What I made from my T-shirt yarn leftovers ....

At the end of THIS POST I wrote that I had some leftovers from my t-shirt yarn and some royal blue to try .... I did!!!!

I started with the royal blue ... some trivets....

For the granny circle, I just followed a free pattern from Kotbury, HERE !!!
Both the granny square and the granny triangle, instead, I remembered the patterns by heart (I think I made so many of these in the last years!!!) and I worked only 3 rounds for each.
The borders, in all 3 samples, are made of single crochet stitches (US crochet terminology) and the picots are made with 5 chains each!

Then I made two necklaces !
The first one was even shown in my Instagram account ...

I crocheted a long chain with the blue and the red together, then I made some tassels out of some cotton threads from Bali and I knotted them around the foundation chain and .... voila' !!!!


The second necklace had less t-shirt yarn available, so the design had to be slightly different, even though even here some chains were worked ...

With some colourful rayon thread, I embellished this necklace with some slips stitches (pink) and some little arches made with chains!!!

What do you think???

xxxx Alessandra

Something different : a water dispenser cover (or cosy?) !!!!

A friend of mine asked me to crochet her a cover for her terracotta water dispenser ....
I never did that before ....
I checked on Pinterest to find some inspiration ... almost nothing ...

I asked my friend to take some measures (circumference, diameter and height) and knowing that she loves the blue&green combo, I started to crochet a circle for the top ...

I've been using some turquoise yarn from my stash and a 4mm hook and my design involved some filet crochet !!!

As the subject was "water" (and because of the colour selection), I decided to consider some fish to crochet on the cover ...

The fish pattern was taken from Betty Barnden's FILET CROCHET and I adapted it (on a piece of paper with small squares) accordingly with my needs (number of stitches, groups and spaces) ...

... and after some rounds, I started to see the fish ...

The thing is that, because starting to crochet from the top to the bottom, you have to read the chart upside down !

To check properly the design, I put the cover on a lamp that I have on my computer desk, that is next an Egyptian panel with ... fish! ...

After the trio of fish was completed, I decided to add some waves (pattern taken from the same book as for the fish) ...

To break the sameness of the work, I began to decorate the top of the cover with some neon green and slip stitches ..

... and the waves were getting more and more ..

I like when you are approaching the end of your work and you realize "It makes sense!" ...

I added some extra designs to the cover (another kind of fish and some seaweed) and fringes to complete it

as you notice, at a certain point my turquoise yarn ended and I had to replace it with some other yarn... I was disappointed, but then I thought that the abyss are darker than the surface water, so .... it was not completely wrong and I patted my shoulder to cheer me up !!!

These are all the designs I used in the cover (the seaweed is mine!) ....

the cover in all its length .....

I gave the cover to my friend last Friday (she was so excited!) and later she sent a picture of her terracotta water dispenser all covered up for the occasion ...

.... and the picture arrived with a caption "Happy water filter" !!

She rolled it a bit (I think we had some problems with the conversion of the measures from inches to cm !!!!), but she loves it and she said the colours are fantastic!!!

I like to notice that in the back of the pic there is a cat bowl with fish on .... !!!!

I'm curious to know your opinion on it!!!!!

xxxx Alessandra

Make it !!! …. Finally a pattern ( a kind of …) !!!!!!

….. It has been a long time without a patterns or photo tutorials from me…. Sorry for that, but I didn't have honestly the time or the mind set for all that !!!! ;oD

Today I can show you what happened to my colourful and stripy piece of fabric ……

… Yes !!!! It turned out as a bright and cheerful placemat ( Tobia and Matteo want one both!) ….

I didn't put down a proper pattern to follow, but I can give you some directions, if interested !!!

Using a 2,5 mm hook, I decided to chain 110 chains+3 more (as my first double crochet for the beginning of the first row) for the foundation row and the first 2 rows (in red) are made of double crochets (please remember that I follow US crochet terminology!). Then I added pink at the beginning of the 3rd row (without cutting the red thread) : with this colour, instead, I worked 2 rows of single crochets. At the end of the 4th row, I cut the pink thread and reused the red one, working other 2 more rows of double crochets!
The stitches are repeated in sequences of two ( 2 rows in double crochets, then 2 rows in single crochets, then again!) and I decided to use red and hot pink as the main colours for the base of my placemat. In pink, turquoise, green lime and peach I crocheted the tiny stripes of single crochet.
In total, I worked 62 rows (32 rows in double crochet and 30 rows in single crochet), then I fasten it off.

After trimming in all the colourful ends, keeping the front of the work in front of me, I decided to start to work on one of the shorter sides of my rectangle. I chose yellow to be the main and only colour, and with it I started to crochet a first row of single crochets.
The second row was made of single crochets (again!), while the third row was something like : chain 3 (as first double crochet), chain 1, 1 double crochet in 3rd stitch, chain 1, 1 double crochet in 5th stitch, chain 1, …… repeat till the end of the row!!!!
Rows 2 and 3 were repeated 3 more times. I completed the yellow strip at the end of row 9.

At the conclusion of row 9, I didn't cut the yellow thread, but, instead, I started to work a simple and tiny border, all around the placemat. I didn't work it for the 4th side of the placemat, but I stopped at the end of the 3rd side, where I decided to cut the yarn and fasten off ! DONE !

This border is quite easy : 1 sc, 2 chains, 1 sc, 2 chains, …… and on and on !!!! Do you remember this photo tutorial ??? It can be helpful !!!!

The dimensions of the finish placemat are : 47cmx32cm

Some more pictures ….. !!!!!! …… ;oD …….

Happy weekend, xxxxx Alessandra

My Ravelry notes are HERE !!!!

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