The Beautiful Blogger Blanket, the Beyond The Square Challenge 2012 and a lovely surprise for me!

Thank you so much for all your kind good

 wishes for my interview this morning...

Thank you for making me smile all the way

 into the door Faith....

 It went well-ish... and now I sit with fingers, 

toes, knees, ears and eyes crossed until

 I get the phone call...

At the very beginning of this week an envelope 

arrived.. sorry... no photo of the envelope.. 

it has disappeared into the depths of my 

camera somewhere.. ah well.. it's not the 

envelope you are interested in is it?

Victoria from the wonderful, Yarn Round Hook 

in the UK has sent me 2 squares for the 

Beautiful Blogger Blanket of 2012! 

Again a lovely card with a very sweet message on..

You are all being so lovely; you send me good wishes 

and encouragement and I love getting them! 

Both of Victoria's squares are from Jan Eaton's 

book; '200 Crochet Blocks'.

The pink one, above, is # 197, 'Fretwork', 

sorry Victoria, the photo is slightly blurred!

The blue one, above, is # 94, 'Gothic Square'.

Some close-ups for you to linger over longingly...

2 stunning squares gives you 2 entries 

into the Beautiful Blogger Blanket draw 

on 29th February Victoria...Good luck and 

thank you for joining in!.  

If you haven't seen the beautiful work that Barbara 

from made in k-town does please umm..

(my hubby says I am always saying 'pop over'!) 

...mosey on over there (!) and see her latest motif!  

You can see everyone else's motifs here.

My latest is Motif # 3... 

I made this one twice.. just for the heck of it! 

The first one is made of a very fine thread 

which is not marked so I can't tell you what

 size it is.. it is just called crochet cotton! 

I used a 1.25mm hook... 

and then in my usual cotton which is 

Debbie Bliss Eco Baby ...

 I prefer the first one, but it won't work with the 

others if I am going to  use them all together... 

Here are the first 3 squares all together.. 

Finally my suprise! My hubby has sent tickets 

for me to go to MADRID for the weekend! 

I fly tomorrow... alone (gulp!)... and come

 home on Monday... so excuse me if I don't

 blog over the weekend... the Sangria and

 Tapas are calling.... 

I hope you all have a

 lovely weekend too! x

Beautiful Blogger Blanket - finish date delayed to end of February and One-a-Day-ish!

So many lovely people have been contacting me for my
 postal address for the Beautiful Blogger Blanket.. 


Some of them live half way across the world! 

It seems that quite a few bloggers have only just
 found our beautiful blanket project and need 
more time....

 So I hope you won't mind too much if I delay the end date for the 
blanket until Prince Charles Birthday

 29th February 2012

This gives us all another 5 weeks... so if 

you have been worrying that your squares 

won't reach me in time, or if you have been 

kicking yourself for not joining in time...

Get a wriggle on and whip up a square or two! 

Look at the beautiful squares on the blanket's 
own page (the link is at the top of the right hand column) 

...and see what you could win! The whole blanket! 

Here are some squares that arrived at the end of 
last week from Joanne of Rose & Dahlia.... 

An exciting little package with a beautiful 

cup cake card

and 6 perfect little squares... 

1 pink granny square from a pattern in the book, 

'Happy Hooker', by Debbie Stoller - p.67.

Joanne used Rowan Handknit cotton yarn

 and the square measures 11cm x 11cm.

One...

Two....

Three...

Four! Simple Squares from the book, 

'Cute and Easy Crochet' by Nicki Trench.  p.36.

Again using Rowan Handknit cotton, each one measures 10cm x 10cm.

And finally... *swoon* ....

This GORGEOUS 11cm x 11cm square which

 has a pale pink background, a red red rose

 and green ground behind the rose to look 

like leaves. 

This one is called the Camella Square and 

again comes from 'Cute and Easy Crochet' 

by Nicki Trench. (P. 88)

Do you need anymore inspiration to make a square

 and send it to me to be sewn into our blanket?  

Then pop over to a blog which is new to me... 

Dana's lovely Crafty Minx blog.  Dana is 

making a square a day and they are 

stunning! 

Finally...today is Tuesday.. yep Tuesday again already! 

The girls have all been making great progress this 

week over at Carole's blog - Gingerbread Girl 

 and on the Ravelry group too here.

Did I hear you ask about my progress? 

A measly 2.5 squares and I haven't taken a photo! 

One more week to complete my self-imposed

 deadline of getting up to date by 31st January....

I think I have about 40 to make this week!

P.S: I'm off to another job interview tomorrow morning.. wish me luck! 

Crochet competition results, Beyond the Square Motif # 2 and Beautiful Blogger Blanket 2012

Last week I showed you my entry for Elisabeth Andree's 

crochet competition on her blog About Crochet ... 

Well I wasn't lucky enough to win...but my goodness, 

you should see the two winning entries...

They are amazing!  

Have a look at Lindy's scarf on her blog Who I Am  

I loved it as soon as I saw it. 

http://lindy-whoami.blogspot.com/2012/01/about-crochet-chsc-project.html

It is a sophisticated, clever design that shows off 

the texture of two crochet patterns beautifully, 

and Lindy's husband takes beautiful photographs

 of her (go and see)!.  

Lindy has also crocheted some squares for 

the beautiful Blogger Blanket...have a look here...

I can't wait to sew them into the blanket but they 

aren't in the country yet - they are coming all the 

way from Minnesota, USA! 

