Solar System Baby Blanket (finished!)

 It's done! Well, mostly. I was going to add in a constellation, but right now I'm recovering from, you know, creating a solar system. Fatiguing work, that.

 The sun.

 Mercury, Venus, Earth (moon!), Mars, Saturn...

 Mars, Saturn, Jupiter...

 Uranus, Neptune, PLUTO (because Pluto is a planet too! Take that, NASA scientists!)!

Lest you think this is impressive, I'll point out that it took me over 2 weeks to create this blanket, while God made the whole universe in 6 days. Just sayin'. ;)

Can't wait to *hand* deliver this blanket to the boy himself! 1 week to go!!

Have a Lovely Day!
~Jess

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Yellow! (Finished!)

 I can show off this project now: Tah-Dah! A super simple blanket I made for a friend! She's getting married in approximately 2 months -today was the bridal shower- and at the moment is a quite in love with the color yellow (as well as her fiance... should probably mention him too).

I found some granny square blankets on Pinterest that were solid like this and found it surprisingly beautiful. I like the hidden "X"s that pop out when you look from afar.

Just a 7 round granny square, joined-as-you-go, with an ecru white border (I opted for 2dc clusters, as you see, for a speedy finish).

It's not huge; just a throw size. JoAnn's stopped carrying this color yellow. Good thing I bought as much as I did!!

Tasseled corners. They're for fun.

Here's an up close view of the tassels. I love the simplicity of the blanket- as long as the color matches, this blanket will look appropriate anywhere. Of course after I wrapped it up the thought occurred to me to add some doilies to it Dottie Angel style, but oh well. It is what it is, as they say. :)

Have a Lovely Day!
~Jess

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Oh Baby! (Charity)

Check out this lovely hat and blanket set I made for a friend's niece. Crocheting for charity is immensely rewarding (and beautiful)!

The blanket was made with 2 strands of incredibly soft "baby yarn", worked together, and the flowers are "Irish Roses" made with silk & bamboo blends- incredibly soft and beautiful. It's not the traditional baby-blanket look, which is good because babies grow up. :)

Have a Lovely Day!
~Jess
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Summer....

Muggy days, visiting relatives, play dates galore, tomato harvesting, fields of sunflowers round every corner: summer has hit hard in these parts.
I'm exhausted. In a good way. I think.
I haven't forgotten my little blog. I just haven't had many consecutive moments to dedicate to the updating part of it. It will happen. It will. Maybe in September. :)

Little Boy Blue's FINISHED blanket!

Some upcoming posts include...
~ detailed information on the Meal-a-Day Charity, what I'm doing to be involved and what YOU can do to be involved too!
~ excessive happy dancing and a post all about the yarn (YARN!) that is en route to my house as I type this. It's from KnitPicks. Swoon!
~ plentiful pictures of my works-in-progress. Maybe a finished post too (those are always nice!)
~ and whatever else is on my mind.

Have a Lovely Day!
~Jess

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A Visual Update (WIP)

This is not a true blog post. This is just a little visual update for Little Boy Blue's Turning of Two birthday blanket. And so, without further blathering from me....

Hope you enjoyed that and I hope this prompts me to pick it up again and *finish the thing*!!!! :)

Have a Lovely Day!
~Jess

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July Birthday (Sneak Peek)

My little boy turns

2

in July. 

No, not right around the corner (well...), but close enough

for me to be thinking about

Birthday Presents.

Especially those of the handmade variety.

The last couple of months the boy''s been completely obsessed with the color Blue. He points out all the blue things everywhere we go and he'll repeatedly say, "Blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, blue, Blue, BLUE, BLUE!!" until you acknowledge, "Yes, that car is blue!" He can now smile at you with his blinky little eyes that sweet little face and reply, "Mhmm" (because he can't yet say "yes"). 

I try as hard as I possibly can to be a birthday and Christmas minimalist, but I do feel compelled to make my kids something special during those times. My older son got a blanket last October when he turned 3 , and while I wanted Little Brother to open his own star blanket on his 3rd birthday, I realized today-- why? They're two very different boys, so they honestly don't need the same things just in different colors. And once that sunk in, I got to work.

