Crochet Jumper

See, I knew if I wrote a list of my outstanding projects I may actually finish one and it worked!  Over the last couple of days I have finally finished my first crochet jumper.....and possibly my last :(

If I saw this jumper in a shop I would not give it a second glance, if I actually tried it on I would never buy it as it is so poorly fitting and yet this is what I have ended up with.


I used a pattern from the book "Crochet in no time" by Melody Griffiths, it was taken me a couple of years complete.  The pattern was the Frill-Edged Sweater.  I used SMC Select Brioletto yarn in burgandy which was a blend of Wool (60%) and Polyester (40%). It wasn't quite the same as what the pattern asked for but close enough.

Unfortunately I had really poor tension and was utterly rubbish at following a pattern so the jumper looks nothing like it is meant to, the neck is too big, the jumper too wide and the length not long enough.  All that combined with ridiculously shaped sleeves and the jumper is barely wearable.

I say barely wearable as despite all its faults I have put too much into this jumper not to use it so it will be my slop around the house sweater.

Quilt number 11 - Triangles

This quilt was for a colleague at work who had just had a baby.  I kept the cutting simple by using triangles, I made 6 1/2 inch squares (conveniently the width of my large ruler) and then cut them diagonally.

The fabric had to be gender neutral as as I didn't know the sex of the baby before it was born and wanted to get a head start on making it, not that is made much difference to the finishing time as it was still only completed a couple of months after the birth!

The printed fabric is from Lewis and Irenes's spring 2015 collection "Safari". I added solids of green and yellow with some makower spraytime which is my go to fabric when I need a plain fabric but want it to be just a little more interesting. It ended up being quite a low density quilt but hopefully that will be mice a soothing for the baby.

I struggled for a little while to get happy with the layout of the pieces as I was making it up as I went along but also had directional fabric.

I also added a strip of patchwork to the back as I had some squares left over. To speed up the quilting I machine quilted it in a meandering free motion style and then used did some in the ditch quilting for the first time round the border using my special foot.

Reverse of the quilt

In the ditch quilting

Table mats and table runner

This has been made for a gift for a house we are staying at in the summer in Ibiza.  Ibiza has lots of gifts with lizards on them as they can be found all over the place so I wanted to find some fabric with them one. I finally tracked down this one by Robert Kaufman and so promptly order a couple of metres of it.

I kept the design of the mats simple and could make several at a time just by cutting the dimensions across the widths of the fabrics, then piecing and cutting again.  I needed to be sure that I could get this done in time for the holiday!

Having recently been on a free motion quilting course at Hometown in Rochester I was also keen to try out some of the techniques shown, hence the row of hearts down the strips.

Crochet baby blanket

I had started this blanket when my sister was expecting a child but sadly my crochet skills were not really that great so it was left and occasionally worked on and then got stuffed to the back of the cupboard for several years, during which time the child grew up and at the time I completed it was 6 years old and I had not got enough yarn to make it a larger quilt.


I wanted my first blanket to be a traditional granny square pattern and learnt how to crochet them on a course at hometown. When I came to do it at home I soon became frustrated with continually having to change my yarn so decided that one granny square would be plenty to make an accent square (oh yes, I know that is cheating!)

I decided to use the opportunity to try out squares in several different stitches to add variety to the project and managed one more patterned square by using stripes. The yarn I used was a selection of cotton dk by Debbie Bliss, colour, 13002, 13039,13009, 13038 and crocheted using a 4mm hook.
















Once I had completed all the squares I played around with the layout on the floor in a similar way I would do with my quilt blocks before deciding on the final layout. Once decided I took a picture of it on my phone so I didn't need to number the squares and had a quick reference:









 I then crocheted it all together giving a border of a row of double crochet.  I finished it with a scalloped edge which is really quite simple but helps to bring the blanket together.

The finished item was then going to be given to my newest nephew but my son has decided that it would be his cuddle blanket while watching television.