Little Boy Blue Granny Stripe Blanket ~ Ta Dah!

At last ~ I have finally finished my Little Boy Blue Granny Stripe Blanket. This blanket was started away back in October 2011 ~ just a bit more than three years ago! How slack is that!! My poor small boy has been waiting VERY patiently for his blanket to be made. But now he is a very happy boy and can snuggle up in his own crochet blanket the way that it was intended.

This Boy Granny Stripe was made using Stylecraft Special Double Knitting in various shades of blue ~ which were Aster ~ Cloud Blue ~ Denim ~ Royal ~ Sherbet ~ Turquoise. I was also going to use Midnight but once I got started it seemed just a little too dark to sit comfortably with the other blues so I took it out of the mix.



I also decided not to go with working random stripes. I arranged the colours in the order that I thought they looked the nicest and then just repeated the sequence all the way up the whole of the blanket. All very technical!

This was the first few rows after the foundation chain ~ on hindsight I definitely should have gone up a hook size as the beginning of the blanket still seems a bit on the tight side.  You live and you learn!

I not quite sure why this blanket has taken me so long to make or why I seemed to lose motivation along the way ~ however, it's all done now! And it's not put me off blanket making either as I am already making plans to start another one! My daughter wants her own snuggly crochet blanket now too.

This was just over the half way point ~ eleven repeats of colour ~ six different coloured blue stripes in each repeat ~ sixty six granny stripes.

Now for the tricky bit! How difficult is it to try and photograph a large blanket? Nobody told me that I would have to climb on top of furniture and balance precariously with a camera in my hand just to fit the whole blanket into the picture.

However ~ Ta Dah!!

Here it is ~ The Little Boy Blue Granny Stripe Blanket in all it's glory ~ All 122 gorgeous blue stripes of it!

Because the blanket is so big I decided to go with a very simple edge to finish it off. Three rows of treble clusters around the edge of the blanket in Denim, Cloud Blue and Turquoise followed by a simple scalloped shell type border ~ as requested by my boy himself.

Finally ~ some Blankety Facts ::

Yarn ~ Stylecraft Special Double Knitting worked on a 4mm hook.

Measurements  ~ 128cms by 168cms.

Stripes ~ 122 stripes of blue loveliness.

Amount of yarn used ~ nearly 20 x 100gm balls.

Cost ~ 20 x £1.69 = £33.80

Weight ~ just under 2Kgs ~ very cosy and very snuggly indeed!!

I am happy to report that the blanket has been in almost constant use since it has been finished and that my boy has really been enjoying wrapping himself up in his own cosy and snuggly blanket on these recent very chilly wintery mornings :O)xx

Easy does it!

We have had some unwanted visitors here this week in the form of coughs and colds and sneezes and it has been necessary to slow the pace right down and take things a little bit easier. I've had a small boy home from school for the last couple of days. He has been fighting a temperature and has been wrapped up in a cosy blankety nest on the settee ~ and although my Little Boy Blue Granny Stripe is not quite finished yet it has already been put to good use as part of that blankety nest. There has been some cuddly doggies making use of it too!  I know that he must really be feeling under the weather as he has been happy to sit still and has been a bit too quiet ~ which is really not like him at all!

There has not been much opportunity to get out and about either as the weather here has been rather a mixed bag. There has been rain, sleet, snow, lots of wind and the odd glimpse of some sunshine. And it's been bitterly COLD too ~ It really can't seem to make up it's mind!

I took the opportunity on one of the nicer weather moments to have a walk along the sea front ~ and on the way home I passed this wonderful statue. He's called The Watcher ~ he is dressed in outdoor gear, with his camera slung over his shoulder and he gazes out towards the sea looking through his binoculars in the direction of the Bass Rock. He stands there in all weathers and I think he is just crying out for a bit of a woolly makeover ~ maybe a hat and a scarf would keep him a bit cosier!

I've been trying to get myself into the Christmas spirit too ~ I managed to rescue this little Poinsettia plant from the reduced shelf in the supermarket for a bargain price of just less than two pounds. It was all dried up and in need of a little bit of TLC ~ all it really needed was a long drink of water and a nice spot at the window and it soon perked up. It's looking very healthy now and I am enjoying seeing it's beautiful red and green foliage every time I come into the room. These lovely plants are just so Christmassy!

Hope that you all have a very lovely and cosy weekend :O)xx

Random Things

This week I have been enjoying a nice cup of tea and a very sticky slice of syrupy flapjack bought especially for me by my boy. It was absolutely delicious despite the fact in had been wrapped up in a napkin and carted around inside his school bag for a whole afternoon.

I treated myself to a really cheap pot of hyacinths from the local supermarket for just a few pounds, They came inside a rather dull and dreary brown plastic pot so I decided to re-pot them into my favourite seasidey mugs. I'm really looking forward to seeing them bloom on my kitchen window sill and can't wait for them to begin to flower ~ I decided to go for the blue flowers as I love them the best. They have already grown quite a little bit in height since I brought them home.

