Monochrome Throw

I have become engrossed with making throws, afghans and lapghans out of squares. There are many varieties of squares and colors of yarn that possibilities are endless. Here I made a throw in a single color and used solid grannies and traditional grannies. I think it turned out lovely and a more sophisticated look than multicolor squares would make. There is no pattern, I just fiddled around and came up with this. I used larger hooks than I usually use for the lapghans I make.

I used a little over 2 Caron One Pound skeins of off white. This yarn is nice and soft and after washing it was very soft. I did use the wash cycle for delicates and dried on medium heat. I used softener in the wash and also used dryer sheets that were probably not necessary.

I have a pile of slippers that I've recently made. I have a trip planned back to my old home state of Illinois to visit and I plan on taking everyone I visit a pair of slippers. I know that I will probably miscalculate but I hope that I err on the side of making too many instead of too few. I will be showing you these slippers another day.

Wishing a nice weekend for all of you. Take care...

Hugs,

Sharon

Monday's Link to a Free Crochet Pattern (27 February 2017)

Here's a pattern for a ripple type afghan. It is a different take on a traditional afghan. Have fun!

Monday's Link to Free Crochet Pattern (20 February 2017)

Messy bun hats seem to be all the rage lately. Here's a cute pattern for you.

Monday's Link to a Free Crochet Pattern (13 February 2017)

Today's link to a free crochet pattern is right here to this blog. I hope you enjoy this. If anyone makes this pattern and blogs about it, let me know so that I can link to your blog and let others see your creation.

Thanks for visiting.

Sharon

Pattern courtesy of Internet Archive https://archive.org/details/PlaidOne


  

Monday's Link to Free Crochet Pattern (30 January 2017)

Today's link is to a pattern for Cache Baskets. It has patterns for 3 different sizes of baskets to suit many of your needs.

Have fun!

Sharon

Haribo Lakritz Konfekt

Lapghan for Vets Home

Another lapghan from odds and ends of purplish yarn completed. I used solid granny squares of 6 rounds. I used 6 squares across by 6 squares tall for a total of 36. I edged it with 1 round of DC and finished it with a round of shells. I ended up with 2 extra stitches so I had to do a little "fudging" on the shell row. Here's the pictures.

Not much going on here. Last night I finished squares for yet another lapghan. It will take me a few days to assemble it.

 Take care my friends,

Sharon

Instant Photo Prints with The Prynt Case for Apple iPhone 6s , iPhone 6 , and iPhone 7

Quick Note.

I have endeavored to keep my blog posts free from political themes. However, today I feel I must put my 2 cents out in blogland. Many of my fellow Americans have given our new president less than 24 hours to demonstrate that he is trying to work for the betterment of our great nation. Women have marched in our capital and in other parts of our nation. Hoodlums have rioted, demonstrated, and caused injuries. All this was done without giving President Trump a chance. A single word that demonstrates this is "prejudice" and it is NOT a pretty word. His former opponent, Hillary Rodham-Clinton has tweeted her support of the marchers. If she truly was a patriot, she would have urged her supporters to get behind the president and if his actions were intolerable, then follow the proper protocol to make changes.

I could go on and on but I will stop here.

Peace,
Sharon

A Couple Baby Blankets...

One of my sons recently asked me if I would make a couple baby blankets so that he could give them to friends who were expecting babies. He did not know the gender of the anticipated bundles of joy. I decided to use gender neutral colors that were popular in my younger days--pastel green and yellow. I also decided to make the main color an off-white color (Aran by Red Heart). I think the blankets look "antiquey," Here's the pics--

For this blanket, I made 4 of the squaring the big circle squares, joined them and then treated them like a big square (guess that's what they became) and continued making rounds until it was the size I desired. The final round was done with a shell stitch,

For the 2nd baby blanket, I used the cuddle and coo pattern. I did not, however use the edging that the pattern called for but rather did 3 rounds of single crochet. I was having problems with the edges "rippling" so I just did a simple edging. This pattern, except for my incompetence with the edging, was very easy to make. I will probably try this one again and play around with different edgings.

It has become our routine, to head to Florida for winters. This year however, I am unable to travel. I'm not feeling "bad," but I have blood clots in both legs. No biggie, I have what is known as a vena cava filter that "catches" the clots and prevents them from traveling to organs such as lungs, heart or brain. I have had problems with my legs, especially left leg, swelling and feeling uncomfortable, no real pain. This was going on started in August when I was in the hospital with back pain. I had always thought that blood clots cause PAIN, not just achiness or discomfort. The point I want to make is that if you have any of these symptoms that you should seek medical attention. I was fortunate to have the filter put in as a precaution before I had a surgery. 

I hope y'all are warm and cozy. Have a great week.

Peace,

Sharon

Nellie Belle's New Sweater

Nellie Belle is our baby. She is 11+ years old, not in the best of health but don't tell her that because she thinks she's a teenager and likes to romp and play and act the diva. We may not make it to our snowbird home this winter so I decided to make Nellie a sweater to keep her warm. She's not too fond of clothing so this is more of a thing for me than her. Anyway, here's a picture of her sporting her new duds.

