Pintastic!

I love Pinterest.

I adore looking at pretty things. Whoever came up with that saying "Eye Candy" was pretty spot on when it comes to how I feel about Pinterest. I realise its commonly used to describe an attractive member of the opposite sex, but these days I get just as much pleasure from finding an image of a perfectly executed queen size granny square blanket as I do from perving on Ryan Gosling (although this BLOG helps to combine the two).

At about 2:30am last night (this morning) I pinned a progress shot of my latest blanket, the 'Retro Circles Blanket'.

This Morning I've woken up to find it repinned 63 times (and 14 likes) in 5ish hours! wooooo!

Loving that folks out there like it, I really like it too. Its made with the luxurious 'Sublime Extra Fine Merino DK' which is so soft and squishy. It will be hard to say goodbye to this one. I think I will be making a cushion cover with any left over yarn so I can still keep a little of it.

Here's another shot of my plan for the layout of the squares. Not a great photo as it was most likely taken well after midnight one night, when 'natural light' is hard to come by.

Talking of goodbyes, I said goodbye to my last blanket this week. Excited to see this one have a new owner to love it.

I've had many requests to make another, but Ive decided I wont be making the same blanket twice. So each one is truly one of a kind.

Remember you can find me on Facebook to see what I'm up to and 'ready to ship' items are listed in my Madeit.com.au Store

Have a Pintastic Day!

T-shirt Yarn!

I've been wanting to try to make my own t-shirt yarn for a while now, since finding This Tutorial on Pinterest.

My boys were playing tug-o-war with a dress that had been floating around my wardrobe for a while now. When they managed to stretch the ties from the front door to the back, I knew it was time to finally say goodbye. So today I gave it a shot!

I cut it under the bust and the hem, so I was left with a tube of fabric.



The tutorial called for me to fold the fabric over twice, but since this was a viscose (modal maybe?) fabric it was a bit slippery and hard to tell that my folds were flat, so I opted for folding it in half.

I'm pretty sure I held my breath the whole time I was cutting the strips, well perhaps not the whole time, but it felt like it.

I was doing really well with step 4, until the last few strips, somehow I ended up with about half a dozen 'loops' instead for strips, but it was an overall sucess.

I had to try it out right away. At first i used a 10mm hook but found it a bit too tight so switched to a 15mm and started on a little basket. I think it will become a yarn bag at some stage perhaps using the ties as handles? We'll see, Ive got the bug now, so will have to raid the wardrobe for some more items!

Give it a shot, its easier than you may think.

x   Adele

Bumpy Rainbow Blanket Tutorial

This is a Fantastically fun blanket that is very easy to make. Have fun deciding on the colours you would like, and make it as big or small as you choose.
If you find any mistakes or aren't sure about something leave me a comment and I'll help the best I can.

Materials (based on my blanket above that you can find HERE)

• 700g 8ply yarn (I used acrylic in 7 different colours)
• 5mm hook
• needle to sew in ends

Gauge: is not important in this pattern.

Abbreviations: (standard US crochet terms)

• CH- chain
• SC- single crochet
• HDC- Half double crochet
• DC- Double crochet
• RW- Row

Special Stitches:

Bobble Stitch (also known as a puff stitch but this is 'puffier'):

Yarn over, insert hook into next stitch of previous row, yarn over and pull through (3 loops on your hook).






Yarn over and pull through first two loops, leaving two loops still on hook (first incomplete DC)

complete 4 more incomplete DC's in SAME stitch

Yarn over and pull through ALL 6 loops on hook










Bobble stitch complete. You may need to puff up the stitch from the back so it is more rounded to the front. I just poke the stitches forward with my finger. The next stitch follows directly after the bobble stitch, there is no need to chain one (as is sometimes called for with similar stitches).

Blanket Pattern

Ch in multiples of 6 + 4, until you get your desired length. This will be your vertical/longer side of the blanket. Alternatively if you would prefer horizontal stripes you could make a shorter chain and crochet more rows. For this tutorial I chained 22 (three sets of 6 +4).