Sharing first place in Elisabeth's contest was 

Donatella of Inspiration and Realisation... 

http://inspirationrealisation.blogspot.com/2011/12/crochet-chain-link-scarf.html

Donatella crocheted this brilliant chain link scarf in 

gorgeous greens - the pattern is on her blog too. 

If you want to see all of the competition entries 

pop over here - I think they are all amazing! 

Still lingering at Elisabeth's Blog today she posted 

about a new blanket she has made which is beautiful.. 

have a peak here...  

It's a very clever use of colour isn't it? 

I had better show you my second motif for the Beyond 

the Square Challenge 2012 over at Barbara's blog 

made in k-town ....her it is all pinned out...

and again after blocking....

MOTIF # 2

If you want to be really impressed have a look at 

Barbara's gallery page where you can see 

everyone's motifs in the challenge.

Finally pop over to see the squares that Barbina 

has made for the Beautiful Blogger Blanket of 

2012 over at Little things made with love♥

Simple, beautiful squares are on their way from 

Germany and Barbina is going to post the pattern.  

I foresee little 'Barbina' blankets popping up all 

over Pinterest! 

I'll be back tomorrow with the contents of an 
envelope that arrived here on Friday...

Beyond The Square: Challenge 2012 and My Horrible Garden

I recently joined Barbara of the lovely blog 

Made in K-town  in a challenge to make at 

least 100 motifs from this book -  

Beyond The Square, Crochet Motifs by Edie Eckman. 

Finally, last night, I made my first one.  

Being the organised person I am ( if any 

family are listening, please just keep quiet

 at this point and let me have my fantasy)

I began on MOTIF # 1 

Here it is being blocked...

I'm not very happy with my picots, but
I've never done them before... I'll be
better at them by the end of this book! 

1 down, 99 to go....

If you would like to see the work of everyone 

who is joining in with this challenge, have

 a look at the page Barbara set up here.

Now the gardeners amongst you may want to look away or cover your eyes at this point. 

Yes, my garden is shameful.  

It used to be nice when my Mum & Dad helped me,

but they are not able to now, hence my garden

 is a muddy, weedy patch of very poor land.  

The weeds are in charge, Fred the dog 

likes digging holes in the lawn, my children hate 

going out there and my husband works abroad...

I have finally come to realise, it is down 

to ME to make it better.  

Here is the plan...

Wish me luck... I'm going out... 

I will blog about it again when there is 

progress to show you...

Beautiful Blogger Blanket of 2012 – WISH LIST

It occurred to me that there are some bloggers / crocheters 

whose squares I would LOVE to see in the 

Beautiful Blogger Blanket of 2012

They are the crochet blog 'Queens and Kings', 

Those whose writing we love, 

Whose crochet is inspiration and delightful, 

Whose blogs we visit in our droves...  

I propose that we compile a WISH LIST 

 of all those lovely people between us...

If you suggest someone, I will contact them

 and tell them that they are on our wish list... 

You never know... they might join us with a square...

What do you think? 

Suggest away....

One-a-day Tuesday Tallies and The beautiful Blogger Blanket gets squares from South Africa!

It is Tuesday...TUESDAY and I am doing my Tuesday Tallies!  

This has often been done in a late rush on a Wednesday 

so you can imagine my delight at being on time this week.. 

Here are the FOUR squares I made this week.. 

hence falling even more behind, when I have 

promised all and sundry that I will catch up 

by 31st January... 

Still 4 is better than none.. 

Pop over to Carole's blog Gingerbread Girl, 

to see how everyone else is getting on with 

their Tuesday Tallies...  

You can also check them all out at the Ravelry 

One-a-Day group page...

On Saturday morning the postman caused quite a stir 

when he brought me this.....

An envelope all the way from South Africa! 

Laura from My House in Africa had sent her 

squares for the Beautiful Blogger Blanket of 2012.. 

and look... 9 of them!  How generous! 

 It didn't matter how much I tried, I couldn't 

get the camera to pick up what a lovely colour 

these squares are..

                                                       

                                                Sorry Laura! 

A small plain dark Teal-green square measuring 10cm x 10cm

 This one is the same size, the same colour, 

but has a beautiful pale teal flower with 

a blue centre ...WOW!

 A larger (15cm x 15cm) granny squared circle

 in the same 3 colours...

Another smaller square - this time with the base 

ground in the paler teal green with a darker 

flower centre.. WOW again!

 Another smaller square (10cm x 10cm) 

in the paler teal-green....

One gorgeous larger lacy square (16cm x 16cm),

which has a star motif in the centre, 

surrounded by bands of trebles (UK term) 

and single crochet (UK term)...

This one is bigger again (22cm x 22cm) and 

is 3 bands of the previously used colours in 

single crochet.  

There is a pretty little centre too....

 The same size (22cm x 22cm), same colours, 

a centre that reminds me of the sun, with 

groups of trebles in bands and then a 

band of single crochet... lovely! 

 Finally, a 20cm x 20cm square in the same 

3 colours, rows of trebles and single 

crochet (UK terms)...

Some close ups...

 Well done Laura... I can't believe you sent 9 squares... 

thank you very much! You now have 9 entries 

to win the...Beautiful Blogger Blanket of 2012... 

Good luck! 

As well as all this, Laura sent  me a gift 

all the way from South Africa.. a beautiful 

traditional African beaded bowl or jug cover.. 

I put it over a wine glass to 

show you all the lovely beading dangling down.. 

 Thank you so much Laura!