Circles and circles

I have been doing some paper crafts lately. Reason - its easy and you get to see the end result quickly.

I wanted to replace my butterfly mobile with something new. I had some colorful brochures (from our home hunting last year) lying around. I picked those up and started cutting out circles in two sizes. For tracing the circle I chose a glass and a lid, in different sizes. I was so busy in the tracing and cutting that I forgot to take in-progress pictures.

Finally when all the circles were cut out, I laid the smaller ones on top of the bigger circles. Also tried to make them look as contrasting as possible. Once the pattern was set, I put my dear sewing machine to use - sewed all of them together.

And finally hung it on an empty wall near the kitchen.

What I love about this mobile is that when we switch on the fan in our living room, the circles start to twist and turn showing the colors.

I completed the project on Sunday evening and could not wait till the weekend to capture pictures of it at day time. So I clicked the pictures in the dim light itself.

I actually wanted to give the title to this post as 'New Paper Mobile' but then thought people might start thinking of it as a new mobile technology or gadget.

Weaving in Ends - Tip

Weaving in the ends are perhaps what I don't like. And when the project is big and with different colors of yarns, even worse. I found out a tip using which the number of ends to be weaved in can be reduced.

Let's see how to do it.

This is how you start with the stitch for a Granny Square or a crochet round.

The steps to make the end weaved in starts once the magic circle is done and you start doing the stitches in the square.

Yarn over, bring the hook through the magic circle, and when you do the yarn over again, make sure that the End to be weaved in (ETBWI) is in between the yarn and the hook. Now yarn over.

Continue the stitches while keeping the ETBWI in between during the yarning over step.

Here you see the length of the ETBWI visible reducing as the stitches increase.

And finally, there is no ETBWI now. You have only the loose end remaining. Result, lot of time saved on weaving in the loose ends.

Granny Square Edges - Tip

The biggest challenge when making Granny squares are that they often do not turn out to be the perfect squares with the crisp edges. This creates difficulty when trying to join two squares together.

So some tips -

When making a Granny Square:

1. Choose the correct size hook for the yarn you choose.

2. Hold the loose end of the yarn with even tension throughout the process. If you keep varying the tension, the size of the stitches also vary, which creates uneven squares.

3. When using more than one type of (or colour) yarn to make a square, make sure that the yarns are of the same ply and thickness. Else, the square can become uneven.

When joining Granny Squares, if the edges of are curved up like this, it is difficult to get the stitches correctly.


Here is one tip. Hold the squares to be joined together. Insert a smooth thin rod through the holes in the edge and hold it taut till you get a neat corner on the square. I used my crochet hook itself to hold the stitches up.


Now you can see that perfect bend at the corner as well as identify the stitches easily.

Happy joining :-)

Mini Green Blanket

I finally finished working on the mini green blanket. I am extremely thrilled with how it turned out. I had very few threads to weave in and the granny squares turned out perfectly this time. They are the best grannies I have made till date. Joining together the squares were also a lot fun. I would pick up the granny squares, huddle in front of the television and start joining. This is fun as it doesn't require much attention and you get the feeling that you are almost nearing the end of your project.

The mini green blanket was a quick project as most of the grannies were already ready when I started on the project recently.

As I mentioned earlier, I went on for a the usual edging - simple double crochets. I made three rounds of the edges (the pic shows only 2) and didn't take the final pics though.

Well, let's see the final mini green blanket!

Update - Mini blanket

I have been crocheting all through the weekend and completed the rest of the granny squares, joined the squares (I love this part a lot), and even started on the edging part. Within a day or two, hopefully, I will be able to show you the finished mini green blanket.

Edging was a difficult part to decide on. I wanted to try something really new, which I hadn't tried till now. But later on stuck with the conventional edging that I do owing to the blanket colours being not too flashy or vibrant. I just look forward to lay my hands on the blanket and finish it off. I still have a few threads to weave in.

During this projects I learnt a few techniques which makes blocking granny squares not that necessary and reducing the time you spent on weaving in the loose ends. I plan to write up a post on the techniques soon. So wait a bit.

See you all soon with my finished mini blanket.