ELeni

Geometrics Cal – Part 7, Border

Part 7 of the Geometrics Cal is out. It‘s the final part, the border.

The blanket is finished with a nice, plain double border. I did mine in two colours and used Walnut for the back layer and Copper for the front.

Do you like double borders?

Apparently many people don’t like double borders. There are always complaints about the slip stitch round on crochet forums. I remember quite well: after reading all that, I was really scared of it when I started crocheting overlay mosaic. I was so scared that I left my first piece – a little table mat – with a fringe.
This also was the reason that I switched to the so-called inset mosaic. You don’t have to handle all the yarn ends there. But of course you also need a border for inset mosaic. The first pattern I worked on didn’t suggest a border, and I had no idea what I could do myself. In my search for inspiration, I came across a double border that works without slip stitches and is based solely on front post double crochet. I just gave it a try and the result was quite nice. The border gave the blanket a nice drape. It is probably an acceptable alternative to the classic double border. But I don’t think the front post dc do go with every pattern.

At some point, the time had come for me too.I did my first double border with a slip stitch start when I was testing Gretchen. As a tester you have no chance to escape, lol.

First I had to experiment a little with the tension for my slip stitches and tried out different hook sizes. But then: Wow! … Since then I’ve been a fan of double borders with slip stitch rounds!!
A double border is such a nice finish. And the slip stitches ensure that the border looks neat and lies flat. I just love it! And I love doing a slip stitch round.
In my opinion, it is a fairy tale that it is complicated and takes forever. After all the work you put into your blanket it is absolutely worth the effort!

Two advices though: either keep your slip stitches a bit relaxed (but not too loose) or go up a hook size AND count your stitches!

The colours for my border

geometrics-colours-part-7 Download

Here some more impressions of my finished blanket.
Hubby grabbed it and loves it. And I am very pleased of how it turned out myself!

Happy hooking!

Edit, January 2024:
Over the last few days I have revised my posts on the Geometrics Cal and the associated documents. As a supplement, you can now also download my complete colour scheme in one pdf-document here:

geometrics-colours-part-1-7 Download

Geometrics Cal – Part 6

The Geometrics Cal is slowly coming to an end!
Today the pattern for the last 48 rows was published. Next week the instructions for the border will follow. So there is not much more to say.

This is my part 6 …

Here my colour placement for the last part.

geometrics-colours-part-6 Download

See you next week 💕.

Geometrics Cal – Part 5

Time flies!
Now it is already week 5 of the Geometrics Cal.
More than half of the blanket is finished. Part 6 will follow next week and part 7 will be all about the border.

If you followed the pattern so far, you have already worked 163 rows. YAY!

Part 5 is again a longer part with 52 rows. Firstly, pattern 4, which we already know from part 3, is repeated. This is followed by a repetition of pattern 1, then the new pattern 6 and another repetition of pattern 1.

And here is my colour placement.
For pattern 4, as in part 3, I used Walnut and Lime. Pattern 6 is done in Copper and Parchment.

geometrics-colours-part-5 Download

If you are looking for the earlier parts, you can find them here

See you next week!

Back home

I have been back home for a little more than a week after a wonderful holiday now and I am still a bit sad!
Due to Corona we stayed in Germany and have been to the Black Forest, a wonderful region in the south of our country. My home is in an area that is a bit hilly but not particularly high (about 120 m above sea level). That’s why I’m always fascinated when I’m either on the flat land such as the North Sea coast, or in the mountains.

The Black Forest has a lot of woods, mountains, green willows and cows. The mountains are up to 1.500 m above sea level although you usually don’t even notice it when you are at 800 m yourself.

We stayed at at lovely vacation home in St.Märgen and have done a lot of hikes.

Our place was the perfect backdrop to take some nice photos of my Geometrics blanket.

Besides that I haven’t tested any crochet patterns! I started knitting socks! I should have chosen a simpler pattern though. After I haven’t knitted for over a year my stitches don’t look very neat. I will have to practice this a little more.

And I managed to make a little progress on my When Summer turns into Fall blanket.

Back home I am working on some tests again and I think I will be able to show them next month. Ana is just creating a lovely Winter / Christmas blanket, Daiga from BebaBlanket is also very busy and there will be a new design from Pam Kinghton-Haener.

Meanwhile here some more holiday impressions.

Have a nice week 💕

Geometrics Cal – Part 4

Now it is already week 4 of the Geometrics Cal. The new part was released today.

