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cotton

Daisy bag

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This bag was designed on my daily commute.   I love the fresh look with white cotton and picked the colours my daughter liked but the colour way is entirely up to you!

The finished bag measures 10 inches by 7 inches or 25cm by 18cm.   I put on one shoulder strap but it would easily convert to two smaller handles if you prefer.   I have included instructions for both.

The yarn I have used here is Drops Muskat a mercerized cotton which gives great stitch definition and a firm finish that should not stretch with use.   It works up on a 4mm hook and is very good quality/value.   I paid £1.45 per 50g ball.

Daisy Bag instructions – UK terms  (SCROLL DOWN FOR US TERMS!)

The pattern uses a 4mm hook and three colours of yarn.   For the example in the photo I used:

Yarn A – Drops Muskat – colour 19 – Light Grey

Yarn B – Drops Muskat – colour 18 – White

Yarn C – Drops Muskat – colour 06 – Light Pink

Starting with Yarn A – Light Grey

Base – Chain 5 stitches, slip stitch into the first chain to form a loop.  Chain 35.   slip stitch into the fifth stitch from the hook to form a second loop.

1st round – This is the only real fiddly bit so it is worth taking your time.  Chain 2, DC 30 along the straight chain.  Take care not to let the chain twist as you work it.   Don’t worry if you have to pull it out a couple of times to get it right (I did!).   Work 6DC into the end loop, DC 30 along the straight chain working into the DC’s from the first part of the round.   This gives a strong bottom to the bag.   your work should look like the photo’s below.   Finally – work 6 DC into the end loop and join with a slip stitch to your start point for the round.

2nd round – Chain 2, DC 31, work 2DC into each of the middle four of the six DCs you worked into the loop of the base.  DC 32, work 2DC into the middle four of the six DCs you worked into the second loop of the base.  1 DC, slip stitch to join to the start point of the round.

3rd round – Chain 2, DC 32, work 2DC into the next 6 stitches, DC 35, work 2 DC into the next 6 stitches, 1DC, slip stitch to join to the start point of the round.

The base of the bag is now complete!!  If you would like a bigger base – repeat the row above, adjusting the increase round the ends of the base to allow the work to lie flat.

4th round – Chain 2.   DC into every stitch BUT – only pick up the back of the stitch.  See photo below.   This creates a line that will form the edge of the bottom of the bag.

5th round – Chain 2, Tr into each stitch on the row below.   Slip stitch to join to the top of the three chains that started the round.   Note – lots of patterns would say to chain three before a round  of Trebles but I find that chain 2 works better for me and gives a neater finish.   It might be worth trying both versions to see what suits you best.

6th round – Chain 2, DC into each stitch on the row below.   Slip stitch to join to the top of the two chains that started the round.

7th round – repeat the 5th round working Trebles

8th round – repeat the 6th round working DCs

9th round – repeat the 5th round working Trebles

10th round – repeat the 6th round working DCs

Change colour!   Working with Yarn B – White –   I normally try to join in the yarn on the end of the bag so that the start of each row is not in the middle of the flat part where they are more visible.

11th round – repeat the 5th round working Trebles

12th round – repeat the 6th round working DCs

13th round – This round creates the ‘holes’ that we will later weave the bands through.  Chain 4, (miss one stitch and work Treble into the next, chain 1)  repeat to end of round.  Join with a slip stitch to the third of the four chains that started the round.

14th round – Chain 2, work one  DC into the ‘hole’ on the previous row.  Continue by working 2DC into each of the ‘holes’ created in the previous round.  Join with a slip stitch to the second of the two chains that started the round.

15th round – repeat the 5th round working Trebles

16th round – repeat the 6th round working DCs

17th round – repeat the 13th round, creating the holes.

18th round – repeat the 14th round working DCs into the ‘holes’.

19th round – repeat the 5th round working Trebles

20th round – repeat the 6th round working DCs

Change colour!   Working with Yarn C – Light Pink

21st round – repeat the 6th round working DCs

22nd round – repeat the 5th round working Trebles

23rd round – repeat the 6th round working DCs

24th round – repeat the 5th round working Trebles

25th round – repeat the 6th round working DCs

26th round – repeat the 5th round working Trebles

27th round – Chain 2, Htr into each stitch on the row below.   Join with a slip stitch to the second of the two chains that started the row.

28th round – Slip stitch into each stitch on the round below to create the decorative edge.   Join to the start point with a slip stitch and this completes the main part of the bag.

Creating the ‘ribbons’ that weave through the bag.

To create the two ribbons that you will weave in and out of the ‘holes’ in the bag, first take yarn A – Light Grey and make a chain 102 stitches long.

Slip stitch into the third stitch from the hook and keep going with a slip stitch into each chain until you get back to the start point.    Pull both ends through the loop on the hook to finish off, leaving the two ends which you will use to stitch up the ribbon.