Rw1-  Ch 3 (added to your original chain), dc in 4th chain from hook and in next 3 stitches (this will make 5 dc including ch 3). *Bobble stitch in next, 5 dc. Repeat from * until end of row. Turn

Rw 2-  ch 2 hdc in each stitch across fasten off

Join new colour
(I use different methods for joining new colours but this is what i used for this blanket)

Rw 3-  turn ch 3 dc in next 4, *bobble stitch, 5dc.  repeat from * across row turn
Rw 4-  ch 2, hdc in each across. Fasten off

Join new colour

Repeat rows 3&4 until desired width is achieved.
Fasten off last colour and sew in ends.

I decided on a simple single crochet (sc) border for the rainbow blanket. You can find tutorials for that on YouTube,  this one looks good... But you can do any kind of border you like to finish it off.

I'd love to see your creations! Feel free to post them on my Facebook page or Email me.

Disclaimer: Please do not sell my patterns or claim them as your own. You are free to do what you wish with finished items made from my patterns (donate, sell, etc), but if you are selling them online please link back to this page for pattern credit. Please use your own images if advertising an item from my pattern.


Love the pattern? I love coffee.... you can shout me one if you like. PayPal donate button is to the left of screen. Thanks.

Happy Hooking!
-Adele

The Frump, the Other and an enemy named Time.

I made a new years resolution this year. I'm not usually one who makes them so I thought I would keep it simple. Look after myself a little more. After having my children and not returning to work full time I've let myself go. It's a funny saying isn't it? To let one's self 'go'. Go where? I've certainly not been going anywhere in particular, apart from school drop off/pick up, the park, grocery shopping... But it seems my other self has run off, all dolled up, to have some non-mummy fun somewhere and left frumpy self behind.

So it took me until about mid February to see to this resolution. Well to think about seeing to it really. My ultimate goal is to get to the hairdressers. What a simple goal, yet seemingly so unattainable. My last hair cut was over two years ago! Eek! And a dye from a box was applied sometime after the twins were just born. Needless to say my hair is constantly in the mummy bun and when it does get released for a day or two it's almost touching the waistband on my jeans. But there always seems to be a more pressing situation to take care of, and my enemy 'Time' is always giggling at me while running off into the horizon. Hopefully this goal gets achieved by the end of the year, for now I'll have to try to find something that doesn't take too much time out of my day, but brings a bit of my other self back again.

One day, while dusting the bookshelf in my glorious frumpiness, I came across a nail polish. These are usually reserved for toe use as my finger nails refuse to grow (unless I'm pregnant, then strangely enough they take off). But I thought I would give it a shot, stumpy nails and all.

Note the crappy job.

But then the inevitable happens...

The chipped nail polish look is never a good one...

A few positives have come out of this simple act. Firstly, it forces me to sit and do nothing until the polish has dried. This is rare for me, usually even in down time I would be doing something just to get it done while I can. Next, my nails have actually started growing a little and it makes me feel a bit more girlie, rather than just boy mum-ie. And lastly it opened my eyes to another hairy issue I have been using the 'time' excuse to avoid. The two furry caterpillars that have been slowly growing on my face. I rediscovered tweezers, forgot about those guys. For some reason I kept thinking I HAD to try to find the time to go to the beautician and get them waxed.

Slow progress, I know, but progress nonetheless. My 'other self' has popped in to say hi, hopefully she'll visit a little more often and maybe even stick around for a while. Its nice to see her again for a change, and I think Master N likes it too. Each time I change colour he notices, "Oh, I like your nails mum!" Thanks son. It's nice when the little things are noticed by those you would least expect.

I do believe its important for a mother to feel good about herself and take that time to make sure it happens, a whole family benefits from this. If Time would just stop running for a moment...

Look after yourselves folks
Adele