All quite on the Eastern front

Not much crochet to share with you at the moment because the children (including the biggest kid, my husband) are home for the holidays so we have been getting together with family,

 opening presents,

getting out for fresh air, stunt scooting,

and eating our own body weight in satsumas.

All the making time I have had has been taken up with writing the pattern and making the sample for my magazine commission which obviously needs to be kept secret. And the maths, (oh, the maths!) has had me chewing my finger nails but it is now done I hope (the proof is in the sample) Thank goodness for Excel is all I can say. 

I have been very inspired by my Christmas present (from very kind, thoughtful and hint-taking husband)

Its a Japanese crochet stitch dictionary. Its all in Japanese but thanks to the wondrous international nature of the crochet chart system I can understand it. There are so many beautiful stitches to use with some very different ideas to any I have in my other stitch dictionaries. But this deserves its own post...once I've had some quality time with the book, some stash and a hook I will do a fulsome post on this fascinating book.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Well I didn't think I would post again this week but then I had forgotten that we had some visitors coming to stay...

In our village there is a tradition of having a posada. This is taken from a Mexican tradition where people dress up as Mary and Joseph and go house to house to celebrate the journey to Bethlehem. Ours is a little different: a set of figures moves around the village in December spending one night with each family. But most exciting of all, from my point of view, is that they are 100% knitted!

When we first moved to the village it was long before 'Knitivity' and 'Knit your own Royal Wedding' Amigurami were not even popular yet so I was utterly entranced by the idea and booked our slot like a shot. And they did not disappoint...

It's a really sweet way to remember the Christmas story with the children, they love giving Mary and Joseph a cuddle as you read the story (included in the box) and play quite happily preparing a stable for the baby Jesus.

And aside from a little wrapping (ok, a lot) Christmas preparations are now complete. My cake is finally iced.

So Merry Christmas everyone; may yours be happy and healthy and, at least partially, knitted!

Busy but not necessarily productive

Christmas is on its way and I have been busying around with the family Christmas preparations, the children are now all off for the holidays so quiet time is at an end and in the evenings I have been busy working on a couple of presents and a big submission.

Now sadly, for a blogger, none of this is particularly blog worthy.

I could show you a beautiful shot of the decorated cake but its only at marzipan stage so far. Our Christmas tree is a source of shame to me but I will show you a tiny pic - just don't cheat and hover over/click it to make it bigger - promise? OK then.

It was all going to be so good. I had, from last year, a selection of lovely purpley baubles, this year I'd found some beautiful teal baubles. All the children's wonderful creations had been relegated displayed to their best on the tree in their bedroom. I allowed the boys to help decorate the tree in that only slightly controlling way, with the odd gentle reminder of 'no, I think a shiny ones would look better next to the matt one rather than another matt one' and 'make sure you space the little bells all around the tree' then gently tweaked after they had finished. It all looked pretty and lovely, I neglected to take a photo as the light was not right. Then baby girl woke up. Oooo shiny pretty things that look perfect for chomping on. Three broken baubles (luckily plastic) later: the bottom half of the tree looks like it was in a hurricane and the top half of the tree is gaily festooned with all the baubles in NO PARTICULAR ORDER. Humph! I have no energy to correct it.

I will have to take heart that some other people's houses are looking lovely thanks to me. Debbie Hampton shared this picture with me

A beautiful garland she made with my Quick Picot Snowflake pattern Isn't it lovely? 

The pattern has been doing amazingly well, I've had more than 1,500 view of the page and its been downloaded from Ravelry nearly 650 times and has 14 projects - it even made it on to their 'Hot Right Now' page for crochet patterns at number 8! 

I have been making, but nothing that is going to set the crochet world alight. I made a hat for my 6 year old which I think he has lost as it wasn't anywhere to be found when I went to photograph it for the blog tonight and I'm currently working on a scarf for my husband for Christmas:

I love the stitch - granite stitch. It has all the charm of a knitted moss stitch but none of the yarn back and forth malarkey that I hate about moss stitch. It isn't the most interesting to work. (dc, ch1, sk1 dc) but the yarn is nice and soft and chunky so I'm sure two metres will fly by.

But most evenings have been spent obsessively swatching a knitting idea that I plan to submit to a HUGE publication. Its a bit daring of me as I'm sure competition is very fierce and the standard is very high. But 'fortune favours the brave' and 'nothing ventured, nothing gained' are the buzz words of the moment so I'm going to go for it. I think my idea is really strong and if they don't like it enough I'm sure someone will or I can always self publish it. The good thing about my work is that this planning time will never truly be wasted. I've now got the final design so swatching can stop which is a very good thing as I was driving myself slightly mad with it all and I have created a new stitch pattern that I utterly love! (please, please, please let the editors love it too!)

