Meet Grace

 Hi all -

Sorry for the long delay since my last post. August ended up being a busy month. With Lance's passing, I was finally able to go to Kansas City to visit the family. It had been a year and a half since my last visit, so this was a long time coming! I had a great time with my family! We went to the "Barbie" movie, got massages and pedicures, and spent some quality time together. My hairdresser is in KC, so I finally got to get my hair cut. It feels so much better being short again!! And I helped my sister start to go through all of the stuff that has accumulated in her house over the years. We made some great progress and she felt so good about what we did! Then, the day after I got back home, I went to the Humane Society and adopted a new dog. Meet Grace:

Grace in the pool at the shelter

Grace in her bed at home with some of her many toys

Grace hunting squirrels in her new backyard

Grace is a 10-month old puppy of mixed breed. I'm not sure what breeds exactly, but people have guessed she might be part Rottweiler, part Akita and part Shepard. She has her first vet visit tomorrow so I'll see what he thinks she might be. She's a very sweet, well-behaved little girl and she gets along with the cats great! She's taking up most of my time right now.

Other than that, I've continued to make crochet of the Lion Brand market bags that I like so well. I've been making them in a variety of colors, concentrating on colors that might be more appealing to men:

These are all made with Bamboo Pop yarn, which is a 50% cotton, 50% rayon from bamboo yarn. It makes a really soft yet strong bag. I really like how these turn out. These will all be Christmas presents for members of my family.

I've also been getting ready for Joji Locatelli's Fall Knit-Along (KAL). I've never dong this KAL before, but I think it's going to be fun. It runs Sept-Nov. You have to sign up ahead of time with which of Joji's patterns you might make. It's okay if you don't end up making the patterns that you sign up for, but you can only work on those patterns for the KAL. There are a bunch of prizes and people join in from all over the world. (Joji is from Argentina.) It sounds like a really fun and supportive group! So I've been spending some time looking through Joji's patterns and deciding what I might make. I've picked out several shawl and cowl patterns as gifts for the women in my family and some hats for the men. I picked out yarn for a bunch of the projects and wound some of the yarn into cakes so I'm ready to start with my first project on Sept 1 (you can't start before then). I signed up for more projects than I think I'll be able to finish so I'll have options depending on what I feel like working on. It will be nice if I can get all of my gifts finished!

That's all that's happening on my end. I hope everyone is doing well!

Nancy

Brioche Bun Scarf Finished

 Hi all -

I hope everyone is having a good summer and is staying cool! We've been having pleasant temperatures at my house, but have continued to have unusual amounts of rain. The storms Monday and Tuesday evenings were severe and we lost internet at my house Monday evening through Tuesday noon, then lost power for about 5 hours on Tuesday evening, with the internet having a bit of trouble recovering after that. We had some trouble with slow internet yesterday, but everything seems to be recovered today. I'm crossing my fingers that everything continues to stay up!

I've been doing a lot of crochet this week. First, I finished my Brioche Bun Scarf designed by High Desert Yarn:

Brioche Bun Scarf

Brioche Bun Scarf detail

I can't tell you how much I love this scarf! It's squishy and warm and the full fringe looks wonderful! This one is for my niece, but I'm sure I'll be making more of these!

I also made a Faith Over Fear Beanie designed by Kristen Caldwell:

Faith Over Fear Beanie

I think this hat looks good, but I'm not sure about the practicality of the brim. The brim has a pretty look, but it feels like it will just stretch out and not hold the hat on your head well. I'm soaking the hat in wool wash right now so I can block it to see how it feels after the yarn softens up a bit. This will be a good lesson in the best construction for crocheted hats. There are some other stitches that designers use for hats, so I'll have to try some of those to see what I think. And another thought would be to knit them brim then crochet the rest of the hat.

Another project I made this week is a Granny Square Scrap Bag designed by Selena Baca:

Granny Square Scrap Bag

Granny Square Scrap Bag

I really love how this bag turned out! I followed the pattern except for a few small changes. The way they had you do the corners sounded to me like they would be a little baggy so I changed those a little. This change added four extra clusters to the rounds of the body, so when I got to the top I added some decreases to a round to make the opening a little smaller and get back to the original stitch count. Finally, I added an extra round to the body to get my colors to work out. This will probably be a gift for one of my sisters, depending on what other stuff I get completed before Christmas. (Christmas seems like a long way away, but time is short if you make the gifts that you give!)

I also started making a Hannah's Starlight Cowl designed by Joy Clements:

Hannah's Starlight Cowl

This yarn is a little harder to work with because it's a wool/silk blend. The silk gives the wool strength so that the yarn doesn't stretch at all. This can make it a little difficult to get the hook through the holes. The beginning of this cowl was really slow going between the difficult yarn and trying a new-to-me technique where you create the foundation chain and the first row at the same time. But it seems to be going faster now that I've got a bit of the body done. I think this will end up being a soft, luxurious cowl when it's finished. 

Finally, I finished my Quintessential Slouch designed by Jane Veitenheimer:

Quintessential Slouch

I like this hat better now that it's done, but I don't know if I'll make another garter stitch hat. It just looks a bit sloppier to me than a stockinette hat does.

That's all for this week....

Nancy