Longest project ever is FINISHED!

We found out at the end of summer that my cousin is pregnant.  I've been procrastinating knitting a blanket for her because, well, she's not due until February.  And Christmas was coming.  And I've been promising my brother a Ninja Turtle pillow for months.  And she's not due until February.

It's January now.  So that baby can be here is just a few weeks.  That's not a lot of time.  Luckily, I finished all my Christmas gifts, as seen in the last post.  I also finished that damn pillow.  Let's dwell there for a moment.

BFF turtle pillows

I know I've mentioned the turtle pillow before.  On the right is the pillow my grandmother crocheted for Andrew almost 20 years ago when we were kids.  So many problems, I don't know where to start.  You may notice that the darker green doesn't necessarily match.  As in, she used 2 different dark green acrylic yarns to crochet him.  One was definitely thicker than the other.  If you were able to look closely, the turtle's head is stuffed with not only fiber fill, but also random yarn scraps.  Not green ones, but probably every other color you can imagine.  Now, I'm economical/eco-friendly in the same way, except I stuff my hexipuffs with yarn scraps.  Not a pillow/doll that's made almost entirely of loose double crochet stitches.  Another problem- his shell should be on his back, not his stomach.  I think I find that one the funniest!

Of course, this guy shows the wear of almost 20 years of lovin from my brother.  His face embroidery is almost all gone and his arms are barely holding on these days.  Which is why Andrew wanted me to make a new one for him.  This way he can keep the one Grandma made and destroy the one I make.

I tried to match Grandma's turtle as best possible, while making my own improvements.  For one thing, my turtle is almost entirely done in single crochet.  And his shell is in the right spot :o).  But I tried to shape the head to look like the actual Ninja Turtle and I crocheted the limbs, head, shell and belly together with that green panel (Grandma sewed her pieces together....I'm too lazy for that).  I tried to make the arms and legs muscular and "realistic" shaped*.

I took a ton of notes and wrote down every stitch I made.  Maybe eventually I'll write it up but I really need a break from this guy.  He's been in the works for about a year now and I just don't want to look at him again for quite a while.  Unless I'm in my brother's room to watch = 3 with him.

As for that baby blanket, it's almost done.  Hopefully it'll be in the mail by the end of this week.




*How realistic can it be when it's modeled after a cartoon ninja turtle??

Granny's Not so Square

This past Sunday, two wonderful ladies (Randy and Barbara) taught the Brooklyn Fiber Arts Guild about granny squares.  Now, I can do a granny square.  But of course I was going to watch two well known, respected, educated, and professional women teach it.  Plus, I helped Camille, who was sitting next to me and isn't a big crocheter.

I learned to crochet the summer of 1997 at 12 years old.  My aunt taught me and a cousin, probably to keep us busy at the farm while the boys ran around like maniacs.  I don't believe my cousin kept with it, but I loved it.  I still remember that beige acrylic swatch I made first.  I probably ripped it out to make the blanket-that-never-was.  This blanket is still sitting half made in a storage bin in my room.  I no longer feel the need to make a 250 st single crochet acrylic blanket with terrible fringe on the edges.  It will be ripped out soon and made into charity blankets.

When I finally got bored of making single crochet rows, I started designing dresses for my American Girl dolls.  I chained maybe 20 or so sts (not really sure anymore....1997 was quite a while ago) and then just started crocheting in a circle.  No slip stitch.  All I knew how to do was single crochet and chain.  And so it went until 2006/7ish, but more on that in a minute.  Now these dresses- they were tubes (ha! of course) up to Kristina and Josefina's armpits, at which I stopped working in the round and made a front to the dress.  When this reached a satisfactory height, I started working on a 5-stitch shoulder strap.  I bound this to the back of the dress and repeated for the other shoulder.  When I was done, I also made a headband for my dolls- chain some sts and then crochet a row.  This was the beginning of my fiber life and designing career.

Such things went until 2003.  I wanted to make Nicole a Harry Potter themed scarf, but I did not like the feel of crochet for it.  Don't forget that I never used anything other than Red Heart at this point and could only single crochet (no granny squares for me yet).  I decided to learn to knit since it seemed to come out "softer." Thank you CYC for teaching me wrong because of the terrible drawings on learntoknit.com.

I stopped crocheting completely at this point.  Knitting took over my life!  But then in either 2006 or 2007 I bought Stitch 'N Bitch Crochet: The Happy Hooker and learned how to make a granny square, flowers, and shell stitch. I could finally do more than a single crochet!  I made one of the Garden Scarf and at least two of the One Skein Scarf.

I still don't crochet very much.  I just prefer knitting but sometimes the ease of crocheting is just nice, especially after a really big knitting project.

I have a love/hate relationship with granny squares.  They can be so tacky and kitschy looking sometimes, but then sometimes they can be awesome, great for using stash, great for spreading limited stash, and just fun to make.

Here is a granny square blanket I made for the Guild's charity project from November (yes, I'm so very behind).  I used leftover Caron acrylic and some random grey acrylic.  The maroon and yellow are leftovers from Harry Potter projects of course.

This was also yesterday's 365 photo.  I forgot to take pictures of my other projects during the daylight so this was the best I could do.

Here is a baby blankie I'm working on just trying to use up some stash.  It was some Moda Dea I had bought forever ago to make a sweater with, but I never bought as much as I needed and then they discontinued the yarn.  I tried to use it up last year by knitting a hat, but still had a skein and then some leftover.  So far I've used the mini-ball leftovers and am working on using up the full ball I had.  I think it'll come out to a decent size, but my fingers are still crossed for this one.

Can you believe I only started this Sunday at the Guild meeting?  That's another great thing about crochet- it goes so fast!

So, how do you all feel about crocheting?