single crochet

Finally. One finished project.

by Carol Browne on January 31, 2010 · 8 comments

in Crafts, General

I was as surprised as Dion Phaneuf* this morning to find that I had actually nearly finished my rug. Finally! The Year of the Ox wasn’t kidding. Just one long year of putting one foot in front of the other and feeling like the field would never be tilled. I didn’t think I’d ever get anything completed. But today, I finished the rug! I spent just about the whole day yesterday ripping and rolling fabric – the most time consuming part of the project. Crocheting it was easy.

I thought I would have to block the whole heavy carpet by soaking it in the tub and then drying it off in between towels and putting something heavy on it so it would flatten out. But instead, I just ironed it. I turned the iron on to the highest setting, hit the steam button a lot and it flattened out into a perfectly flat circle. Yay! You can’t do that for every crochet project, unfortunately. I only ironed this instead of blocking it because the fabric was made of cotton (I’m sure there was some polyester in there, too) and is safe to iron out. I would not do that with wool (NO!) or mohair (NO!), but piles of torn fabric you’ve had in your closet for at least 4 years? It’s totally cool.

Would you like to see it in our front entrance? You can see it below…

*Hockey Talk – Dion Phaneuf was traded this morning to the Toronto Maple Leafs from Calgary. I didn’t see that coming.
[click to continue…]

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The red rug

by Carol Browne on January 10, 2010 · 6 comments

in Crafts, Photos


After making the little gold and yellow mat for the cabinet in the dining room, I decided to make a round red rug for the front entrance. I decided to throw away the worn out mat I paid $1.99 at Army & Navy about 3 years ago. I know! $1.99 for a little rug you wipe your feet on. Amazing. It’s like shopping in the Wild West over at A&N. I think you can find penny candy there, too.

I’m freestyle crocheting this rug. I’ve been ripping up all the dark red fabric I have in my stash. I did it this afternoon during a perfect movie for making noisy ripping sounds – a surprisingly disappointing Public Enemies. Oof. Sadly the dialogue was so terrible and corny, the rrrrriiiiiiiiiiiiip of the fabric was a welcome relief. And the ending? P.U. – that was the cornball icing on the cheeseball movie. But, if you enjoy a lot of tommy gun fire, I definitely recommend it. And the ripping of the fabric really didn’t take away from the rounds of shots.

After all the ripping, I connected the fabric pieces together and just started single crocheting in a round. I used the same technique I learned a few years ago at a crochet course I took. The instructor kept telling us to “put the crochet hook where it wants to go.” Very Zen instructions. Eventually it will be a great big circle. Right now it’s not a very big circle, but it will be once I get back to it. I think I’ll add a black border to finish it off.

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