I decided that the afore mentioned re-potted hyacinths were just crying out for couple of crocheted coasters to make their life on the window sill a bit more comfortable. I had a bit of a rake through my stash of Stylecraft and found some suitable hyacinthy colours and managed to whip up some pretty little Flowery coasters for them to sit on.

I also enjoyed a nice chilled glass of white wine on Sunday evening whilst adding the last few stripes to my Little Boy Blue Granny Stripe blanket. I am happy to report that I am now on the final push with this blanket (it's only taken me nearly three years!) and I am just about teetering on the edge!

Just recently the skies around my little part of the world have been pretty spectacular ~ this was the sunrise a couple of mornings ago. The colours have been particularly beautiful this month and I do love to see the dark silhouette of the Law against the sky.

Hoping your week has been full of lovely random things too :O)xx

Little Things

Little things that have made me happy this week ::

Thing One ~ watching my boy march at the front of the Remembrance Parade last Sunday playing his bagpipes.

He looked so smart in his uniform and I'm not ashamed to say that I had a little tear in my eye as I watched him march past. Such a Proud Mummy Moment!

Thing Two ~ unearthing my Little Boy Blue Granny Stripe (which has been on the go for much longer than I care to admit!), and adding a few more lovely blue stripes. It feels like it's just the right kind of weather now to be crocheting a blanket too. I think that I must be almost 3/4 of the way done with this blanket now and it is getting quite heavy. There is something quite comforting about feeling the weight of the blanket on your knee as you crochet, and I must say that it is doing a really good job of keeping me cosy as I crochet away adding stripes.

Thing Three ~ ordering some Rico Creative Cotton for my latest project from The Wool Warehouse and being delighted when I opened the parcel and found that it came all nicely packaged up in a beautiful little organza bag. I really didn't expect that ~ what a lovely thing to do!

Hoping you all have a very lovely weekend :O)xx

Blanket progress

As promised, I'm just popping by to show you the progress that I've made so far with my Little Boy Blue Granny Stripe Blanket. Admittedly there has not been as much progress made with this blanket as I would have liked ~ but that is purely down to me doing my usual thing and letting myself be completely sidetracked with other projects such as knitting socks. Oh!! ~ and running out of a crucial component to hooking a blanket called yarn didn't help me much either!

When I first started planning to make this blanket I wasn't quite sure if I was going to just stick with using blue tones ~ I had been toying with the idea of adding red and cream into the mix. But when I tried the colours out together I wasn't completely convinced that they really worked and decided to follow my instincts and stay with my all time most favourite colour spectrum of blue. And I must say that I am very happy indeed with my final choice.

The yarn that I am using to hook this blanket is good old dependable ~ and very reasonably priced ~ Stylecraft Special Double Knitting. In the following colours :: Denim, Aster,Cloud Blue, Sherbet, Royal and Turquoise.

Each colourful blue stripe of the Little Boy Blue Blanket is made up of two rows of treble clusters, and there are 74 treble clusters in each row. At a rough guess I think that it usually takes me about 15 minutes to work one row of treble clusters, which means it takes me around half an hour to complete each blue stripe. Not too bad! I have managed to get six repeats of each colour from my first six balls of yarn.

I did think that I would manage to get seven repeats ~ but no amount of finger crossing and silent hooky praying would make the last little amount of yarn stretch to complete another stripe. Almost but not quite! I only had another few little treble clusters to go until I reached the end of the stripe! But the yarn totally refused to play ball! Still it gave me a great excuse to go online and indulge in a little bit of yarn shopping ~

Not that many of us normally need an excuse! I ordered another six balls of blue loveliness and then took the liberty of adding a few more colours to my stash for some future projects that I have already lined up in my little head!

We have now broken up for our Half Term holidays, so I am looking forward to spending a lazy week at home with my two small people. I hope that you all a lovely weekend and I'll stop by again sometime early next week :O)xx

A New Year ~ 2012

Well, here we are, already four days in to a brand New Year. I hope that you all had a very lovely time at Christmas ~ although, I must say that Christmas seems like it was absolutely ages ago! We took all our decorations down yesterday before my lovely husband went back to work and now the house looks very bare indeed.

It was our very first Christmas in our new house and we all had a really wonderful time, despite being loudly awakened at half past two in the morning by a very bouncy and excited small boy, shouting "He's been!". Once he had opened his stocking he was more than happy enough to go back to sleep until a more reasonable hour! Thank Goodness! As usual my two Small People were well and truly spoilt! The day itself was fairly quiet ~ we had some family over for Christmas lunch and I'm pleased to report that I all my panicking over cooking Christmas lunch was a bit silly as everyone said nice things about the food and it all got eaten ~ so it can't have been that bad!!


