Pinterest Inspiration - Colorful Afghans

Happy Monday everyone! It's only a happy Monday for me because today is a holiday and I am able to enjoy a quiet Monday morning at home. And during my quiet time I was enjoying the many colorful posted afghans in Pinterest. With the temperatures dropping and the signs of snow, I am wanting to make more afghans! Here a just a few that caught my eye this morning:

Granny Square Garden by Past Perfect Patterns Etsy Shop

Lovely Stacked Afghans!! Flowers in the Snow by Sarah Dotson 

Sunny Daze by Laura Pavy

Well those are my Pinterest Inspirations today! I hope all have a great week!

I Love Yarn Day!!!

Banner courtesy of Red Heart website

Yes, today is officially I love Yarn Day! I definitely love yarn. I can just stand in a yarn store or isle for hours just admiring all the color and textures. I am notorious for picking up almost every skein and just squeezing it. Maybe my American friends and fellow bloggers remember the charmin commercial always telling the store guy not to squeeze the charmin. That's me with yarn!!

So what do you do for I love Yarn Day you may ask? Well, you can do a lot of things.

Check out the official website for I love Yarn Day Organization and check out what others are doing for this wonderful day!

What did I do for this special day? I have a WIP in my bag so I can work on it during any down time at work today. I also completed a really cute and fast project. I made myself a new crochet hook case using a pattern by Alli Hyer. You can find the pattern here. It is not only a useful project but it also taught me a new stitch, the star stitch.

 

 

A very quick stash busting project. What I love the most is that you roll it out and can easily find the correct size hook needed for the project you are working on!

 

Everyone have a great weekend! And enjoy today by making something with some of your favorite yarn!

 

WIP Wednesday - Still working with Tunisian Crochet

Happy Wednesday everyone!! I am still enjoying the Tunisian crochet technique. I started a new project that works with the Tunisian Knit and Purl stitches. The combination of stitches make a diamond pattern. This is a very intricate pattern where you must keep a good count of each stitch and row or it will turn out to be a disaster. I should know because I have already had to frog it twice so far! :( I did start out using a black yarn, but it was really hard to see the post that I needed to go into. I swapped it out to the ocean blue instead and it has been much easier to see.

I am going by the pattern Tunisian Knits and Purls are Diamond by Linda Rommerdahl. The pattern is written well in my opinion. I did re-format it so I would have each row written out. I like to be able to check off each row I have completed and the written pattern only goes to row 14 then tells you to repeat rows 4 - 14 until you reach desired length. A little copy and paste with some renumbering and I got myself a 3 page pattern! :-)

This will be a scarf once done, but will take awhile since I will need to do about 200 rows to make it the length I prefer.  I did modify row 2 and 3 from the Tunisian simple stitch to Tunisian double crochet stitch. I also found that if you do the first row in the spine of the chain stitch it doesn't roll up as much. The video below by The Crochet Crowd is a great tutorial on the different methods to begin your foundation row.

Enjoy the rest of your week! I am linking up with Tami's blog again this week. I am also linking up with Frontier Dreams. Take a moment and check out other WIPs.

Fall Foliage - Inspiration all around!!

Yesterday was such a lovely day that the hubby and I did a quick hike at Park City Mountain Resort. It was the last day for Summer/Fall operations. Time to start readying the mountain for ski season!!

From my last post, you saw where it snowed Thursday night. Well most of the snow has melted that is at the lower elevations. There is still some snow on the ground, plus the melted snow made the trail a little muddy. It was still great fun to do an afternoon hike. Here are a few pictures of the glorious fall foliage we are able to enjoy living in Park City!!

One of the many old structures you find around the town of Park City. This is actually an original part of a lift at PCMR.



I love that we are able to enjoy all the colors of Fall. From the deep reds to the bright yellows!!

You can see how muddy the trail was. Also the small amount of snow remaining mixed with the falling leaves is just gorgeous.

 

Fall is my favorite season and time of the year. It is filled with cold nights and perfect days. The vibrant colors are so very inspiring. It puts me in a creative state of mind. I begin working on Winter ensembles such as scarves and hats. It also gets me geared up and planning for Christmas décor. Is there a certain season that inspires you the most? Leave a comment and let me know which season and why. Everyone have a great week!!

