For this wire hanger transformation, I started with Habu stainless steel yarn in grey and single crochet around the perimeter.  Then using a darning needle, I threaded Kid Seta mohair yarn in red vertically thru the single crochet stitches and then horizontally thru the vertical mohair.  Last but not least, I added a knitted twisted rose. Should be great for those little strappy style tops.

wire hanger no.1

Sometimes I see something or I am inspired by what I’ve just read and it is all I can do to stay seated. Does that happen to you? This time, it all started here.  I was reading Kirsty’s post about covering wire hangers and it stopped me in my tracks. Take the time to cover a plain ole wire hanger?  I mean really?  I’ve covered the cute puffy fabric type baby hangers with knit or crochet, but never did it occur to me to cover the generic everyday wire hanger. Well, I thought, why not? All I have to do is go into the closet and pick one off the rack and decide how to cover it, right?  So I grabbed my E-hook, some green and pink stash yarn and started with single crochet stitches all around.  I then pulled my favorite Japanese crochet book off the shelf and picked a flower/leaf combo to add to the top.  Simple enough for my first, shall I challenge my creativity with another?  You can view other challengers covered wire hangers over here on flickr.

Floppy fun

Did you get in on the 10-for-10 crochet pattern sale over at Sarah London? You know how I love a sale and I’m thrilled with my selections.  Today I’ve been working with the Floppy Flower pattern. I made up a few samples to see what yarn I like best. So far I’ve made the Purple/yellow in dk cotton, the Yellow/white in 4 ply fingering cotton and the Aqua/yellow in dk acrylic. I want to make up a bunch to use as party decorations. I think big using bold color is beautiful!  Oh, and did I mention how much fun they are to make?

More fun

Luck be a lady...

I was extremely fortunate to win a recent Giveaway prize from Dorien at Just-Do.  These beautiful Dutch mug rugs arrived all the way from the Netherlands via the mail yesterday.

When I opened the package I was delighted to see how adorable they are in person.  Really, they are just so sweet and colorful. Dorien, your work is Incredible!  I look forward to using them often as I sit down to a cuppa tea.

If you get a chance stop by her blog and have a look around to see what she has been up to. She always has one of her beautiful creations posted for us to see and be inspired by.  She also has a shop on Etsy where you can find some of her hand made items along with a crochet pattern or two.  Thank you Dorien, I love them! 

Groetjes, Karen.

FO

The Cream and Sugar Cowl pattern by Alana Dakos is a fun, quick knit using a 16” size 5 circular bamboo needle. The pattern itself is not only beautiful, but the directions are very easy to read and comprehend.  Pattern available on Alana's website, Never not Knitting.

I just love Becoming Art Yarns Marchote sock in the ‘Allspice’ colorway created by Lisa Sanchez. I picked up this beautiful yarn at Stitches West earlier this year.

Yarn available at Lisa's website, Becoming Art.

Even though I probably won’t have much use for this Cowl until next fall, I’m happy to add it to my list of FO’s.  This was the first time I had worked with sock yarn and I have to say it wasn’t as scary as I had expected. I can see another Cowl project in my future. Since the photo using model/designer, Julie Crawford couldn't possibly be improved upon, I've taken license to use it here.

Rainbows

‘Crochet a Rainbow’, Sarah London’s project to help flood victims in Australia and now the earthquake/tsunami victims in Japan is in full swing. I’d call her endeavor a true labor of love. When I first read Sarah’s post asking for help with creating colorful crochet granny squares to make up blankets, I knew I wanted to participate. I’ve been busy with hook and yarn, all the while thinking of those so many miles away, hopeful to bring some measure of comfort. I brought out my stash yarn and put together colorful combinations using dk weight acrylic.  While working on this project I would visualize a multi- colored granny square crossing the sky like Hailey’s comet with a rainbow tail trailing behind it creating a bridge from creator to recipient. Being a mere mortal, I’m sending my squares via regular means, royal mail. If you’d like to participate or learn more about this amazing project, there is a group on Ravelry to share information, a group on flickr to share photographs and regular updates available on Sarah’s blog, click on the sidebar rainbow!  Thank you Sarah for all your hard work.

Splashy

I think I mentioned in a previous post that I’m obsessed with the pattern Splashy, a Crochet Flower scarf from the book ‘Crochet in Color’ by Kathy Merrick. I knew immediately upon viewing the photos that I wanted to make this scarf. I love the recommended Noro silk garden yarn because of its wonderful color changes and large selection of color combination choices. I chose to go with the Noro silk garden sock yarn with its smaller gauge to create the flowers.  I have to tell ya that I enjoyed every minute of working on this project as it kept me engaged with the addition of each new flower. So magical...  Who can resist color transitions, as they are tons of fun and the join as you go feature of this pattern reduces the amount of sewing in of loose ends. I used size 3.5mm crochet hook, 2 skeins of color no. 256 yarn and the finished dimensions are 60x14. Modifications to the pattern include; choice of yarn (sock), addition of 1 column of the large flower and 1 column of the smaller one. What really helped me along with this project was having a favorite TV series marathon running in the background.  I will always connect the show ‘Brothers and Sisters’ with the making of this project as I got thru four seasons of this much loved show.  So a bit of math is required to give you an idea of how long it took me to put this scarf together, lets see, 4 seasons, 24 episodes each at 40 minutes per = about 64 hours of hook to the yarn time. Now that’s a handy way to measure a time commitment. Both project and show receive a 5 star rating!