Part 3 was a relatively big part with 52 rows, wasn’t it? But half of the blanket is almost there. Part 4 will add another 37 rows, so not so much to crochet this week.

This is my part 4. It is the only part where I used some Gold. I absolutely love the combination of Parchment, Copper and Gold.

And here my colour placement:

geometrics-colours-part-4 Download

My growing blanket …

See you next week 💕

Geometrics Cal – Part 3

Today part 3 of the Geometrics Cal was released in Ana’s Ravelry shop. If you follow the Cal and finished part 2 you have already hooked 73 rows, only 190 rows to go until the border starts.

I have seen a lot of beautiful color ways in Ana’s Facebook group or on Instagram. And I have to say I am a bit jealous. They all are very beautiful! I often struggle with my colour choices and choosing colours for a new project is usually not the most fun part for me.

This time colour choice was easy. My plan was to make a blanket for hubby that matches my When Summer turns into Fall blanket. It therefore just made sense to use the same colours. Colours that go perfectly together and have an autumnal look. Well …

As I said, I didn’t have a finished colour scheme in mind beforehand, just a rough idea. I wanted to use Parchment as main colour. Copper, Gold and Walnut as accompanying colours and a bit of Lime as an accent. Hm … Things turned out differently …

To save time, we tested the pattern immediately after Ana had finished a part of her blanket. So when I started, I didn’t know how the entire blanket would look like, I knew only part 1 and part 2 of the pattern.
This way, it was not possible to plan any colours in advance. But I should have paid attention to how Ana arranged her colours. I did not! When we got to part 3, I realised that I had somehow started off wrong.

I suddenly noticed that I shouldn’t have started the small separating border (pattern 1) with Parchment, the colour I wanted to use as main colour. As for Overlay Mosaic you have to change colours every row, it made it impossible to use Parchment as background colour for pattern 4! Small mistake, big effect …

At this point, however, I didn’t want to suddenly change the colour sequence for pattern 1 – I had already used it a few times and it would have looked strange for me to suddenly change it. Normally I would have started again and redone the whole blanket. But when you are testing a pattern, time is limited. I had already been working on my blanket for 9 days and was afraid that I would not be able to make up the time when I start again. I had to improvise …

And so it happened that my blanket suddenly got a slightly retro look with the combination of Lime and Walnut. I struggled with this look for a long time, but meanwhile I love it and my Gemetrics has a good chance of becoming the best-loved blanket in the house.

But enough of my look behind the scenes – here my “improvised colour scheme”

geometrics-colours-part-3 Download

See you next week!

Geometrics Cal – Part 2

The first week of the Cal has already passed and Part 2 was released today.

If you are taking part in the Cal I hope you had a good start! Meanwhile I have seen a lot of lovely Geometrics versions in Ana’s Facebook group.

This is mine so far …

For pattern 3, I used Walnut and Parchment.

And I decided to keep the colour combination – Parchment, Lime and Walnut – that I had already used in the first part for pattern 1..

So, here my colours in detail.

And the pdf to download

geometrics-colours-part-2 Download

See you next week 💕

Please also see

Geometrics Cal – Sneak Peek
Geometrics Cal – Part 1

Bloom the Mood

A pattern test for BebaBlanket

Bloom the Mood is a pattern from her BiS series.
BiS means Beauty in Simplicity . A series of quick and easy patterns that are meant as relaxing in between projects that don’t need too much counting.

And indeed, the pattern was relaxing and fun to work on!
It has charts for 4 different flower motifs and a chart for a separation section. You can combine them just the way you like.

The flowers immediately reminded me of an old cross-stitch pattern. So I originally planned to make a small wallhanging. I decided to go with a cotton yarn to make it not too big and bulky. And I also was looking for some subdued colours to take into account the old cross-stitch pattern.

On my search I came across the 8/4 Rainbow Cotton from hobbii. They have a great colour range and I wanted to try this yarn for a very long time. The colours look a little different on the website but I am still happy with what I got.

I choose the colour Mist (the one in the middle) for the background, Light Jeansblue for the separations and Sage Green for the Leaves. Powder Rose, Dark Powder Rose, Apricot and Grayish Purple for the flowers.

Later on I replaced Apricot with Lilac which is not shown on the picture above. Apricot is a bit too bright for the subdued look I wanted to create. It is still a beautiful colour though and looks great in combination with the Grayish Purple.
The yarn is smooth and soft and I love working with it! I am sure it will become one of my favorite cotton yarns for making light blankets, pillow cases and so on.