Headwraps and Scarves

Last Friday I decided to walk home from work which is a 6 mile walk for me. It was a very nice day when I started the walk. Well, by the time I was 4 miles into my walk the weather became colder and it began to snow. I didn't have anything for my head to keep me warm, so I ended up with a head cold all weekend. What do you do when you are sick in bed all weekend? I crocheted headwraps and scarves!! Hopefully, these headwraps will keep the head cold at bay for the rest of the winter.

 

This is a very simple pattern that I found on Ravelry. The pattern can be found here. It is by blogger Frayed Knot. You can actually modify it by increasing the stitch row to adjust the width. I had to because of the yarn weight I used. The cactus flower headwrap was crocheted with Lion Brand Amazing yarn which is 1.75 oz weight and required an increase to 14 stitches wide. The Ozark forest wrap is made with Lion Brand Tweed and I increased to a 14 stitch wide wrap because of how tight I crocheted the stitches. The woodland tweed is also made from the Lion Brand Tweed and kept it at the 12 stitch wide pattern. This is an easy 1 hour project and great for a quick Christmas gift. I have a few nieces that will benefit from this pattern. :-) Plus my scarf thief has now also became a headwrap thief. I hadn't even sewn the button on the Cactus Flower one before my daughter snatched it up!

 

Since my DD wants to always own the items I crochet, she was commissioned as my head model! She added a little whimsical to the look by adding leopard spots to her makeup!

  

I have also made a couple of scarves to go along with the headwraps. I had already made a woodland tweed scarf, you might remember it from this post. It is an easy granny square scarf.

  

 

I made a scarf out of the Ozark forest colored yarn as well. It is the Spring Petal Scarf pattern. I loved how the sc and dc stitch combination makes this gorgeous shell.

 

 

Last, but not least, I completed the Tunisian Crochet Scarf! It turned out great. I did this one up without a pattern, but it is a pretty basic stitch. I just did 2 rows of Tunisian simple stitch, a row of Tunisian reverse stitch, and then Tunisian double crochet until I reached the length I wanted and ended it the same way I began. I made it into an infinity scarf mainly because Tunisian crochet really rolls up at the ends. I added a few buttons as well. 

 

 

I hope everyone enjoys their weekend! I'm linking up with Tami's blog again this Friday. Please take a moment and check out other FOs!

 

Just a quick pic of what I woke up to this morning.

 

Snow and lots of it!!

 



WIP Wednesday - Tunisian Crochet Scarf

Hello everyone! I have falling in love with a new crochet technique this week! Yes, Tunisian Crochet has been my new passion these past few days. I was sparked by it when The Crochet Crowd uploaded a new Tunisian Crochet Series. It is a 10 part video tutorial and Mikey Sellick is a great instructor. If you are interested in a learning a new technique, I suggest checking out these tutorials.

I love how the yarn works up in such a great texture. This scarf can definitely be reversible because of the distinct stitching pattern on the right side/working side of the scarf and the soft look of the wrong side/opposite side of the scarf.

I am using Lion Brand Amazing yarn which is 53% wool and 47% acrylic. It is the Cactus Flower color scheme which is a gorgeous blend of bright magenta, mustard, deep orange, and dark brown. These colors to me represent Autumn! This yarn is a very light weight worsted at only 1.75 oz, so very breakable and hard to unravel back with if you make a stitch mistake. I know because I had to frog back about 4 rows when I realized I had dropped a couple of stitches, well the yarn broke and I could not unravel anymore. The scarf is now 22 stitches wide compared to 24 stitches when I began, but I figure it won't be noticeable once it is wrapped around your neck. :-)

This gorgeous scarf will be a set that accompanies a really cute piece of headwear. You will have to see the duo once the scarf is complete. ;-)

On a different note, the snow has melted that we received last week and the temperatures have been in the upper 60s. Yesterday, the hubby and I went on a short bike ride. The single tracks on the Park City Mountain Resort are covered in gorgeous fall leaves. I would have taken a few pics of them but once I am biking up these trails I do not want to jump off my bike plus all I had was my cell phone. But once we made it to McPolin Farm I did take a moment to capture a quick mountainside pic of the changing colors. It was taken with my phone so not a great as it could be, but I also read that if you want to take pictures of fall leaves you need to take them when there is a slight overcast to really pick up their vibrant colors. As you can see, it was a very sunny afternoon!

 



I hope you all have a great week! Take a moment and check out other great WIPs over at Tami's blog.