One a day Tuesday's Tallies: Tada moment!

Hi darlings!

What a week, autumn has really found Rotterdam. The wind won't give my little plants on the balcony any break and it makes my umbrella totally useless from protecting me from all the rain that has been pooring. Not really my favorite kind of weather, but autumn also has a sunny side. Sometimes the sun peeks through the clouds just long enough for me to take a stroll with the dog hunting for chestnuts. I love chestnuts so much! They really represent the change of the seasons for me and the color, my oh my the color! 

Next to getting these pretty little fellows, I harvested my carrots. They were on my balcony for months and this is the result:

A bit disappointing to be honest, they didn’t even tasted sweet. Bummer! A well, on to the part you all have been waiting for: my One a day Tada moment! I think it is pretty and I love it! Sometimes finished objects disappear from my home as a gift for friends and family (for example my scarf went to my mom and my bunny went to a cousin), but this time I am sure it will stay right here! It just took me too long and it has been an amazing journey with all of you supporting me. So here it is:

I have started this project on the 30^th of August 2011, so it took me one and a half month. I used Super Durable Breikatoen No. 10 for this project, which is a 100% cotton 3 ply yarn and a 2.0 mm crochet hook. You will need a whole skein and a tiny bit of a second one. 

The project is 1,5 meters long and I choose to make it slightly bigger than my table. 

The pattern I used is this one. I just used the flowers and made the project into a table runner. 

The pattern is Japanese so for the ones that don’t use a chart, I have written the pattern down of one flower:

1.       Chain 8 and slip stitch in the first stitch to form a circle

2.       Ch. 4, *dc in the next stitch followed by a ch. 1* repeat until you reach the end of the circle and join to the 3^rd stitch of the chain 4

3.       Ch. 8, *skip 3 stitches and dc in the next (so skip a ch. Stitch, a dc and a ch. Stitch of the last round)* and repeat. At the end of the circle join in the 3^rd stitch of the chain 8.

4.       Ch. 1, sc in the same stitch, *ch. 2, dc in the 3^rd stitch of the chain 5 of the last round, ch. 3, dc in the same stitch as the other dc (so the 3^rd stitch of the chain 5), ch. 2, sc in the top of the dc of last round* repeat and join into the sc at the end of the round.

5.       *Ch. 3, 3 dc’s into the first stitch of the ch. 3 of last round, ch. 3, 3 dc’s in the 3^rd stitch of the ch. 3, ch. 3 and join in the sc of the last round.

And that’s it. You can join the flowers as you go by joining the tops of the flower petals with a slip stitch.  I must say, it sounds a bit difficult when reading the pattern and I highly recommend using the chart. So much easier ;-).  


Well, that was my first One a day project. Of course my tallies will go on, since I have thought of a new project. I will tell you all about it next Tuesday. Check here for the other great One a day projects! 


Edit: The diner set is the "Jokkmokk" from IKEA. It is very tiny, which is very convenient since we have a small appartment. Of course it made my live also much easier when making this table runner haha. 


Edit2: Some of you might already want to know what kind of project the next One a day will be, why not take a guess? I'll give a hint, it is also for the home and it is NOT similar to the table runner. 

charming

Hello again!

I tend to hop from one craft project to another, from blankets to amigurumi but also from crochet to sewing to polymer clay. Maybe I am not really focussed for that matter, but it does keep me enthusiastic and thus motivated. It gives some variation and sometimes you can even combine crafts (for example my cupcake keychain I combined crochet with a polymer clay ice cream cone and some ribbon). 

This week I went crafty with polymer clay again, I just love that stuff! It's so easy to use and I found out the possibilities are endless. You can even paint on it! I've seen some pretty cool stuff all around the internet that you can create with clay but the cutiest ones were the charms. So, it was decided. I got out my clay and just tried some things out. Wanna see the result? Ok, here you go:

I made the background in photoshop and my inspiration came (of course) from the beach. In the top of the image you can see a baby and her mommy jellyfish (which I hate in real life, but like this they are rather cute), in the bottom an octopus and a hermit crab. I painted faces on them with acrylic paint after baking and glazed them when the paint was dry. I use the brand FIMO clay, another well-known polymer clay brand is Sculpey but it is not offered in my local stores. It should be simular though. 

Has anyone worked with polymer clay before? 

Lot's of love,

Suzanne

Oh by the way, in the image you see "by Suzannetje87" this is my username on DeviantART. A website for all kinds of crafsts (a bit like Ravelry). So if you are a member there you can find me :-). 

Tuesday's Tallies: Blocking

Hi lovelies,

Hurray, it's Tuesday! I made a lovely discovery today, boy oh boy, I'm so excited. But I will share the excitement at the end of the post, first I will share how I discovered it:

I must be honest, the progress hasn't been fasting up but I did do one a day for both my projects. The stripy project is not far enough to post about, so I will focus on the flower project. I wanted to know how I was progressing and the flowers tend to curl a lot. So to see how big they really are, I start blocking the first part. 

Look at all those pins, putting everything in place and revealing wonderful figures. For those of you that never blocked before, blocking is a method to shape your crochet project. Not all pattern require blocking, take for example my stripy project. It is loosely hooked and it is flat when I lay it down. But this flowery project is curling up like a little baby. By pinning it down and then spraying some water with a spray bottle the right shape will start to form.

The hardest part is waiting for 24 (!!) hours, if you don’t the project will start to curl again. By the way, I am not sure this method also works for non-organic yarn projects. This project is 100% cotton and other projects that I blocked were also made from organic yarn. Maybe some of my lovely followers can comment on this. 

Look at the difference between a blocked and a non-blocked flower:

And this is where the exitement kicked in. Because of the huge difference in size between blocked and non-blocked, the project is now so close to a FINISHED OBJECT! Also, I first wanted this project to cover my whole table. I don't fancy that idea anymore. I think it will be a bit much and a tablerunner would therefore be much suited for these flowers. Which again decreases the amount of flowers to make! I think I dare to say that in the next Tuesday's Tallies I will share a finished project, hurray! 

I'm so exited, and I just can't hide it, tutututututututu. 

Hope your having a blast with your one a day project too, haha ;-). You can check the other projects here at the Gingerbread Girl blog.

PS: Sorry for the bad quality of the pictures, I don't have my camera around and used my phone. 

P.P.S: In my next post I will share some little polymer clay charms I have been making!