Work the second ribbon in the same way but in yarn C – Light Pink.

Creating the flower decorations.

First Flower – Working with Yarn A – Light Grey.   

1st round – Make a magic loop then Chain 2, DC 11.  Join to form a disc.

2nd round – (Chain 6 slip stitch into the row below at the base of the chain.   Slip stitch into next stitch) repeat six times.   This will give you a disc with six chain stitch loops that will form the basis of the petals.

Change colour! – working with Yarn C – Light Pink

3rd round – (working into one of the chain stitch loops, 3 DC, 1 Htr, 1Tr, 1HTr, 3DC.  work one slip stitch into the stitch on the row below between the chain stitch petals), repeat six times until you have a full set of six petals.   You have a finished flower!

Second Flower – Now work the flower again switching round the two yarn colours.

Assemble the bag by slotting the ribbon through the ‘holes’.    I chose to put the Pink ribbon closest to the bottom and near to the Grey section of the bag.    If you weave the ribbon in and out of the holes over and under the Trebles that form the holes you should find you come back to the start with two ‘unders’ side by side.    This is probably easier to see in the photo below than it is to understand my explanation!

Join the two ends of ribbon at this point and then attach the flower over the top of the join, between the two places that the ribbon was woven under the bars.    I used the flower with the Light Pink petals at the bottom of the bag next to the section that was made in Light Grey.   ie use the flower with petals in Yarn C against the ribbon in Yarn C.

Finally – Adding Handles or Strap.  

To finish the bag you need to decide whether you would like a shoulder strap or twin handles.    The start point for both is to create ribbons as above.    Each strap or handle needs three ribbons which are plaited.

The ribbon length I used to create the shoulder strap was 202 chain.

The ribbon length I used to create each handle was 82 chain.

Work three ribbons – one in each colour.    Attach the three ribbons to each other at one end.   Note – if you use two of the ribbons the same way around and one the opposite way round you will have ends of yarn at both ends of the plait, this will help with the stitching up.   

 

Using the ends of yarn from each ribbon stitch the handles into the bag – and you are done!!   

I hope you enjoyed this pattern.   Please let me know.    US terms follow.

Daisy Bag instructions – US terms

The pattern uses a 4mm hook and three colours of yarn.   For the example in the photo I used:

Yarn A – Drops Muskat – colour 19 – Light Grey

Yarn B – Drops Muskat – colour 18 – White

Yarn C – Drops Muskat – colour 06 – Light Pink

Starting with Yarn A – Light Grey

Base – Chain 5 stitches, slip stitch into the first chain to form a loop.  Chain 35.   slip stitch into the fifth stitch from the hook to form a second loop.

1st round – This is the only real fiddly bit so it is worth taking your time.  Chain 2, SC 30 along the straight chain.  Take care not to let the chain twist as you work it.   Don’t worry if you have to pull it out a couple of times to get it right (I did!).   Work 6SC into the end loop, SC 30 along the straight chain working into the SC’s from the first part of the round.   This gives a strong bottom to the bag.   your work should look like the photo’s below.   Finally – work 6 SC into the end loop and join with a slip stitch to your start point for the round.

2nd round – Chain 2, SC 31, work 2SC into each of the middle four of the six SCs you worked into the loop of the base.  SC 32, work 2SC into the middle four of the six SCs you worked into the second loop of the base.  1 SC, slip stitch to join to the start point of the round.

3rd round – Chain 2, SC 32, work 2SC into the next 6 stitches, SC 35, work 2 SC into the next 6 stitches, 1SC, slip stitch to join to the start point of the round.

The base of the bag is now complete!!  If you would like a bigger base – repeat the row above, adjusting the increase round the ends of the base to allow the work to lie flat.

4th round – Chain 2.   SC into every stitch BUT – only pick up the back of the stitch.  See photo below.   This creates a line that will form the edge of the bottom of the bag.

5th round – Chain 2, DC into each stitch on the row below.   Slip stitch to join to the top of the three chains that started the round.   Note – lots of patterns would say to chain three before a round  of DC but I find that chain 2 works better for me and gives a neater finish.   It might be worth trying both versions to see what suits you best.

6th round – Chain 2, SC into each stitch on the row below.   Slip stitch to join to the top of the two chains that started the round.

7th round – repeat the 5th round working DCs

8th round – repeat the 6th round working SCs

9th round – repeat the 5th round working DCs

10th round – repeat the 6th round working SCs

Change colour!   Working with Yarn B – White –   I normally try to join in the yarn on the end of the bag so that the start of each row is not in the middle of the flat part where they are more visible.

11th round – repeat the 5th round working DCs

12th round – repeat the 6th round working SCs

13th round – This round creates the ‘holes’ that we will later weave the bands through.  Chain 4, (miss one stitch and work DC into the next, chain 1)  repeat to end of round.  Join with a slip stitch to the third of the four chains that started the round.