I started with a separation section and flower chart No. 1 in Dark Powder Rose.

Another separation and flower No. 2 in Powder Rose.

When I took the picture above and saw it lying on my table I decided spontaneously that it won’t be a wallhanging but a table runner for my dining table. And so I continued with flower No. 3 and No. 4.

No. 3 made in Lilac and No. 4 made in Grayish Purple.

I repeated the whole section once more but in the opposite order. And finally decided on a small double border.

I am very happy with the result. Doesn‘t it look gorgeous?

Geometrics Cal – Part 1

Finally the Geometrics Cal started

I wish you lots of fun!

This is what my first part looks like.

As I wrote in my previous post, I use the same colours for the Geometrics blanket as my When Summer turns into Fall blanket has.
When Summer turns into Fall is also one of Ana’s designs.

Ana’s original design is more in shades of blue, with a little yellow. Quite different from my colours.
I couldn’t imagine replacing each of Ana’s 5 colours with one of mine. So I didn’t follow the colour scheme of the pattern. I spontaneously decided how to place the colours and that’s how my own colour scheme came about. I’ll tell you a bit more about it in week 3 .

If you are interested in my color scheme, I will provide the colours I used for each part of the Cal here for download. I think this is much easier than listing them in the Ravelry notes.

My yarn and colours

I used Stylecraft Special DK in the colours Parchment, Walnut, Copper and Gold. I had to replace Lime with the colour Nijmegen from Scheepjes Colour Crafter. Lime was not available at that time but Nijmegen should be the same tone.

A / Parchment
B / Walnut
C / Nijmegen (Lime)
D / Copper
E / Gold

My blanket is worked with a 4,0 mm hook throughout.

So here we go with my colours for the first part.

You also can download a pdf, have fun!

geometrics-colours-part-1 Download

The pattern for the Geometrics Mosaic Cal is available in Ana’s Ravelry shop.

Brood of Angels

is the latest design from Pam Knighton-Haener / A Yarn of Serendipity. Another lovely design for an Afghan square.

As she writes in her pattern intro the Brood of Angels Square is an interpretation and expression of love for her diverse family. That’s so lovely!

The square is designed for Aran or Worsted weight yarn and is either 11 or 12 inches, depending on which hook size is used, 4,5 mm or 5,00 mm. Although it has round by round pictures It is definitely an advanced pattern.

I tested this pattern in July and it was quite a challenge as I checked not only the written pattern but also the videos Pam made for the more complicated rounds. It was the first time I tested a video and it is completely different from testing a written pattern. You have to make sure that the spoken words match what the hands are doing and that this also corresponds to what is written in the instructions. It needs a lot of concentration.! But it also was a lot of fun and lively discussions and exchange about how to best express the complicated stitch sequences.

The pattern suggests two different colour ways. I followed colour way 1 and only deviated from it in round 17. I used 6 different colours of Drops Paris.

Colour A / 66 Plum
Colour B / 17 Off White
Colour C / 62 Sage Green
Colour D / 60 Dark Old Pink
Colour E / 58 Powder Pink
Colour F / 59 Light Old Pink

I am not quite sure about colour E. It also could be no 32 Light Blue Purple, unfortunately I lost the banderole.

Using a 4,5 mm hook my square turned out to be 29,5 cm – nearly 12 inch – and thus slightly bigger than it should be. But it has the same size as the other squares I made from Pams patterns. My tension always is a bit loose when I am working with Drops Paris. The yarn slips a bit and I really struggle with tension. Going down a hook size doesn‘t help because it makes me fell very uncomfortable.

I would like to try her designs in a single colour DK yarn to see how it works and how it looks. Maybe one day … *sigh*

But now here my finished square

Brood of Angels Square / pattern by Pam Knighton-Haener, A Yarn of Serendipity

Another view of my Brood of Angels Square / pattern by Pam Knighton-Haener, A Yarn of Serendipity

It is my third test for Pam and also the third square I made of her designs.

My first one was the Carter Jude Square. I made it in September 2020.

Carter Jude Square / pattern by Pam Knighton-Haener, A Yarn of Serendipity

And the second was the Margaret Square which I tested this year at the end of April. I wrote about in this post.

Margaret Square / pattern by Pam Knighton-Haener, A yarn of Serendipity

Aren‘t they lovely?

And the best: my next test for Pam will start in October, YAY! Be curios!

And also be curios for the first part of Geometrics Cal and another pattern release by BebaBlanket. Both coming next week.