasing various colors and patterns, with a soft background of a room.

There’s my stack o’ squares!

A colorful arrangement of crocheted granny squares in various shades, with a white border, laid out on a patterned carpet.

And there’s my final layout. I considered adding another column, but I grabbed Parcheesi to compare, and this is exactly the same size — and it will be substantially heavier. (I can’t believe it’s almost 15 years since I finished Parcheesi!)

It took about four tries last night to wrap my head around joining these squares! It was a challenge just figuring out which loops to join on each square so they’d match up reasonably well. Add in my apparent inability to count — I ran across more than one place where I made two double crochets into a space instead of three, and I’ve only joined four squares so far — yeah, challenging!! Anyway, I want to crochet it all together, rather than sewing, and initially thought I’d join the squares in each row and then join all the rows together. Turns out, that would be a lot of starting, stopping, cutting, knotting, weaving in. It makes much more sense to join the columns, starting at the bottom & working up. (Thank you, YouTube tutorials!)

As of now, the four squares at bottom left are joined up the middle. I’m hoping to make a little more progress this evening! And already contemplating border possibilities.

Crochet! · Unraveled Wednesday / Knit & Read

9.17: Unraveled Wednesday: FO (finally)

Vicki8 Comments

I’m joining Kat & the Unravelers for Unraveled Wednesday!

KNITTING CROCHETING:

It’s been signed, sealed & delivered… finally an official FO*:

A close-up of a crocheted blanket featuring colorful hexagonal motifs in various shades, with a text embroidered at the bottom reading 'Made by Class of 2023'.
A person standing on a porch holding a large, colorful crocheted blanket made of hexagonal patches in various shades and patterns.
A colorful crocheted blanket featuring hexagonal motifs in various colors, with a handwritten message that says 'Love ♥ Aunt Vic' at the bottom.
A person smiling while holding a large, colorful crocheted blanket with hexagonal motifs in various colors.

Kate & I met up with Addie to deliver the blanket & take him out for breakfast on Sunday morning before heading home.

I didn’t start this blanket in 2021 with Addison’s high school graduation in mind — I didn’t even have his older brother’s graduation blanket in mind at that point — but obviously it’s taken a few years of on/off work to make. He’d visit at least twice a year and I’d be working on the blanket, or he’d ask about it, always commenting on how cool it was… so eventually I decided it would be his! (Flattery will get you everywhere! haha)

A vibrant array of yarn skeins organized by color, featuring shades from dark browns to bright yellows, greens, and blues, displayed on a white textured surface.

It all started with the purchase of a Unicorn Tails Prism Pack during the pandemic, and figuring out what to do with them — along with Unicorn Tail remnants from other projects (mostly gnomes). I’ve posted quite a bit about the project in the Crochet category (along with some of my favorite photos, tho some are not showing & I haven’t been able to fix them yet), if you care to scroll. It was for this project that I first used the Granny Squares Color Pattern Generator.

READING:

I finished Kaffe Fassett: Dreaming In Color: An Autobiography last night. I’d started Kaffe Fassett in the Studio in Minneapolis, so am continuing with that. It’s even more of a “coffee table book” than Dreaming In Color — lots of big pictures & spreads — so I’ll finish it before too long. It’s a visual bonanza.

_ _ _ _

In other news, Davy jumped off the bleachers at lunchtime the other day…

A young boy wearing pajamas with a colorful pattern, sporting a medical boot on one foot, smiles while holding a piece of candy in a fast-food restaurant.

…from a substantial height! Turns out, he broke the first metatarsal in his foot. He has a visit with ortho tomorrow and may end up with a real cast. Stay tuned.

Crochet! · Unraveled Wednesday / Knit & Read

9.4: Unraveling a day late

Vicki6 Comments

I’m joining Kat & the Unravelers for Unraveled Wednesday Thursday!

KNITTING CROCHETING:

I’ve been crocheting squares for my Fair Square Riff… using Purl Soho’s Fair + Square Blanket, Crochet Version, as a starting point. (There’s a Knit Version, too.) I went with the crochet version because it seems like it might be a little quicker to do and it just seems like it’s a bit more portable, too.

The Purl Soho blankets also each have two color versions — one uses 16 colors and the other uses four. I have SIX colors, so… riffing! I don’t even remember exactly how I made the calculation that I came up with — do not ask me to show my work — but I came up with color combos for each square, each using two to four colors, always bordered with a row of white. I tried to employ the Granny Squares Color Pattern Generator, which I used so successfully to generate a chart for hexie love (read/see that here), but I needed something more random pattern-wise. I used it to give me the colors for each square, then used whatever calculation I came up with for the row counts, and employed one of my other favorite design tools — a spreadsheet — to make my chart!

A grid of colorful crochet squares featuring concentric patterns in varying shades of red, yellow, blue, purple, and white.

I’m working top-to-bottom with this as my guide, and have the top row & three squares of the second row finished.

A collection of colorful crocheted squares arranged in a grid, featuring various patterns and colors, with white borders on a paved surface.