So that is my run up to Christmas so far. I hope the next week will bring lots of nice baking some kids crafts and special moments with the children and lots of pyjama days (or mornings at the very least). I know they will be busy and its unlikely I'll post next week so

A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL MY READERS

love

Joanne

Making Winter - Free Snowflake Pattern

So its round two of the Making Winter bloghop.

December is probably the cheeriest and busiest of the Winter months. As a mum, and ergo organiser of Christmas, I find it all a bit stressful but ultimately very exciting time. It can be hard to find time to fit in the relaxing crafts that keep me sane and happy through winter.

The pattern I'm giving you this time is such a quick and easy one that it won't add to the stress of trying to make the perfect Christmas (all crafters have set themselves up with one of those projects before!) and they are so pretty they will make an enchanting addition to any Christmas tree or make a beautiful garland/bunting. They are quick enough to run up enough to use them as part of your gift tag too.

Quick Picot Snowflake

A pretty and very quick-to-make snowflake decoration. Just two rounds!

Worked in DK or worsted it measures approximately 10cm across so makes a perfect Christmas tree decoration. Or why not work it in crochet cotton to make festive earrings or a chunky yarn to make a centre piece.

These motifs would look great joined together to make a runner for your Christmas table or even a shawl.

Notions :

- Small amount of white yarn

- Suitable hook for tight finish

- PVA glue for

stiffening

Gauge:

N/A Worked in DK snowflake measures about 10cm across

Abbreviations (UK terminology)

ch- chain

dc—Double Crochet

tr - Treble Crochet

sl st - slip stitch

Instructions :

Ch 6, sl st into first ch to join

Round 1:  ch3 (counts as 1 tr) working into the ch6 loop tr, ch2, *2tr, ch2* 5 times. Sl st to join. Do not turn.

Round 2:

Form the first long arm of the snowflake:

*Ch 7, sl st in 4th ch from hook to make picot* 3 times sl st in ch before first picot. Ch 2, dc in tr.

Form the first short arm of the snowflake:

In the 2ch space dc, ch4, slst in 4th chain from hook to form picot, dc

Sl st into the next tr and continue working the long and short arms until you have 6.

If you want to make the snowflake a hanging decoration, instead of working the 6th short arm  create a loop as follows :

into the 2ch space, dc ,ch 35, dc.

The snowflakes benefit greatly from blocking. To stiffen the snowflake make a solution of 1 part water, 1 part PVA, submerge the snowflake then squeeze out the excess. Pin to a corkboard to get the right shape and allow to dry.

If you would like this pattern in PDF format, you can download it here

Our Creative Spaces

Here's a little sneak preview of something I've been working on for the Making Winter Week Blog hop that starts on the 12th December on Mrs Thrifty Household's blog

Its beautifully simple and quick to make and the pattern can be yours for free if you pop back over here next week.

Green shoes of happiness

Anyone who looks at this blog might quite quickly work out that I'm a big fan of this teal/petrol green colour. 

These shoes make me very happy.  

(ps there are many less shallow things that make me very happy, I just can't think of them right now)

Advent

Christmas's approach is sharing the beejesus out of me at the moment. I have two magazine commissions (hooray hooray but very scary) that I really want to get done and dusted before hand and all the family Christmas prepartions still to do with everything that entails. When something scares me I turn into THE PROCRASTINATOR. My super powers are worrying and doing nothing.

But with the dawn of December I decided to get going. Amazon has been scoured and I now have about 50% of my presents brought. Father Christmas tells me he did well on kids the stockings at my local yarn and craft shop.

The fruit is soaking for the Christmas cake

The kids have started in on the advent calendars...

(yes I would like a cute folksy little reusable advent that is special to our family but unless there is a heavy emphasis on chocolate the kids will hate it and this isn't really about me)

...and made besequinned Christmas tree decorations

and their equally crafty mum (your truly) has made some crochet Christmas decorations

 let's take a closer look...

 a pretty snowflake of my own design

a traditional Scandinavian heart design that I pimped a little

and a granny bauble that I came up with.

If you are in striking distance of Cambridge (UK) these little beauties can easily be yours. Two ways. 

Either you can come to my Christmas Crochet Class on Saturday 10th December in Burwell or you can come along to my son's Montessori school bazaar Sunday December 11th 10am-1pm in The Guildhall, Burwell.

Hoping your Christmas preparations are running smoothly.