3rd Times a Charm!

Well, it took me 3 tries to make my first pillow. Last year when I made Kirsten's afghan, I thought I would make a pillow too. I bought a pillow form and figured I would just crochet a cover. I did, but getting the size right was a challenge (I wasn't following a pattern) and I didn't like how it looked. I figured if I did just single crochets on the back and shells on the front, that would work. NOT!

I then came across a free pattern for a button pillow with buttons on the side. I first thought I would make it with Seahawks buttons or football buttons (I have fabric of footballs!). However, when I was showing it to Margie (Kirsten's step-grandma) she scrunched up her nose at the thought! So, I decided that may not be the way to go.

My first plan with the buttons was to put them on both sides. White as the base and then dark blue button on top of the white button on the light blue stripe, light blue on the the dark stripe. Well, sewing on buttons proved to be about the hardest part of the whole project. Sewing through the yarn and 2 buttons was about all I could handle!

I mentioned this was my 3rd attempt. The first was the single crochet mess. The second was this pattern. I got within 2 rows of having it completed and ran out of dark blue yarn. I also had very little of the light blue. I could not find more of the light blue which I believe was Red Heart Country Blue, but believe it or not, I had NO covers left to tell me for sure. Again, I fell victim to the company not making a color that I did not have enough! (I feel better about buying 15 skeins of the teal for Carmen's afghan now!)

Back to the dark blue issue, I bought a new skein of the "no dye lot" midnight blue. However, it was significantly darker than the left over skein I had. So, I abandoned the project with 2 rows to go.

As I was trying to get items from Kirsten's birthday list, I was not able to purchase the items in the stores, I had to order them online so I was not going to having anything for her to open. Monday (we were celebrating on Wednesday! I decided to start over. This time using the new skein of dark blue. I had to tear out the first attempt to recover the light blue yarn. I also had to keep the number of rows for the light blue the same since I only had the yarn that was in the second attmept!

Believe it or not, I actually got it done -- even with going to the Mariners game on Tuesday night. Needless to say, I crocheted through the entire game! She seemed to like it when she opened it.

Jury Duty Scarves -- 3 cute, one...

Last month I spent 3 weeks on Jury Duty. I decided while I was doing this, I would learn some new patterns and stitches. As is always the case -- for me, is some turned out better then others! I liked 3 of the scarves and I have not figured out what I must have done wrong on the 4th but I sure did not look like the picture with the pattern.

Some of the great things about being on jury duty:

• Learned the buses again.


• Got to hang out in downtown Seattle -- and eat out almost every day!


• Listened to my book on tape and crocheted on the bus each day.


• Met some great people who were on the jury with me.

Crochet Cable Starter Scarf. This scraf is from the Knit and Crochet Today PBS show. I like that they show how to do tasks in both knit and crochet. The web site is linked to the right. This "cable" is done using front post doubles and triple crochets. I have been thinking about trying it as a "panel" afghan. I think it would look neat as an afghan with the panels done in different colors and then sewen together. Another great -- take along project.

Basket Weave Scarf. This is also a stitch that is in my 365 patterns calendar. It looks like some of the stitches go sideways but it is again done with the front and back post double crochets. I also did this in light green. Left over yarn from the "KCLS Meeting Afghan"!

Mile-A-Minute Scarf. This was on the inside of a skein of Coats & Clark yarn. However, I certainly did something wrong! It called for 2TRCL which I interrupted as 2 Triple crochet clusters. When in fact it meant 1 cluster with 2 triple crochet stitches on each side of the 3 chains. If the picture to the right had been included, I would not have made the mistake. It is included in the online instructions.

Tip: If there is a pattern number on the instructions you find either on the skein wrapper or free patterns in the store, you can go to that company's website and enter that code and usually you will see the instructions on their website. Some will also include corrections and/or comments from people who have used the pattern.

Peppermint Twist Pattern (April 8) from 365 Crochet Stitches a Year: Perpetual Calendar . I purchased this for myself (for Christmas) from the Cultured Purl yarn shop in Gilman Village, Issaquah WA. The link is to the calendar on Amazon. This scarf is a bit too wide. The great thing I like about the patterns in the calendar is it gives you the number of stichets to complete one pattern plus the extra stitches for the beginning chain. This is done with front post triple and double crochets. That is what gives the look like the opposite color is in the other color's row. Do do a front post stitch down into the other color. This pattern is like the cable pattern above in that it has a very definite right and wrong side.