The craft fayre unfortuntely was a bit naff-it was held in a community centre in two rooms and I don't think it was well organised or well advertised as very few people showed up.  I had 120 decorations-managed to sell about 20...just about covered the cost of the table and some of my materials but nothing else!  Only one person wanted a tarot reading as well but it went well-good learning experience even if it was a massive let down :-(

On the plus side, I have lots of beautiful decorations that'll be making their way into this year's Yule gifts....

Now I'm desperately trying to make some presents for family for Yule-rapidly running out of time!

And...I'm back!

Well, not back to my usual crochet prolificy yet-the cast came off nearly two months ago and I STILL haven't been given a physio appointment!  Thankfully, a friend has had a bunch of physio on her wrist so she came me some strengthening exercises so it's a lot better but still not completely back to normal.

I've been crocheting hard, making lots of beautiful christmass tree decorations to sell at my very first Craft Fayre-a friend of mine who makes divine Vegan cakes is sharing a stall with me so I'm making lots of little decorations and we'll both be offering Tarot readings as well.  We did a Halloween event as Tarot readers (my first ever despite reading for ten years) which was nervewracking but amazing and gave me a lot of confidence.

I'm making a range of things to sell-the fayre is next Saturday (eeek!) but so far I have about 40 items ready to go.  These include-

The patterns are from these two sites-
http://amjaylou.blogspot.co.uk/2013/11/crochet-christmas-tree-decoration.html

http://belladia.typepad.com/bella_dia/2008/02/sweet-heart-cro.html

They're both wonderfully simple and beautiful and hopefully will prove popular...
I figure whatever I can't sell will go on the Tangled Web's page or in as little Yule gifts

I'm way behind on my crochet plans this Christmas-I have no money to speak of (there's been a number of big problems with the Jobcentre which has made things quite desperate at times) and I usually make quite a bit of the gifts-this year I'm not sure what'll happen as I'm running out of time and my wrist can't manage much.  Keep your fingers crossed for a successful Fayre on Saturday!

Hope you're all well xxxx

Christmas Special Blanket

Long time without posting-I'm working really hard which isn't leaving a lot of crochet time-a little frustrating as despite supposedly earning a wage, I'm still financially struggling.  Last year, I made most of the Yule gifts as I had no money-this year I have no money and no time to make anything!  Bit of a nightmare.

Anyway, a while back one of my close friends told me about fundraising she was doing to help out the people in her community who were saving through Park Christmas Club and whose savings were taken by their Park representative and not passed along.  Many have literally lost all the money they've been saving all year and due to a criminal investigation, Park say they cannot help with any compensation.  So there's a lot of fundraising going on to help out.  Follow this link for more details.  I suggested making a blanket (as usual lol) to go towards the raffle or to be auctioned, originally planning a 6 by 9
size but due to time constraints I made a much smaller 6 by 6 which will either make a lovely gift for someone's Grandma or be a nice tablecloth centrepiece.

The holly leaves pattern is from the amazing Attic24 but the stars, snowflakes and trees are mine :-)  Very pleased with how they turned out.

I kept the border simple with a round of sparkly deep purple, a round of white and a chain stitch round in red.  For the last round, I used red and put (in american terms) 1sc 1dc 1tr ch2 slst into first chain to make a small picot point and slst into the top of the prev tr then another 1tr 1dc 1sc and slst into the next chain sp and repeat along.  In the corners, I just did a slst 1sc slst and slst into next space as I didn't want to mess with corners.  Uses a LOT of yarn and took quite a while but worth it I think!  What do you think?

Edited to include my pattern for the snowflakes.  I've been playing with hexagons of late and they make a great snowflake base (they're also the base for the star).  My sister left a lovely comment asking for a link to the pattern for the snowflakes (which made me grin this much :-D) so I typed it out and messaged her.  Thought it may be nice to copy it here as well but be warned, I'm terrible at writing out a pattern (I tend to make things up as I go) and it may not make much sense...

I'm using american terms cos I'll only confuse myself if I try to translate it...Apologises for the poor pattern writing, it's not something I've practised much!

