Moogly’s Chainless Starting Double Crochet

While making my beautiful Candace Scarf in the last couple of weeks, I decided to incorporate this new technique that I learned from being a regular visitor to the Moogly Blog.

In pretty much every single pattern you read, when crocheting to the end of the row the instruction will be “Chain 2, turn,” which is a great, fast and simple way to keep going when making items that are worked in rows.  However, the down side is that there are always holes where the chain 2 is.  Now, this probably isn’t noticeable at all to the wearer, unless they crochet.  But to me it’s basically like a pair of dog’s bollocks.  Fairly obvious.

Here’s what the standard chain 2 turn begin looks like:

Big gap, using chain 2 begin to a rowAnd here’s how it looks when you use the Chainless Starting Double Crochet:

No gap, using chainless starting double crochet

And to compare:

The two methods side by side

For the instructions you can head over to Youtube and watch the tutorial made by Tamara from Moogly:

Or you can check out the photo tutorial here.  Obviously if you’re a lefty like me you have to flip everything over in your mind’s eye for it to make sense.

I love it when I come across these little hacks, so I’ll be sure to share more of them with you as I find them.

St Patrick’s Day Baby Leprechaun Hat Pattern now Available

It has taken months and months and MONTHS to get there, but I finally have my St Patrick’s Day Leprechaun hat pattern ready to go.

Well, I have it in the newborn size for now.  I’m still working on the toddler size and will post the adult size as soon as I can.

The pattern is available in all of my stores, Etsy, Craftsy, and of course, Ravelry!

Here’s how it looks:

Baby Leprechaun - St Patrick's Day, pattern now available!

To celebrate, I’m giving away two copies of the pattern for free!  All you have to do to win is comment on this original post (on missneriss.com), and I will draw a random winner on Wednesday 12 March!  I will announce the lucky winners here and they will also be contacted by email.

Good luck, and thanks so much for your ongoing support!

Updated 13 March 2014

And the winners are:

Suzy and Patricia!  Congratulations, the pattern is on its way to you!

Pinned today:

Scotty’s Place: The Sampler Blanket .. #crochet

The “Candace” Scarf

I’ve just finished making this absolutely gorgeous scarf for my mum. I’ve been searching for the perfect project for her for a long time and when I finally came across this amazingly beautiful yarn from Malabrigo I knew that the time was right!

My mum loves all things blue. She has loads of blue clothes and blue jewellery, and of all of the blues, turquoise is the most beautiful on her. It matches her eyes perfectly and she always looks that little bit more vibrant when she wears it.

So making this scarf truly was a labour of love and I can’t wait to see how it looks when she wears it in a few weeks.

20140308-131505.jpg

But why is it called the “Candace” scarf? Well, I’m sure it has a completely different name, but when a bunch of my crafty girlfriends were all chatting about great patterns, Candace piped up with this one and because it’s such a beautiful pattern and loads of us have made one, The “Candace” just sort of stuck.

I’ll share the (free) pattern during the week. I didn’t write it, so I’ll link it, but I did hack it, so I’ll describe what I did so you can make it for yourself!

Crochet Mood Blanket February Progress Report

For the entire month of February it was zero.  That’s right, zilch.  Niets.  Nada.

I don’t know what happened, truly.  On January 31 I was busy and happy and enjoying making my mood blanket, then on February 1 it was like the lights went out.  I put the progress in the cupboard and was busy with other things that interested me more.

But, the guilt became too much.  Be damned if I’m going to give up on this project!  It may not have a years worth of squares at the end, or it may become a cushion (god I hope not), but it will become something!

I spent the last few evenings on the couch trying to catch up as best as I could, so as of today (March 4), I’m only about 12 days behind.  I’ve completely given up on the mood concept, and am just adding random colours and letting it grow.

Here it is:

I still love the colours, and I love the feel of the blanket and it makes me very happy, I just need to be more motivated to finish the bloody thing!

How’s your progress?

Just for your info, I bought the pattern for the blanket from babylovebrand.net and the yarn is Cotton Light by Drops.

#crochetmoodblanket2014 update on missneriss.com

 

Pinned today:

Small #crochet #amigurumi piggies, seen at missneriss.com

Small pigs #amigurumi #crochet totally cute!

Baby’s not a baby any more!

It’s a strange feeling. Two years ago I was childless and happy, and today I have a toddler and am even happier.

This coming Wednesday my daughter and I both have birthdays. She’ll be two, and I’ll be 29 again. We celebrated her birthday yesterday with my husband’s family and had a lovely day eating rainbow cake. I felt a bit guilty letting her eat so much food colouring, but honestly, it’s once a year. I’m not feeding her red icy poles on a daily basis, and there’s no red cordial in our house!

Last year we went a bit overboard with a Very Hungry Caterpillar birthday theme, and this year we toned it down a lot, and had rainbow things. My daughter loves rainbows – I’m always drawing them for her and she loves to give it a go herself.

So off to Pinterest I went and found the most amazing rainbow cakes in jars that I just had to make.

It took a bit more effort than I thought, and if I could I’d do them again because I got my amounts wrong, so instead of one rainbow, I had to mix up two batches and had two rainbows in the end. They also shrunk a bit while cooling, but I don’t know how I could have prevented that to be honest – any ideas?

Here’s the original:
Rainbow cake from babble.com

And here’s my daughter, enjoying herself immensely!

As a little bit of fun for myself, I dressed her as my two year old self for the day. My mum has a photo of me with my hair in pigtails and wearing this exact dress as a two year old, so because my own family can’t be here to celebrate either birthday, I wanted to offer a bit of a tribute to them too.

The best part of the whole day was Raina saying happy birthday all the time and even singing Happy Birthday to You, she’s awesome.

Meet Kevin the Minion

Here he is, finished!

Kevin the Minion - as seen on missneriss.com

(click the image to pin it)

I loved making him, and it was a great experiment without a pattern.  Obviously with my critical eye there are loads of changes that I would make, so am considering making even more, and writing the pattern down.  Plus I’d love to make the possessed minion too…

What do you think?  Worth the investment in time?

Image

WIP Wednesday

It’s taken ages, but finally I get to make Kevin the minion! I’m loving this little guy, and can’t wait to see how he ends up when he’s all done.

I initially went searching for a pattern, but the only one that I loved was All About Ami’s but it was much too big, so I decided to make my own.

He’s working up quickly too, which is what I love about amigurumi projects – instant gratification!

How much do you love minions?  Probably not as much as I do….

Fresh off the Hook – Elephant Lovey

When a friend asked if I would make her something for a baby boy, all I could think of was this beautiful Elephant Snuggle by local Amsterdam designer Dendennis, so even though the request came through at about 9pm and I was planning on an early night, I couldn’t wait to get started.

In real life the elephant is even better looking than in the photos!

Elephant Snuggle on missneriss.com - free pattern

Elephant Snuggle on missneriss.com - free pattern

Elephant Snuggle on missneriss.com - free pattern

Best news of all, the pattern is absolutely free!

->  Get the Elephant Snuggle here  <-

I used Drops Paris for this project, which you can order via Wool Warehouse* and Caro’s Atelier*.

If you’d like me to make you one of these, feel free to shoot me an email from my contact page, and don’t forget to follow me on Facebook and Instagram too!

*Affiliate Link