I've enjoyed lots of very lazy days during these holidays ~ days sitting around in my pyjamas with my feet up, drinking lots of tea and consuming vast amounts of chocolate. I have also been lucky enough to have been able to spend quite a bit of time indulging in some Hooky Stuff and there has also been the sound of clicking knitting needles too.


Due to numerous factors, (but mainly because we were in the middle of moving house and everything was packed away) last year was a very unproductive year for me crochet wise so I am planning to make amends for it this year. I'd love to be able to find the time to finish all my WIP's, and maybe even produce twelve finished woolly things by the end of the year! I'd also love to have a go at knitting myself a pair of socks ~ surely it can't be that hard, can it?


I'm off now to hook a couple more rows of my blue Granny Stripe ~ there may even be a cup of tea to be had too ~ but this time there's definitely no chocolate allowed! :O)xx

Blue Stripes

This week I am absolutely loving my new Blue Stripey wellies from Joules. They have Green and Blue Stripes with a jaunty little orange stripe up the back of the boot and the very delightful name of Water Fall ~ my all time favourite Watery colours.


Just right for late Autumny walks through the lovely crisp, scrunchy leaves and more than likely for stamping through puddles and trudging through snow later on in the year! This year I am determined to be prepared for the wet and wintery weather when it arrives.


Loving my Blue Stripey socks too! Just right for feet that need to stay warm and dry inside the Blue Stripey Wellies out in the cold and also for sitting cosily on the settee with a cup of tea and some hooky stripes.


Also loving my Blue Granny Stripes ~ although progress has not been as quick as I would have liked and these particular Granny Stripes are at the stage of looking very scarf like at the moment! And although a scarf would come in very handy right now, these stripes are destined to be a snuggly Blue Stripey Granny blanket just right for keeping warm and cosy on a wintery evening.


I'm off now to try and hook up a few more Blue Stripes ~ Enjoy your weekend and I'll see you all very soon :O)xx

Smiley things :O)

Making me smile today is the progress that I have been making with my blue stripey blanket.


I have been whizzing back and forward along these stripey rows making lots of treble clusters of cozy blue loveliness. I love how easy this project is ~ easy, mindless crochet that can be picked up and put down without too much thinking about. And these days that's exactly the sort of crocheting that I need.

Smiley thing number two is this lovely new crochet book which just happened to pop through my door this week ~ Cute and Easy Crochet by Nicki Trench. Do you see that EASY word cropping up again? I bought this book from The Book People for just £3.99 ~ can you believe it? I had to do a double take for it to sink in. There was really no reason why I couldn't have this book ~ It just had to be mine! What an absolute bargain! This really is a super book and it is jam packed with lots of lovely projects which are just begging to be made ~ the only problem that I am going to have is deciding what to actually make first.

Also making me smile today is my pretty new year planner. I have been particularly scatterbrained over the past few weeks. Forgetting about meetings for work, missing dental appointments and my worst scatterbrained moment of all was turning up a week early for parent's night at my little boy's school!

Up until now my usual haphazzard method is to scribble things down on little pieces of paper and then end up hunting frantically for them in one of my many piles! So, in an attempt to get myself a bit more organised ~ and to save my poor children squirming with embarrassment at their mother ~ I am going to try and write down appointments as soon as I get them. This year planner is great because it has a side for me and a side for the rest of the family per page ~ there really is no excuse now is there? Wish me (and my children) luck!

I hope that you find lots to be smiley about today too! See you all soon :O)xx

Granny Stripes

At last!

I have finally managed to get around to making a start on a Granny Stripe blanket. I have been wanting to crochet one of these lovelies ever since they started doing the rounds of Blogland last year, but have just never had the time up until now. But here I am jumping on the Granny Stripe bandwagon and I have to say that I am really looking forward to the ride.

The foundation chain has to be done in multiples of three ~ so I sat yesterday and crocheted a chain whilst counting 123,123,123 in my head. In the absence of a size 5 hook I remembered to crochet my chain loosely on my trusty and very favourite size 4 in order to make crocheting the first row as easy as possible.
I am making this Granny Stripe for my little boy and want it to be around about the single bed size when finished. So, I carried on counting 123, 123, 123 in my head until I thought the chain looked the right length and then ran up stairs with hook and chain in hand and measured it against the bed. That's about as technical as I get these days!

This Boy Granny Stripe is going to be made using Stylecraft Special DK in various shades of blue, with perhaps a few other colours thrown in for good measure. But I've not quite decided whether or not I'll deviate from the Blueness or not yet!


These are the colours that I have chosen so far ~
Aster ~ Royal ~ Midnight ~ Denim ~ Cloud Blue ~ Turquoise ~ Sherbet ~ Bluebell.
I am really excited about this blanket and now that I have finished the tricksy foundation row I am raring to go and can't wait to go whizzing along the rows with ease ~ making lots of lovely Blue treble clusters.

Right! I'm off now to put the kettle on for a cuppa and then get settled for a few rows of Granny Stripes :O)xx