Sashay

A bit ago, a young neighbor of mine (who knows that I crochet) pointed to a beautiful frilly crochet scarf that another of our neighbors was wearing, and asked if I could teach her how to make one. 

I didn't know, but I figured I could probably find out, and so I asked her for a bit of reconnaissance time. After a google search or two, I found what I was looking for at good old redheart.com

Specifically, I found this pattern. The yarn needed is called Red Heart Sashay, and it's more ribbon than yarn, which accounts for the frills all through the scarf.

And then, I worked up this scarf:



Would you believe that this whole scarf is made up of a foundation chain row, followed by row after row of 4 single crochet stitches? Getting my fingers used to working with the ribbon yarn has been kind of tricky, but not unenjoyable.

 

Regardless of all of this, the scarf is frilly, fun, and I love the texture of it. I can see me making more like them in the future.  

(And I recently taught my young neighbor as well.)

new dishcloth set

I made a new set of dishcloths, using my pattern of choice, which just happens to be the pattern that is on the back of the label for the Peaches & Creme yarn balls or cones.  Basically, you chain 21, and then half-double crochet for fourteen rows (putting eighteen stitches per row). After you've done that, you do two rounds of single crochet around for a border. The first border should have 21 stitches per side, with three stitches in each of the corners.

It's a handy pattern. I've made a few others of my own, and I like those as well, but I always come back to this one. Maybe I'm just a basic kind of girl? Who knows?

Anyway, I'm calling this set "Black Hills", because the colors kind of remind me of what I've seen around the Mount Rushmore area.

a ridiculously easy, but not always obvious, solution for the problem of lost scissors

Do you have a hard time keeping track of your scissors when you are crocheting? I used to spend about half my crocheting time looking for my scissors! (or at least, it felt that way). Either I was sitting on them, or my skein of yarn had rolled onto them, or I had placed them to the right of me, but was looking to the left . . . you get the idea, and you know the story, right?

Well, one day, about fifteen years ago, I chanced to be a Thanksgiving Dinner, and I saw one of my cousins working on some needlework in the corner. There, around her neck was a long chain with a pair of scissors safety-pinned to it. Brilliant!  Whenever she needed a little snip, there it was, she just snipped away, no looking for scissors or anything.

I've never lost my scissors since.

I don't generally use a chain per se (I'm not all that fancy), but I've used dollar-store mardi gras beads, as well as a "necklace" I made by crocheting a chain with three strands of yarn at once. Right now my holder of choice is a lanyard tag that I got at a convention I attended a few years back. Works like a charm.











So there you are, a helpful hint for the day.