Obviously, my colors are a little different than charted. I kind of like those brighter colors, but I’m working with what I’ve got/was given (and the guidance for those choices was “jewel tones”). The colors are a bit richer & more vibrant in person — I ran outside to take photos last night as the light was fading.

Anyway, I’m sort of single-minded about this project & want to get it done so I can move on. I’ve been knocking out about one square every evening during TV time. We were watching a Swedish series for a minute, so reading subtitles slowed me down a little bit, but more recently we’ve started watching some historical docu-dramas — Wyatt Earp and the Cowboy War, and The Men Who Built America: Frontiersmen — which are more crochet-friendly.

READING:

I’m a bit more than half-way through Kaffe Fassett: Dreaming In Color: An Autobiography — there are a lot of photos & photo spreads (it’s a workout holding that bulky book up in bed) which are really fun to look at, and it’s interesting to read about his (really rather) charmed life. And I’m even more interested in meeting The Man next month.

Crochet! · Unraveled Wednesday / Knit & Read

8.27: Unraveled Wednesday

Vicki7 Comments

I’m joining Kat & the Unravelers for Unraveled Wednesday!

KNITTING CROCHETING:

Two crocheted granny squares side by side, one in red and the other in blue with a yellow star pattern, all bordered by white yarn.

WordPress has a daily writing prompt, and this is today’s: What was the last thing you searched for online? Why were you looking for it? Lordy. Some of my search history from last night:

  • n k calculator
  • what are the combinations of 3 with 6 numbers
  • I need 35 random variations of 1-6
  • what are the possible variations of 1-6 in sets of 3 with some repeats
  • generate sets of three numbers that equal 6 with no negative numbers
  • etc.

I’m using an existing pattern as a jump-off point — the size of it & that it’s 7-row granny squares, really. That pattern uses four colors, and I’m using six. I want the 7th row of each square to be white, the other six rows a random combo of three colors… or two. I tell ya, my head was spinning last night after looking at (meaningless to me) math nerd calculations; reading the comments/feedback was a whole ‘nother level o’ nerdiness.

Google AI was helping a bit. Mostly, I discovered that it came down to wording: what exactly was I looking for? I’m not really sure, but I think I landed on a solution.

A crocheted granny square featuring a central yellow flower design surrounded by dark teal and purple accents.

Meanwhile, the little hexi-ish flower above was me getting my crochet legs back… it was supposed to be a square! (Another thing that I’ve discovered is that I prefer a crochet chart over written directions — opposite of my preference for knitting.)

SEWING:

Front & back of my current panel as of last night:

A sewing pattern piece laid out on a flat surface, featuring a dark fabric with a pattern of varying-sized polka dots and floral designs.
A piece of fabric with a curved top edge and marked stitching lines, featuring various hand-stitched designs, laid flat on a concrete surface.

And the back of that same panel last week:

A gray fabric panel with visible stitching and embroidery designs in various colors, laying flat on a concrete surface.

I’ve added just a couple of things on the middle section — usually when I still have a pretty good length of thread or floss to use.

A piece of fabric with various stitched circles and patterns in shades of gray and blue, featuring decorative elements and embellishments.
Close-up of a fabric panel featuring various embroidered circular and abstract designs in contrasting thread colors against a blue-gray background.

Close up (side-by-side photos are galleries, so click for bigger images).

There are three motifs remaining on that bottom section, and I marked each with a pin.

Close-up view of a sewing project featuring a circular patch with pins and stitching on a dark fabric background.
Close-up of a fabric panel showing various fabric pieces, a pin, and a sewing outline on a dark background.
Close-up of a sewing project showing a circle marked on fabric with pins and a needle.

All three will be done in applique… not certain about other embellishments yet.

READING:

I finished This Long Thread last week — that took a while, but I read a few things in between (and, also, there’s just a lot going on!). It was a good book, and interesting to read so many makers’ stories.

I picked World Travel: An Irreverent Guide by Anthony Bourdain off the pile o’ books. It was written posthumously, using his own words (written, or from a show). It’s going to be a good read, but I’ll be skipping over the logistics part of each locale — perhaps I’d use it as reference if I were going somewhere, but I already know, for instance, that the part about the airport in Lima, Peru, is different! It’s also a book that I can pick up & put down without really losing my place…

And I’ve already put it down, since Kaffe Fassett: Dreaming In Color: An Autobiography arrived on my front porch! It’s rather large & heavy for reading in bed (which is where almost all of my reading is done), but I’m enjoying it so far, especially because Kaffe Fassett Is Coming! to MDK HQ in Nashville… and I’m going! More later.

Finally:

Four children standing in front of a house with a window, holding bags and wearing casual clothing.

Ali shared this year’s First Day of School photo with us and wrote, “I’m starting to see why everyone sees me in Malina!” Turns out, they’re not as hard to get out of bed in the morning this year, which means they ended up with a little too much time on their hands before they had to leave — one thing led to another & it didn’t end well. From the look on Davy’s face, I’d bet he was involved. Anyway, speaking of Malina, I think she’s probably going to have a growth spurt pretty soon!