I had leftover turquoise yarn from my still very secret Cooperative Press project and figured it'd be just perfect for my speedy-summery-seed-stitch blanket. I don't have enough blue to make the blanket the size I want, so I'm interspersing it with very random -and therefore, very delightful- stripes of whatever extra cotton I have lying around. Not very much, come to find out. Most of that is going to the Sunburst Granny.

I'm only one day into this blanket, and probably close to a 3rd of the way done. Assuming I have enough yarn to pull it off, it'll easily be done within a week. Very speedy, indeedy. And THEN I'll take some glorious, "Look, it's FINISHED!!" pictures and write out my little pattern to share with the world-wide-web. A free pattern, nothing quite as delightful!

In the mean time, I hope you enjoyed your sneak peek!

Have a LoVeLy DaY!

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Berry Smoothie Star Blankie (WIP)

Hurray! I have a WIP going on this week!

Presenting, 

for your viewing pleasure:

 The Berry Smoothie Star Blankie!

I took these last week while I was waiting for *more yarn* to come in from Lion Brand. But I'll give you all the details when I'm d-o-n-e. In the mean time, I hope you enjoyed this sneak peek!!

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Stash Bustin' Blankie! (W.I.P.)

I promise I'm still working on that Bed of Roses blanket. As beautiful as "Rosie" is, it's not exactly great blogging material. But, for those curious, I am: 5 rows in with 3 to go and then a border! Yaaaay!

But this post isn't about the Bed of Roses. It's about:

My Stash Bustin' Blankie!

I started making my extra scraps into granny squares and have finally gotten to a point where it's all coming together. I can "see" where it's going (at last!) and am a tad excited to have a "matches nothing" blanket around. Everything else I made has a definitely place and *goes* somewhere. As a result if it gets dragged to a different room it just looks u-g-l-y. But not this blankie! This blankie will be ugly beautiful everywhere! (Okay, so it does have a little bit of ugliness in it. But who doesn't?)

yum!

Since the colors are chaotic (I prefer to think of it as "eclectic"), I plan to border them all with a neutral, probably a grey acrylic I have lying around, but maybe an ecru cotton. I can't decide. I really love cotton. But I also really really love not spending money. ;)

 This project is s...l...o...w going - I started back in.... August(?), so don't anticipate any stash blankie updates any time soon. I just organized the squares last night and felt compelled to photograph them this morning because, well, 

who doesn't love a stack of granny squares?! 

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Have a lovely day!

Wow! (Finished!)

The baby blanket is finished! And in time too, the baby hasn't yet made her debut. Whew! Amy, you now have my permission to have your sweet little Mia. I know that's exactly what you were waiting for. 

;)

 

I hope everyone likes crochet eye-candy because here... we... go!

Since the blanket itself is a bit to take in, I kept the border nice and simple. Nothing fancy, just a half-double-crochet around, skipping where the chain-2 spaces joined up to bring it together more.

Favorite square #1.

Favorite square #2.

Favorite square #3.

Favorite square #4.

Favorite square #5.

Color Info: Lion Brand Cotton-Ease Azalea

Color Info: Lion Brand Cotton-Ease Maize

Color Info: Lion Brand Cotton-Ease Terracotta

Color Info: Lion Brand Cotton-Ease Cherry 

Color Info: Lion Brand Cotton-Ease Blossom

Color Info: Lion Brand Cotton-Ease Berry
(the gray color is Stone)

Here's a better look at my border. Nice and simple!

And I had to take pictures  of Baby Blankie against the blue wall. They look so good together!

The boys tested out it's durability...

 

...snuggleability...

...and general pleasantness and warmth. 

I'm happy to announce that it was baby-approved. 

So, allow me a moment to gush and say: Wow! What a fantastic result to a very fun project! It's definitely resparked my interest in my own blanket WIP. Can't wait to show that one off as *finished*. 

I hope everyone has a beautiful Christmas! I plan to show a sneak peek of another WIP right after Christmas. Be sure to check back then- it's the perfect blend of functional, trendy, and beautiful colors!

PS- I've been awarded with a Liebster award! How fun! My official follow-up post is forth coming, but check out nuresma's blog for the scoop (and learn a little German while you're at it)! Thanks!