Friday 11 October 2013

Simple Crochet Scarf Tutorial


Scarves are one of the simplest things to make from crochet.  I’ve only used treble crochet and chains to make this one.  Like my granny square tutorial I am using a cotton yarn and a larger hook than recommended, both of these are just so that the stitches are easier for you to see.  I am also using different colours for each row so you can see it easier – you can either copy the colour changes or just work in a single colour.

Chain 25, this makes quite a narrow scarf, simply add more stitches if you want a wider scarf.

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Chain 3 extra stitches, this will count as the first treble in your row

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Treble into the fourth chain from the hook

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Treble into the next chain

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Treble into each stitch of the row

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Chain 3, and turn your work over, ready to work back down the row

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Have a quick look at the top of the stitches here, you should see a row of ‘V’ shapes all the way down. 

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When you are making the next row, be sure to put the hook under both sides of the ‘V’ shape.

Now you know what to look for, find the next treble in the row and make a treble into the top of it

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Continue to treble down the row until you reach the end. 

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Now the only tricky bit left is finding the last stitch to treble into. This is probably where you are going wrong if your rectangles start to get a little more triangle-shaped. At the start of the previous row you did 3 chains.  (the green stitch just above my thumb in this photo)

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Your last treble should be into the top of this chain, like this:

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If you’re not sure if you’ve done it or not, then count your stitches to make sure you have 25 (or more if your original chain row was longer)

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For the next row, as before, chain 3, turn your work over, and treble into each stitch of the row.
Keep going until your scarf is the length you want.  If you want to turn it into a snood/cowl then just sew the ends together.

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Hope that helps you get started.

Thursday 10 October 2013

Christmas Crochet in Simply Homemade


Christmas is coming – no matter how you try to deny the fact, and who should we see on the front cover of Simply Homemade this month – my little Rudolf.

Simply Homemade issue 35 - on sale now!

Sometimes it seems a bit odd to me to be making Christmas themed projects when I’ve just returned from my summer holiday, but I guess at least I have a head start on what will be hanging on my Christmas tree this year.

The ipad cover on the front of the magazine is also one of my projects and the magazine also has patterns for a couple of messenger bags I designed.

I’ll leave you with a photos of the other crochet projects that I made for this issue:

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Next time – a crochet scarf tutorial, are you excited yet?

Monday 7 October 2013

How to Crochet a Granny Square

I thought today I’d add a post showing you how to make a granny square. The yarn I’ve used for this is a 100% cotton yarn which photographs nicely, and a 4mm hook (which is slightly larger than the yarn recommends) but which makes the stitches nice and clear to see.

I am assuming that you know how to make a slip stitch, and how to make chains and treble stitches (UK notation).

Round 1:  chain 6 stitches

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then place your hook through the first chain you made,

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and slip stitch (wrap the yarn around the hook and pull it through both loops on the hook)

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Chain 3 - this counts as a treble

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2 trebles into the centre ring - this is now your first group of trebles.  We will be making quite a few of these groups of trebles before the granny square is finished.

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Chain 3 - this leaves a gap or "chain space"

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3 trebles into the centre ring - yippee, the first corner is made.

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chain 3, 3 trebles into centre ring - you've now made 2 corners, you're half way.

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chain 3, 3 more trebles into centre ring

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3 chain, and then slip stitch through the top of the 3 chain you made at the start of this round

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Cast off this colour (if you are going to change colours), and admire your tiny little square.

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Round 2: join your second colour by holding the end of the yarn at the back of the square (make sure you leave about 5-10 cm of yarn at the back of the square otherwise you risk it coming undone later), and pull a loop of your new colour through the large gap in one of the corners of the square.

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Chain 3 - this counts as a treble

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Treble 3, chain 3

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Treble 3 more into the same space, and you have your first corner of this round.

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Chain 2, then (treble 3, chain 3, treble 3) into the next large chain space

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chain2, then (treble 3, chain 3, treble 3) into the next large chain space

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chain 2, (treble 3, chain 3, treble 3) into the final large chain space.  Finish this round with a slip stitch into the top of the first chain you made of this round.  Cast off.

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Round 3: Join new colour to one of the spaces on the middle of the sides, chain 3 and then complete 2 trebles in the same chain space.  As this is a side not a corner, we only need to make one group of trebles here.

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Chain 2, move to the next chain space and (treble 3, chain 3, treble 3) into the same space to make a corner.

