FO: Quilted Placemat

It's quite a while since I spotted these lovely red and white fabrics at a stand exhibiting at the Great Northern Quilt Show in Harrogate but I couldn't resist them. They were small pieces (about 10" square) and I think I paid about £1.50 for a pack of 4 pieces.

I was planning on making something for Christmas with them. The stall I bought them from had joined strips of each fabric then cut triangles to make Christmas trees for placemats, etc. I was thinking of doing the same thing and making a table runner or tree skirt or similar. As it happened I just never got round to it and I've now used them for a square placemat to go under the fruit bowl.

I had a bit of a tidy up in the kitchen the other day. This involved moving all the cookbooks to the top of the dresser making space for the scales and fruit bowl and freeing up worktop space.

Here's a close up!

and one without the fruit bowl

The pattern is from A Passion For Patchwork, in fact it's the same as the cushion you can see on the bottom right of the cover. The book gives different dimensions to cut for a few different items.

Look what I got!

I went into town last week and while I was there I spotted a yellow plastic basket. I pondered buying it to put yarn in for my current projects. I needed something that would keep the yarn together, be easy to move about the house and that would hold enough yarn. That was the tricky bit...after all, how much is enough yarn???!!!??? So I looked at the basket and thought about whether I could fit the yarn for my vertical stripe blanket in there - that's 5 balls (i.e. one for each colour) and I thought, yes, yes, I definitely could fit that in there...but I'm also making a neat ripple cushion, that's another 3 balls. Hmm. Now it's definitely not fitting in. Scrap that idea.

Of course a few days later I thought I really need something to keep this yarn in and, of course, regretted not getting the basket. It was 79p!!! Why? Why did I not buy the 79p basket to make my life easier. Ok, so I know that I didn't buy it cos it was yellow and I really wanted a purple basket . 

Yesterday the weather was lovely and sunny, so I wandered up into town. My plan was to BUY. THAT. BASKET. then take Orla to the park.

So, into the shop, down the aisle for the basket. The basket was not there. Off I go up and down the aisles searching for the basket. Nothing. None.

Hmm....plan out the window. Decided to look in some of the other shops and guess what I spot? A basket. The same basket as before but...it's purple . Hang on though, it's definitely smaller than I thought. Yes, I think it's too small. See a pattern here????

I did pick up this plant though, to brighten up the windowsill. I also got some seeds for the kids to plant.

Today we happened to go to a garden center. Shhhhhhh...don't tell my husband that I suggested going to the garden center so I could look for a basket. The baskets weren't big enough and more for flower displays than yarn until I saw it. A bright pink tub trug. As we approached I saw....a PURPLE tub trug. So here it is, filled with current projects(those knitting needles are in use - I'm making a simple shawl and loving it)

I know, it's ridiculous to be so excited about a plastic bucket but it's just perfect. Look, it really is

See that card? Well that's the Mother's Day card Erin made for me at school. She was desperate to give it to me this morning. Oh and check out the floor. It's far, far nicer than the grubby old carpet.

And I just have to share this picture of Orla playing with my neat ripple blanket the other day. She was playing 'bedtime' with Dora.

FO: Hexagon Blanket, Granny Square & Spotty Cushion Covers

So I finally finished the Hexagon Blanket. I don't have accurate amounts for the yarn used because I started with leftovers from the granny ripple blanket. Basically I finished the leftovers and used 1 more ball of each colour, plus maybe half a ball to finish the border rounds.

The first 6 rounds of the hexagons were made in various combinations of lipstick, teal, grey & graphite Stylecraft Special DK. There are no repeated hexagons. Then each of the 39 hexagons had a final seventh round added in parchment, joining each as I went along. I then added the first border round in parchment. I couldn't quite decide what colour to use for the second border round but decided that the first parchement round didn't really look like a border, so I added the second border round in parchment too. I did then ponder adding a third round but decided against it, or rather my husband did.

So, we changed the cover on the sofa so that I could display the blanket nicely:

This gave me an idea of leaving it on the sofa. Of course it needed cushions...luckily I'd finished the granny square cushion cover by sewing three buttons on (that's been waiting a while because it's one of those 5 minute jobs you just never get round to).

And then I dashed into the kitchen to whizz up a couple of spotty cushion covers with the sewing machine. These only took about 20 minutes. They're made with Cath Kidston fabric that I've had for ages. I bought it when visiting the in-laws a few years ago. It had 25% off and I planned to make a bag with it but never got round to it. I am so glad I didn't because I think the cushions look fab! What do you think?

WIP: Hexagon Blanket

Do you remember this big pile of hexagons?

Well, on Monday I put Orla down for a nap and half an hour later she walked through the living room door. Yes, it appears she's on the verge of dropping her nap. So yesterday when she asked to go to bed I sat watching tv for a bit to make sure she'd gone to sleep before starting studying (good plan it was too, she was up 20 minutes later). That big pile was sat there taunting me ;-) so I started the long, boring task of weaving the ends in.

Do you know, virtually all those hexagons have 12 ends to weave in EACH???!!!??? There's 39 hexagons and I think I figured out there were 438 ends. By the time I went to bed last night I'd weaved in the ends on 35 of the hexagons, Alan had done the other 4.

I also started joining them together and have now got 14 of them joined. I decided to use the Join As You Go method for a couple of reasons:

First, and probably the most important one, I was totally sick of weaving in ends and the thought of adding another round to each of those damn hexagons and having another 76 ends to weave in before starting to join them filled me with dread!

Secondly, I rarely use the join as you go method with granny squares as I prefer to slip stitch in the back loops so it was a good excuse to use a different method.

So here's my progress so far:

I've left a few ends to weave in at the end so that I know which side I started with. I chose the position of the hexagons before starting to join by laying them out on the living room floor and moving them around until I was happy with the look. I've now got them in piles for each column in order from top to bottom so it's important to join them in the right place. It's fine when it's uneven (as above) but when you have a symmetrical piece it's hard to know which way is which.

And this is what Orla has been doing:

The pumpkin bowl is her hat!