No Knot's For Me!

When sewing items up, I never use a knot. I always leave a tail length which I over sew into the stitching up of the item as I am sewing it up. I have taken some picture's for an illustrated tutorial.

Beginning with inserting your needle where the sewing up is needed.

I've pulled the needle through and left the tail I will over sew into the sewing up of the item.

Now I will begin to sew up the item.

Here I have done one sewing st, which included going over the tail.

Here I have progressed even more with the sewing up and also sewing over the tail.

I have almost reached the end of my tail, which will be out of site very soon. A tip is to slightly stretch your work through out the sewing up process, so the sewing is not too tight

You can see here where the tail has ended and I am now at the end of my sewing row, but it does not finish here.

To hide and re inforce your sewing ends, we are going back into the sewing we have just completed.

I have gone as far as I feel I need to here.

Now I am going in the reverse direction once again, for more re inforcement.

I am now satisfied with the re inforcement and will just snip off the yarn.

Here it is all finished and no tails or ends to be seen and not a knot was used!

What I have done here is not as neat as it could be, one the colours being different and two taking the picture's whislt working. But I hope you get the gist of it and try it for your self some time. This method can also be used with a small crochet hook, but that's another lesson.

Amazing how this crochet design really works out.

If you can make a granny square, you can certainly make one of these, you just need an extra 2 corners for the hexagon shape.

Starting out with one hexagon shape.

Then a second hexagon shape.

Then fold them together and you have a baby cardigan! This is not actually finished I need to add the collar, cuffs and the borders. I just couldn't wait to share it with you all.

I now have a collar, cuff's and the border. I love how the designer designed the collar, but I had to change the cuffs and border, due to the different size yarn I was using. I just have to sew on the buttons.

This is from the original pattern designer I found at this site.

I have made one of these before, but in a different design from a different designer, you can view that one here with the link to the free pattern. It's the pink and white one.

Okay, here it is finally finished.

Crochet Around The World

Upon surfing the net, I came across some picture's that I liked of people crocheting. Just thought I would share them with you. The first one is my favourite.

Crochet in Sydney Australia 2007

John Lennon Crochet Graph

Once again this year I made my brother-in-law Mal, some thing musical in crochet form for a christmas present. Last year it was the piano scarf. Knowing he liked, absolutely likes John Lennon, I thought I would try my hand at a crochet John Lennon graph. I did get the original idea from here. Mine does look different to the one at that site, it may have been due to the fact I took the picture and used knit pro' for the second time on the same picture, or it may have been my confusion on the different shades of grey that came out in the black and white graph. Any how it was a very big hit with my brother-in-law.

Below is before I finished the border.

I bought some dowel and painted it black for hanging.

This is just a size comparison with one of my bed socks, LOL.

When I was using the graph, I used sc for each square and when I finished each row, I coloured it in with a high lighter, so I knew where I had been. I made it with in a week at a few hours a night. It was enjoyable to see it come together.

I believe Mal' is going to have it framed.

Christmas Joy/Enjoyment.

I hold our yearly family christmas party before christmas day, as we are what I call a mixed family (step children). I do this to try and make it easier on everybody, as you could imagine they would have so many places to attend on christmas day, so this way the pressure is taken off them some what. This year we had it on the 20th of December, so Santa has been already.

Below is a family photo of me and my husband with his children and their partners and little Bella just had to get into the photo, she is of course the prettiest one of all of us.

The it came to some fun time, Beck' decided to taste my cheek, with a big sloppy lick!

Below is our tree, decorated with my crochet ornaments.

This is a play centre that I obtained for 2 of my grandson's.

I would just like to take this opportunity to wish every one a Safe and Happy Xmas! 2008.

Scrap Yarn Recycled

Remember the big bag of scrap yarn that was rescued for me?
Well this is how much of it is left so far.

I'm not sure if I would have gotten around to this as quick as I have if it was not for my recent head injury which required 14 st's and gave me concussion. It was best for me to just sit and not do too much, which kept the nausea and pain at a distance.

So here I have the result of knotting and winding the yarn into use-able balls. They each weigh about 50gm's a ball, I used the small digital scales and guess work to get them to around the same size.

The scrap bits of yarn that were way too small, have made it into one of my scrap yarn vase's, which will be used for decoration until I decide to felt it later on.

Christmas Stockings

This is what I was making with the Tunisian joining method. I have a four door unit and I only had 3 stockings, so of course I had to even it up. It's just 3 rounds of 24 granny squares joined together. I ran out of xmas green yarn, and that is why it is just red and white.

But I do believe the colour difference makes them all unique, I did not make the one with the puppy on it, it was just too cute not to use.

My Yarn Scraps

My yarn scraps are growing, these are just from cut off ends or yarn not worth the rescue. You can view the original post here. There is also some links for scrap yarn projects.

This is my first jar I filled.

The Tunisian Joining Method

Using the Tunisian joining method for crochet squares can certainly make a nice joint to be seen or a hidden join. It seems to be a bit faster and I joined 8 squares at a time with these squares. I think if I had a smaller Tunisian hook than the 4.00mm I have on hand, I would have opted for a smaller one. You can see more on the Tunisian joining method here, with the original learning link I used. Next time I will use a different colour for the joining method so as it can be seen much better, the photo's do not do it much justice.

This is the joining side.

This is the opposite side to the joining side.

This is the size 4.00mm Tunisian hook I used.

Quick Child's Poncho and Hat Set

First of all this is not one of my own patterns it came from this site. I would say it is a beginner to intermediate pattern. I was looking for something quick to make and this is quick.

At this stage I had used a 50 gm ball of yarn.

At this stage I had used another 50gm ball of yarn.

The completed set used just over 200gm's of yarn.

I think it looks very pretty in the pink shades I have used, it is actually from the same ball of yarn, it was a strand each of pink and white and about an 8 ply, the yarn was a bit of a pain to work with, but the end result makes up for that. I used a 6mm hook for the poncho, changed to a 5mm hook for the sleeve edging and a 4mm hook for the hat and flowers. I just made up the pattern for the flowers, but there is a flower pattern that comes with this pattern.

Blogger Award

I was recently invited to participate in a meme, but I did not do anything about it. Then I was sent an award which is a little similar to the meme, but a little easier and it is an award. That is more tempting, I've seen them around and wondered if I would ever receive an award and now I have. I received this award from Jolin Country, thank you for thinking of me Jolin. I know plenty of blogger friends who deserve an award, but I can only choose a few which I will list below.

The rules are that the recipient is to list six things that make him/her happy before subsequently passing forward the glee to others

1. My family, their good health and happiness.

2.Spending time with my family

3.To make a stranger feel welcome

4.Assisting a person in need

5.To be a good and honest person

6.Crocheting makes me happy and satisfied

.

Sherryknit, her health problems do not keep her down!

Joan, for her sheer perserverance in the learning of new crochet techniques.

Linda, who truly is a crochet fanatic.

Kobus, who brings us into her world of recycling

Laughing Purple, for ever the recycler and for sharing every thing new she discovers.

Can I add more? there are so many out there who deserve an award, which is like a bit of a pat on the back!