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work around the edge of the square, in the same way.  Into each side space work 3 trebles followed by 2 chains to move to the next space, and into each corner chain space work (treble 3, chain 3, treble 3) followed by 2 chains to move to the next space.

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You can either continue working around the square to make it larger, or make lots of small squares & stitch them together.

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Make sure you run all of the ends in securely, as you don't want all of your hard work to unravel.

Hope that helps to unlock the mystery of the granny squares. Happy crocheting!

Sunday 6 October 2013

Spreading the Crochet Love

After the success of our school yarn bomb, and the interest we’d had from the other school mums, Sam, Andrea and I decided that we should arrange a crochet group.  A quick call on Facebook, and via the school network led to 15 of us meeting up last Wednesday in the function room of the local pub.
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Many of the ladies were complete beginners to crochet, so the time was spent with the experienced crochet-ers teaching the others to make chains and trebles.
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Look at those lovely bright colours of wool!
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It was a really lovely evening, of socialising and, for many, learning a new skill. 
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I’m already looking forward to next months meeting, and can’t wait to see what everyone has managed to make.

Saturday 14 September 2013

Crochet gifts

After being totally immersed in the crochet yarn bombing project over the last couple of months, for a change I decided to do … more crochet!  This time some gifts.

Firstly these wrist warmers:

wristwarmers

I made a pair of these for my lovely friend Elisabeth, sadly Royal Mail have let me down & so far, over a week after I posted them, they’ve not yet turned up at her house!  Luckily I have proof of postage, so I can claim compensation, but I don’t suppose they’ll pay for the time they took me to make. I made them from a pattern over at Attic24, and they were so easy I made another pair for my daughter.  The gloves are just made from htr stitch and sewn together with a little pretty-ing up on the openings.  I made them with some cotton DK I had left over from another project (a little something I made for next months issue of Inside Crochet – are you excited to see what the project is?)

My cousin had a little baby boy a couple of weeks ago & so I decided that he needed a little pressie.  When I saw a pair of crochet high tops I knew I had to make some:

booties

I found a pattern on Ravelry, and changed the colours.  They only took an evening each, and would have been a bit quicker but for the Great British Bake Off being on the tv the night I started, and as you surely know, you have to keep looking up to see what they are making.  These were made in a baby dk yarn, which hopefully will take lots of washing, and be lovely and snuggly on his feet.

I’m now starting to think about making some Christmas gifts, ideas anyone?

Sally

Tuesday 10 September 2013

What to take when Yarn Bombing

With our first yarn bomb being dismantled shortly, I thought I’d share some tips and things we learned.

Firstly you will need:

A location – if it has a view like this then all the better, however wherever you choose should be easy and safe to get to.

view

Permission – we were lucky that the school saw this as a positive opportunity, and were happy to give us free rein.

A plan – Have a rough idea of what things will go where.

We measured the tree secretly before making the sock.  I’d read somewhere before that it is a good idea to make the sock smaller than the tree, that way you can stretch it round and it’ll stay up.  We were lucky enough to have a helping hand from mother nature here as the tree we picked has very rough bark – just perfect for keeping it’s sock up.

Things to take:

Several pairs of scissors – don’t take your best ones, as long as they’re sharp enough to cut the yarn you’re ok.  Several pairs because it’s guaranteed that you’ll put them down somewhere & not be able to find them and spend longer looking for them than putting up the decorations!

Yarn needles – again take loads for the same reason as the scissors, these are even harder to find if you put them down somewhere.

Cable ties – perfect for attaching tree/bench ‘socks’.

Wire cutters – to cut the cable ties – you really don’t want to be using your scissors on these.

Fishing wire – great to ‘invisibly’ tie things

lots of spare yarn – no need to explain why you will need this!

camera – to record your decorations

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Optional things:

step ladder – helpful and slightly safer than actually climbing the tree to attach your yarn!

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Sign – how else will everyone know what it’s all about?

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A disguise or two

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and finally a preparation tip:

Run ends of your crochet in but leave long tails on everything, we used these tails to tie the stars to the trees.  You can just cut them off if you don’t need them while you are there.

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We also discovered that when making stripy covers that are going to be sat on, it’s worth doing a row of Double crochet around the edge of the cover.  This provides a little more strength between the rows and stops the stripes pulling apart so easily.  We used cable ties to attach the cover to the bench. 

And lastly, the most important tip - make sure you’re not caught!

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Happy yarn bombing

Sally