She's staying close to her daddy, hoping for protection from the camera wielding mom.

Here's the pattern. I added a flower, and you can find the pattern for it here.


Have a great weekend and stay warm.

Sharon

A Couple Completed Things and Coffee...

Just finished a lapghan last night and a dishcloth that I made to have a little break from working on the lapghan. Sometimes I find I need a little change of pace and a small project like a dishcloth or even slippers, a hat or a scarf will do the trick. Anyway, before I "talk your ear off" here are the pictures.

Pattern

No pattern, just solid grannies of 6 rounds except the center one is 12 rounds. I am still making these lapghans to donate to the new veterans' home here in our town in Kentucky.

Moving on to the 2nd half of this post, I want to share my happiness over a Christmas present I received. Hubby bought me a Keurig K55 coffee maker. 

I'm in love with it; however, I am not in love with the price of the coffee to go in it. I suppose if I only drank 1 cup per day it wouldn't be too bad. To be honest,  I drink 6 cups or more everyday. So I put on my thinking cap and thought about what money saving idea I could find. 

I bought a reusable filter. Works great but 1 filter is over $7 at Walmart. I did buy one because in the long run it will save money. As I was browsing through Dollar Tree the other day, I noticed that they had a 2-pack of reusable filters for Keurigs. Bingo! We have a winner. I bought a couple packs and pre-filled them.  When I'm ready for a cup o' joe I just pop one in the brewer.

Another thing, I wanted to have a little variety by having some flavored coffees. Since I drink decaf (like all post-menopausal women should) I found it hard to find much variety in decaf coffees. I spent quite some time on Amazon searching for a good deal on some flavored decaf coffees. I found a variety pack of 6 flavors, 96 count for only $37.90. Score! A smaller size for $13.30 is offered but it costs less per pod by ordering the larger size. I got my order in today and have already tried 3 flavors and I definitely recommend  them.

Today I have been rather chatty so I will let you go for now. 

Cheers (as I raise my coffee cup to you)!

Sharon

Monday's Link to Free Crochet Patterns (02 January 2017)

Happy New Year everyone. Today, I am sharing a link that will take us to a pattern for what looks to be a sturdy tote bag. This bag would be nice to put a to-go crochet project in or to take shopping since in many parts of the United States and other countries, free shopping bags are becoming a thing of the past. Here's the link.

Hope you finished up 2016 on a positive note and are headed for good health, happiness and peace in 2017.

Hugs,
Sharon









3-in-1 Multifunction Breakfast Center

A Quick Look at 2016 Crochet Projects

Here is the slide show of the projects I completed in 2016. I got the photos from my ravelry account under the tab for 2016. Of course, as I was looking at a similar folder I have on facebook (after completing this slideshow video), I noted that I missed posting one project on ravelry so I actually completed 168 projects, not the 167 that are shown in the video. I know that 167 sounds like a big number but I really got hooked on making dishcloths for a few months and they don't take anytime at all to make. I don't know why I had this fascination; I just did. Here's the video with some royalty free music added to spice things up. Thanks for viewing.

Hugs,

Sharon

Kodak PIXPRO Friendly Zoom FZ53

A Couple Hat and Scarf Sets

Didn't want to share these with you until after Christmas. We had a quiet Christmas. Husband, his mom, son #1 and I had Christmas dinner together. Husband did a nice thing for my Christmas. I had lost the diamond in my engagement ring and he had it replaced as well as re-enameling the lettering on my Hawaiian wedding band and a Keurig coffee maker. Back to the subject of crochet, here's a couple hat and scarf sets. One is for a young lady and one is for a gentleman. Here's a look at a few pictures.

I used the Drops Pattern called Broadway with the addition of a flower.

I love the yarn I used to make the red white and blue scarf. It is a Red Heart yarn called Americana. I made this scarf using the granite stitch aka moss stitch so there wasn't a pattern. I know many people use this stitch for color pooling but I haven't had much luck with it but I like the texture of the finished product when using this stitch with most yarns.

This gray hat is what was called a watch cap when I was in the navy. This pattern calls it a seafarers cap. 

This scarf is made the same way as the red, white and blue scarf. In real life, I didn't notice the argyle-like design; looks like I might have had an inadvertent color-pooling success.

This is it for now. I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas.

Hugs,

Sharon

Stockpiling a Few Pairs of Slippers

I have enough slippers made for Christmas gifts this year but I made a few extra pairs because I never know when I will need some additional pairs for unexpected or last minute gifting. Here's a look at the ones I am stockpiling.

If you've been here before, you probably already have the link to the pattern for these because they are one of the most frequently made items here at Sharon's Eclectic Retreat. For the newbies, here's the pattern's link. 

Hope y'all are keeping toasty warm. Happy holiday season.

Hugs,

Sharon

Barbie dolls