Snowflake 1) (round 1) ch 5, join with slst to first chain to make a ring. ch 3 and put 1 dc into the ring and ch2. (2dc, ch2) five times and join with a slst to the beginning chain3. You should have a small hexagon with six groups of 2dc separated by ch2.

This is the base for the first type. (round 2) Slst into the first ch2 space and ch3, 1dc. Then ch5 and put 2dc into the next ch2 space. (ch5, 2dc) into each space around until you have 2dc in each space separated by ch 5 spaces. Slst to close the round.

Now for the fun part...

(round 3) slst into the ch5 space. (1sc, 1hdc, 2dc, 1hdc, 1sc) into the ch5 space and join with a slst into the top of the dc from the previous round. (ch4, slst into third chain to form picot, ch5, *picot in third chain, ch3, picot, ch3, picot, slst into base of *picot, slst across the other side of the chain 2, ch3 picot, slst into base of opposite picot, ch1 and join with slst to dc from previous round.

Repeat this around so that in every ch5 space, you put the 1sc, 1hdc, 2dc, 1hdc, 1sc and on the top of the previous round's dcs, you make the picots. Join with a slst to close and fasten off.

Snowflake 2) (round 1) Make a small hexagon as above.

(round 2) slst into ch2 space and ch3, 1dc, ch2, 2dc, ch1. (2dc, ch2, 2dc, ch1) into each space around and slst to close. You should end up with a bigger hexagon with 6 groups of 2dc, ch2, 2dc, separated by ch1.

(round 3) slst into ch2 space. ch5, picot in 3rd chain, ch5, *picot in 3rd chain, ch3 pciot, ch3, picot and slst into the base of *picot. Slst along the other side of the ch2 and ch3 picot, slst into base of opposite picot, slst along other side of last two ch2 and slst into the ch2 space again. Slst across the top of the 2dc and into the ch1 space. ch4, picot in 3rd chain, ch3, picot, ch3 picot and slst into base of first picot and slst along the other side of the first chain, slst into ch1 space again. Repeat this around so that in each ch2 space you have a long piece with 5 picots in total and in each ch1 space you have a small piece with three picots. Join with a slst and fasten off.

2012 In Crafting and Crochet (lots of photos)

Last year I did only a handful of posts-most of which were blankets :-)  This year has been so crafty for me-there's been blankets-

There's been a new camera so much better pictures of more blankets!

There's been an attempt at an amigurumi bear

Crochet cosiness in the form of hats, scarves and hot water bottle covers

 Ponchos too!

There's been a little bit of pyrography

A few banners :-)

Games and gifts :-)

I wonder if I can top this in 2013!  It's going to be fun finding out :-)

Yule Banners

I was going to do these as separate posts but I've got all the photos uploaded so you get it all at once hahaha!

I made a little banner for my sister as part of her birthday gift and the pattern was so simple that I decided I would do a couple for Yule as well.  So I started making green and red pennants for one spelling out 'Merry Christmas' as part of Mum's gift and while I think it's lovely, it is quite long... (sorry for the photo quality, the light is quite bad and I couldn't find a better place to display it that was long enough!)
I added a crocheted snowflake and at Myf's suggestion, used white felt for the lettering and I like the simplicity of it :-)


As Myf and I are having our Yule celebration on the 17th this year, I've been manically trying to get everything organised and decorated.  So far, we have a tree up and decorated by Myf, paperchains and cards in the living  room and another banner just for us in the dining room.  I want to do most of the house pretty this year so still loads to do but I'm trying to make a lot of our decorations this year to make it extra special.

Rather than using lettering, I chose to crochet some decorations to stitch on and it looks so pretty!

 

It has snowflakes, holly and a little Christmas tree inspired by handmade gift tags my sister made :-)
Myf wants be to make one for her bedroom so hopefully I'll the time to make one for her in time...

I made one more as a early Yule gift for a friend-with a snowman in the centre 

Before I gave it to her, I just add to take a photo of the two hanging up together (sadly couldn't get Mum's on the dresser too-hope they can find somewhere to hang it!)

There's a couple more decorations I need to make this weekend as well as the last part of Mum's gift.  Cards to write and gifts to wrap and more pretty things to hang and lovely food to buy, oh yes, I'm starting to feel the season!