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Little Doilies and a Granny Square Afghan

I've been away for far too long.  Time to get back into the blogging habit (maybe).

One recent project was whipping up a few of the "little doilies" from Patricia Kristoffersen's 99 Little Doilies.  I wanted them to go with my mother's birthday gift, and I was pleased with how they turned out.

I chose simple patterns, because I needed them done quickly-- and I was too distracted by worrying about my husband's travels to want anything too complicated.  (I'm one of those people who can't completely accept that flying is statistically safer than driving.)

Stack o' "Little Doilies"

#32:

Doily #32

#18:

Doily #18

#54:

Doily #54

For this last one, #25, I tried using a particularly small partial ball of thread.  At some point, I realized I wouldn't have enough yardage, so I adjusted the pattern (removed a few rounds).  I think it turned out well enough (though teensy).  I'd like to try this one again, sometime, in full size:

Doily #25

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I finished my Old-Fashioned Granny Squares scrap-ghan in January, but I only got around to taking a few photos yesterday.

I'm happy with the results, but if I ever make another, similar join-as-you-go scrappy afghan, I'll try to resist joining squares until I've crocheted about half of them "loose".  Otherwise, when working with limited amounts of colors (especially when using up scraps in dribs and drabs, instead of starting with a blanket's-worth of scraps from the very beginning), it's difficult to achieve an even distribution of a given color across the whole blanket.  And while that's not strictly necessary, I find that it can make or break a scrappy afghan, in my personal estimation.

Granny Square Afghan

But as I said, I'm happy with this afghan...

Granny Square Afghan

...and I had fun making it, which is of course the whole point of crocheting for most of us, these days...

Granny Square Afghan

There's something very comforting and cozy about granny squares.  No wonder they've been around so long!

Granny Square Afghan

The border is in a style I've used at least a few times before.

One round (in red) of 1 sc in every stitch/space, with 1 sc in between each pair of granny squares and 3 sc in each corner of the blanket.

Seven rounds of Edging #149 (from Edie Eckman’s Around the Corner book).

Then back to the red. One round hdc and a final round of improvised scallops.

Granny Square Afghan

I wondered if the red would feel a little out of place, since there's not any of that exact shade of tomato-red in any of the squares-- but looking at the finished product, I don't find it jarring.  Maybe I've just gotten used to it, though. ;o)  In any case, I had a lot of red yarn, so red it was!

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And here's a peek at a current work in progress:

Brioche Cowl in Progress


This is a quick snap of a brioche knitted cowl.  (Did I ever share a photo of the first brioche cowl, completed?  I'll have to check...)

I've also been knitting quite a few dish scrubbers (tribbles, according to the pattern), and there are a few other things I need to photograph or otherwise prepare for blog-fodder.  Sometime soon, I hope.