Growing Granny

Just a quick update on my flowers in the snow granny blanket. I love to see it grow.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Off the Needles: Sibella Cardigan

It's been a little bit stressful in the last week. I spent several hours in the car and train traveling through half of Germany.

Nevertheless I managed to finish my lovely sibella cardigan. It took me exactly one month to finish this dream in creamy blue. Isn't this a lovely color? The cardigan fits perfect!

While knitting I always imagined myself wearing it with a white airy dress on a warm day in spring. I guess I have to wait a few more weeks to make my knitting vision come true.

Tea with Granny

It's that day of the week again, Friday! You know that day that introduces you to a long, relaxing weekend. I already have some down-to-earth plans for my weekend like doing some grocery shopping, housework (rather not cool) and baking a (hopefully) delicious lemon cake. But the best of my weekend is a huge amount of time for my projects!

This week I started a new granny square blanket that will hopefully become bigger than throw size like my last two granny blankets. As a pattern I chose the flowers in the snow granny square that can be found here at Solstrikke. For the first time I am using the joining as you go method and I love it!

While the granny blanket is in its early stages my current knitting project is progressing faster than I thought. I joined the sleeves of the Sibella Cardigan this week and I started working on the lace section. It's so satisfying to watch the lace pattern grow with every row. 

Now I have to get back to my hooks and needles.

Have a great weekend!

Off the Needles: Quill Shawl

As I was mentioning in one of my last posts I just finished a project I had been working on since May 2014. So almost a whole year I put this beautiful edged shawl on and off my needles constantly.

I started working on the Quill shawl after I passed my state exam in May. After months of stress and learning 24/7 I finally found time to work on bigger, time-consuming projects again instead of only crocheting a few granny squares in between every now and then.

Just a few days after my exam we went to the South of Sweden for vacation. This is where I started working on the shawl. Then I wouldn't have thought that it will take me 10 months to finish it. I'm really proud that I proved the persistence to finish this shawl as it wasn't always fun to do yet another pattern repeat for the never-ending edge. But altogether it was a pleasant project and the result is simply gorgeous.

Simply Snow

After two disappointing days of sleet and snow slush we finally woke up to find the trees covered in a soft blanket of snow. Whereas the streets and pavements were already slushy again, the trees and the park looked like a winter wonder land. This year we haven't been spoiled with snow and that's why I'm really happy to see the city covered in white.

So this Saturday I took a long walk to enjoy the cold and take some pictures. But then suddenly I was drawn to the nearest yarn shop. Before I even knew what was happening I was standing in front of a wide range of beautiful colored cotton yarns I've admired for a few weeks now. This time I couldn't resist and had to buy a nice collection of happy colors for a new granny square project.

I hope you had a peaceful weekend. The rest of the Sunday I will slowly grow onto my couch, drink tea, knit, crochet.

Weekend Bliss

Sometimes I have so many crochet and knit ideas in my head that I start to feel overwhelmed. I am like a little child in a toy store that is only allowed to choose one thing. There are so many projects I want to start preferably now and all at once of course. There are so many techniques I want to learn, so many colour and stitch combinations I want to try, so many patterns I want to create myself eventually. The list could go on forever.

To clear my crammed brain (imagine a drawer stuffed to the edge with different papers) and sort my ideas it helps me to do something completely different for a while. A few days ago I bought the Flow magazine which had a little hand-lettering practise booklet as an extra. First I thought I didn't need a booklet about hand-lettering (what is this anyway?) but then I tried it and couldn't stop to draw letters in all kinds of shapes and forms. 

It felt like some kind of meditation whereas choosing and tweaking crochet and knitting projects felt sometimes like stress in the last few days. Now I try to practise Hand-Lettering everyday for 30 Minutes or so to calm down and relax. 

Of course I couldn't help but start a new project after all, at least it's a small one. Lately I fell in love with tapestry crochet after I saw some really nice projects on Pinterest. I decided to try this new-to-me technique with a pattern I found in an old Simply Crochet magazine. I resisted the urge to go and buy brand new yarn for this i pad cover as I have so much yarn in my stash. However I'm not too happy with the colours as they rather blend than contrast each other. 

Have a happy weekend!

Triangular Granny Pillow

Oh don't you just love the feeling of finishing another project? 

There are those long-term projects that make you proud and satisfied. You proved yourself that you can be persistend and patient. I'm very close to finishing a project I am working on since May 2014! It took me almost one year to finish it but more on that in the next post. 

On the other hand there are those projects that are gratifying because they are quick to work and give you almost instant satisfaction. You can watch them grow almost every day. In creative life I always need projects from both categories to keep me happy and motivated. 

The Triangular Granny Pillow was clearly an instant satisfying project. It took me about two weeks (next to other projects) to finish this soft colored pillow case. For this project I altered a pattern I found in the Simply Crochet Magazin #1 to make the triangles smaller. When I started this project just like that I didn't think it would make such trouble to join the triangles. Maybe I should have worked some kind of space where the triangles meet because after joining they were totally squished. Nevertheless blocking made everything look better again. Yet there are many bumps and holes. For the back I worked half double crochet.

When crocheting I fell in love with the color combination mustard yellow and pale rose- I have to make a project with these colors soon.