Seeing UFO's

I went supply shopping the other day and I couldn't resist buying more cotton yarn. And of course, I didn't know what colors I still had at home so I just picked some out randomly. When I got back home, I wanted to put my yarn away and saw that I still had SO many. Haha, I feel like a yarn hoarder now.
But it made me so happy to see all the colors and I came across an UFO (unfinished object) that I thought would be a good one to finish now.I started making these granny squares in November 2009 and somewhere along the way, I must have gotten bored of it and put it aside. All with untucked ends - yikes!But now I nearly finished tucking in all the ends and need to crochet a few more squares before I can finish the blanket. I can't wait to get back to my crochet hook and hopefully it will be finished by August so it can be a pretty heirloom for our baby.

Moeders voor moeders

I'm part of a sew, crochet, knitting- group called the 'knappe knoopjes' or translated 'smart/pretty buttons'. We come together every 3 weeks to work on our projects together and chat the evening away. On our last get together, lots of participants helped to sew, crochet or knit for a non-profit organization called 'Moeders voor moeders' or 'Mothers for mothers'.
This non-profit organization is dedicated to families or single persons with children under 12 years.They help them with food parcels, clothing and more. The poorest children should not miss the fun times so they also help out with gifts for the children's birthday, Christmas, Saint Nicolas, etc.
They were in great need of dark blue and grey scarves and hats for primary school children to fit with their school uniform, so they called out for help for anyone who could help make 'em.
I too picked up my crochet hook and finished a scarf yesterday. It's pretty hard to photograph as it's quite long and very, very curly but I hope the child wearing it will love it and that it will keep her toasty warm. Well I suppose it will be worn by a girl as it's quite a feminine design. :)

Noticing

The bigger the circle, the slower the progress... :)

UFO's

Since I started crocheting in the beginning of 2009. I know I was determined to tackle the basics but started out a bit too ambitious by wanting to make a pair of slippers. It took me at least four tries to get it right.

1. Hmm..., 2. Second attempt, 3. Third attempt, 4. Attempt 4: Miracle!

Since then, I've been infected by the crochet bug. You can find my projects on Ravelry or in my Flickr. Lately I find I have too little time to crochet but I see so many fun projects around that I usually am very tempted to start yet another project.

So, I thought if I publicly shared my UFO's (unfinished objects), I will be more determined to finish 'em? It is quite embarrassing to see 'em grow instead of see 'em finished...

My granny square blanket.

My ripple blanket.My little blanket.My studio chairs.

Thank goodness I have two of the four finished...

And last but not least, a new project started earlier this week...

My yarn bag.

And I do have a few smaller projects in little pouches here and there too... *blushes*

But, I'm quite confident that I'm not the only one with UFO's laying around so feel free to do a little confession and tell me about yours! :)

New collaboration

A while back Veerle from Nevousinstallezpas asked me to make some beads for her and a little bit later she asked if I could make her some other stuff too. I was a bit tickled by the requests and we decided to do a collaboration instead.
What's the difference?
When someone asks me to make something, I try to make as asked. Then I sell and ship and that's the end of the story. It feels like a job.
A collaborartion leaves more space for thought. I can try out stuff and play to my hearts content. I can not only do what I've been asked to make but add a bit of me to it. I can experiment and it doesn't have to be perfect. I can send samples and she can just play to see if it works and then I can make the real thing. Yay!
Collaborating is exciting & especially in this case as we'll bring crochet and clay together - something that I have been wanting to do for ages...
It was one of the reasons I learned how to crochet but since I only know the basics, I think it's awesome to work with a master...
It feels like an adventure: exciting and inspiring. Can you wait?
A little update on the experiment I planned to do past weekend with the crochet beads I showed you in my creative space: when I found out that the base of the beads was solid wood, I didn't dare firing it in my ceramic kiln. I've done experiments with plant matter and paper, but never tried solid wood. I don't want to ruin the spirals of my kiln, alas I have nothing to show for I'm afraid.

made by Veerle from Nevousinstallezpas

But don't dispair, Veerle and I will hopefully show lots of exciting work in progress... and it will be one of a kind too. Double yay! :)

My creative space

When I came home yesterday, I found a little package on the table. It was from Sandra from ZsaZsaZsu. I did not order anything so I certainly was surprised & even more to see what was inside...
Some crochet samples she made with different kind of thread to see what works best. Bliss, material for me to drench into porcelain slib. Perfect timing as I planned to do a porcelain firing this weekend. Can't wait to see how it all turns out! Thanks so much, Sandra! :)

Want to show your creative space? Hop over to Kootoyoo to play! It's fun! :)

Granny chic

While I'm finishing up the blue one, I couldn't resist starting the new colorcombo in the granny chic project...
Not sure if these colors will clash but I'll see it when I put it all together.One more after this and then I'll show you the end result! :)

Granny chic

Still working on the granny chic project...
I think I will actually finish this one before the summer ends.

