A Few Small Projects

Water Bottle Carrier

I got a last minute invitation to a birthday party for one of my great nephews. With no time to shop and little time to spare, I wanted to give him a gift that he would enjoy. I had some homemade soap from my soap making friend at Purple Peony Emporium, so made a crocheted soap bag to go with it, but I didn't feel that was enough. I then googled to find quick crochet projects for men (he was turning 19), and found a crocheted water bottle holder pattern. 

It has a cross-body strap, which is perfect for keeping your hands free while hiking. Or shopping. I added a small book that I had at home and his gift was complete. 

Soap Bag

I dropped my bar of soap in the bathtub and it broke into pieces. So I figured that it was time to make myself a soap bag. 

It's the same pattern that I've used previously, but I didn't want the open areas like in the square one because the pieces of soap would fall out. So, rather than single crochet for round 3, I did double and finished it off with that. I think I like it better than the square one. 

Wrapped in Sunshine

In my search for shawl patterns, I came across this website: Crochet Shawl 10 Diagrams. I thought the page was in Ukrainian, but Google offered to translate it for me from Greek. However, when I downloaded an individual diagram and isolated the text from the diagram to have it translated, I was then told that it was Russian. Whatever. Fortunately, I do not need a knowledge of any of those languages to interpret a crochet diagram. This is the first one I decided to try. 

I called it "Wrapped in Sunshine" because the individual motifs look like suns to me. They also look sort of like spiders, but I didn't think "Wrapped in Spiders" had the same appeal. I made this one for my daughter as an Easter gift.  I used 314 g/11.1 oz of Red Heart Comfort in papaya and a 5.5 mm hook. It measures approximately 65" across by 30.5" down. 

Buckwheat and Birds

This quilt started from a panel and some fabrics that I felt would work with the panel that I purchased at Marshall's in Edmonton. At that time, I was giving consideration to possibly seeing if I could sell some quilts and thought this project might work. Or just adding another baby quilt to my stash. Otherwise, I really had no recipient in miind.

When I made the quilt top up, I had to decide what kind of setting to use for the panel. Because the panel has a place for the baby's name and vital statistics, 

I decided to see if I could sort of centre that part and therefore the panel would be off-centre. I then selected a new block to try from one of my many quilt books, Buckwheat. Lots of math involved in calculating how wide to make the sashing, how many blocks and what size, etc. in order to make this project the right size for a baby quilt. Once completed, I then set the quilt top aside, figuring I would wait until I knew who the recipient would be so that I could add the information before quilting. 

And then I found out that one of my great nieces was pregnant. Aha, a perfect recipient for this quilt, especially since the quilt was gender neutral. Then my very first great, great niece (that's correct - two greats, this is my middle sister's great granddaughter, and the first of the next generation in my family). I got the name and vital statistics from my niece (the baby's grandmother) and used the alphabet function on my sewing machine to add them to the quilt. Then it was quilted using the Blackbird Pie pantograph from Meadow Lyon. 

Unfortunately, once I finished the quilting, I couldn't find the leftover fabric to use to make the binding. It took me over a month to find it. It was hiding under my two quilt along projects, which have yet to be finished. 

It's finally done and on its way to the newest baby in my family. I really like it. It's a unique setting for a panel, not typical baby colours and a new block tried in two sizes.

Mug Rugs

Administrative Professionals week was upon us, and I didn't want to neglect to honour our administrative assistants. I made each of them a quilted mug rug. 

Those are 3" quilt blocks. I was planning on using this book 

 for the blocks, but I couldn't find it when I needed it (I really need to get my craft studio more neat and tidy), so I took some inspiration from BlockBase+.

Crazy Cats

I have been working on some larger quilts, but when I was searching for the fabric to use to bind Buckwheat and Birds, I came across a fat quarter bundle that I bought at Walmart a few years ago. It consists of one fat quarter of cats playing musical instruments, one of cats dancing between lines of music, one of scattered musical notations and a couple of blenders. Then I was inspired by a quilting video using the Creative Grids Crazy Quilt set. I think in the video, it was the 8" set, whereas I have the 6" set. No matter, I decided to make a wallhanging for some empty wall space in my office at work. 

However, my doctor has since placed me on stress leave, so I guess I will be hanging it up in my hallway. 

Choosing a quilting design, I had a choice of cats or music, and I went with Funky Music. 

Royal Fan

My next shawl from the Crochet Shawl 10 Diagrams page is this one. 

I called it Royal Fan because the motif looks sort of like a fan with a crown above it. I used a 5.00 mm hook, 6 oz/170 g of Red Heart Roll with It Sparkle.

It measures about 75" across and 38½" down. And it will just go into my stash for a quick gift when I need one. 

That's it for now. I still have a table runner set that I need to quilt, but I've set it aside for more pressing projects.