Granny chic

Instead of finishing projects in progress, I decided to start a new one...

Meet Stella

Last week, Stella arrived at my house. An unexpected envelope was dropped in my mailbox. From Scotland, hmm, didn't order anything there, did I?It's from the very talented EmmaLamb who does amazing crochet work! The packaging looks so pretty & professional - wow - instant happiness. She's so cheeky to send me Stella but I love her right away. It doesn't take long before Stella is up and about in my studio.

Why didn't I have Stella before? She's great and makes me jippety jappety happy!

And look how professional the care instructions look. Emma, you're amazing!

In case you have never seen Emma's work, you must take a look in her shop and look at all the pretty things she has in there. She's a magician with color combo's, does not only do some wicked crochet but embroiders too and she is simply an all around cutie pie! Besides an amazing shop, she also has an awesome blog - always inspiring and pretty!
Thank you, dear Emma for making me smile every day! I love having Stella in my studio! :)

Oh, and this is the perfect post to announce 'vintage week' on my blog.
Can you wait? :)

Ripple dreams... part 8

So, I thought it was best to show you some proof why the Ripple blanket is not getting done at all... Whenever I duck underneath it to finish up some more stitches, it is so nice and toasty that I usually fall asleep. I already love it as that is what good blankets do really...
Of course, that way it will be a very slow process and I won't be able to do my weekly crochet post, which stimulates me to finish my projects.
That's why weekly 'Happy Stats' will replace my crochet posts for a while. After all, spring and summer are not really ideal for crocheting warm, wooly blankets. I might pick up some cotton though...

Ripple dreams... part 7

Wow, I got 6 ripple rows done on my ripple blanket this week which is great as I can already cover myself with my blanket when I'm crocheting. It's nice and warm and I can't wait to get it finished completely so that I can actually wrap it around me when vegging out on the couch.Oh, and while I'm at it, remember the butchered bunny?
I re-made him and put him in my shop and he is now in Etsy's voter! Waaah!
You can imagine how excited he is so he promised me he'll wiggle his tail for every vote he gets! :)
You have to log in at Etsy to vote though: http://www.etsy.com/voter_list.php?ref=voter&room_id=97 Thank you for voting!

Ripple dreams... part 6

After a few hectic weeks, I was really happy to pick up my crochet hook. It's becoming harder and harder to choose the colors as I think I've used most of the pretty ones already.
Since I ordered 33 different colors, I started to use some darker colors so that they would not all come together at the end. I hope it doesn't look too dark - what do you think?I now have 17 rows of the 33 done - that's halfway of the first part of the blanket.

Ripple dreams... part 5

Original colors extra colors

Haha, have not much to show you this week. Didn't have any time to get any crocheting done but my wool arrived. Yeah! I didn't have much choice of colors anymore since I already had 25 different ones but I want all different stripes so I added some browns to it. I hope this won't make it too dark but we'll see...

Ripple dreams... part 4

Waves?

No, ripples!

And still lazy about sewing in the ends...

But it looks good already I think.

After last weeks progress on the blanket, I measured the rows and counted the colors of yarn I had bought for my ripple blanket. Well, what I suspected was right: not enough yarn for a decent sized blanket.
So I hopped over to Texere yarns to purchase some more colors. Hard choice because I already have so many. I'm using the King Cole Merino blend for my ripple. It doesn't feel as soft as Debbie Bliss cashmerino or Cashsoft from Rowan Yarns but for 100% merino wool, it feels soft enough. It doesn't tickle as some wool does, and it comes in a nice variety of colors although I'm sad there is no real lime amongst their choices. It will be warm to snuggle under... can't wait!Anyway, I really want to wait for the colors to arrive before making a big progress on my blanket. The way I choose my colors is by putting the balls of yarn next to each other and see how it looks. I do that in ripples of 7, one for each day of the week. :)
I didn't make it this week because of the reason mentioned above. I will wait for the yarn first because I feel I lack some colors now, especially yellow. But I managed to ripple 4 rows.
Everytime I start a row and do a few stitches, I see how it looks and I usually exclaim to myself: 'Oh, that color is just perfect here'! LOL
Do you talk to & encourage yourself when you are working too?