14th round – Chain 2, work one  SC into the ‘hole’ on the previous row.  Continue by working 2SC into each of the ‘holes’ created in the previous round.  Join with a slip stitch to the second of the two chains that started the round.

15th round – repeat the 5th round working DCs

16th round – repeat the 6th round working SCs

17th round – repeat the 13th round, creating the holes.

18th round – repeat the 14th round working SCs into the ‘holes’.

19th round – repeat the 5th round working DCs

20th round – repeat the 6th round working SCs

Change colour!   Working with Yarn C – Light Pink

21st round – repeat the 6th round working SCs

22nd round – repeat the 5th round working DCs

23rd round – repeat the 6th round working SCs

24th round – repeat the 5th round working DCs

25th round – repeat the 6th round working SCs

26th round – repeat the 5th round working DCs

27th round – Chain 2, HDC into each stitch on the row below.   Join with a slip stitch to the second of the two chains that started the row.

28th round – Slip stitch into each stitch on the round below to create the decorative edge.   Join to the start point with a slip stitch and this completes the main part of the bag.

Creating the ‘ribbons’ that weave through the bag.

To create the two ribbons that you will weave in and out of the ‘holes’ in the bag, first take yarn A – Light Grey and make a chain 102 stitches long.

Slip stitch into the third stitch from the hook and keep going with a slip stitch into each chain until you get back to the start point.    Pull both ends through the loop on the hook to finish off, leaving the two ends which you will use to stitch up the ribbon.

Work the second ribbon in the same way but in yarn C – Light Pink.

Creating the flower decorations.

First Flower – Working with Yarn A – Light Grey.

1st round – Make a magic loop then Chain 2, SC 11.  Join to form a disc.

2nd round – (Chain 6 slip stitch into the row below at the base of the chain.   Slip stitch into next stitch) repeat six times.   This will give you a disc with six chain stitch loops that will form the basis of the petals.

Change colour! – working with Yarn C – Light Pink

3rd round – (working into one of the chain stitch loops, 3 SC, 1 HDC, 1DC, 1HDC, 3SC.  work one slip stitch into the stitch on the row below between the chain stitch petals), repeat six times until you have a full set of six petals.   You have a finished flower!

Second Flower – Now work the flower again switching round the two yarn colours.

Assemble the bag by slotting the ribbon through the ‘holes’.    I chose to put the Pink ribbon closest to the bottom and near to the Grey section of the bag.    If you weave the ribbon in and out of the holes over and under the DCs that form the holes you should find you come back to the start with two ‘unders’ side by side.    This is probably easier to see in the photo below than it is to understand my explanation!

Join the two ends of ribbon at this point and then attach the flower over the top of the join, between the two places that the ribbon was woven under the bars.    I used the flower with the Light Pink petals at the bottom of the bag next to the section that was made in Light Grey.   ie use the flower with petals in Yarn C against the ribbon in Yarn C.

Finally – Adding Handles or Strap.

To finish the bag you need to decide whether you would like a shoulder strap or twin handles.    The start point for both is to create ribbons as above.    Each strap or handle needs three ribbons which are plaited.

The ribbon length I used to create the shoulder strap was 202 chain.

The ribbon length I used to create each handle was 82 chain.

Work three ribbons – one in each colour.    Attach the three ribbons to each other at one end.   Note – if you use two of the ribbons the same way around and one the opposite way round you will have ends of yarn at both ends of the plait, this will help with the stitching up.

Using the ends of yarn from each ribbon stitch the handles into the bag – and you are done!!

I hope you enjoyed this pattern.   Please let me know.

Happy Crocheting!

Annie 🙂

Crochet blog – update #8

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Hello and SORRY – it has been a few weeks since my last post.    I was calling these ‘weekly’ updates but that just hasn’t been happening.    My day job has been REALLY busy for a few weeks but should be calming down now, so hopefully I will get to spend my weekends here again.

I have still been busy with my crochet projects on the train each day.    I have also been able to work on with my Hearts and Spots blanket in the evenings.  Although I don’t want to get my laptop out after a day in the office – I don’t mind a bit of crochet to wind down before bed.

Here are the latest views of the blanket.   I still have to tie in all the ends but it is all stitched together.  The border would be finished if I hadn’t run out of yarn!   The yarn order is in for just two more balls of Drops Paris to complete the project.   The patterns for the squares are on my blog, heart square pattern here and basic square pattern here.   I am not fully happy with the way they fit together so I will be tweaking them over the coming weeks.   I plan to put a smaller version of the blanket together as a kit so watch this space on that.

This project is waaay too big for the train now so I have been working on other things in the mornings and evenings.   I started work designing more blocks and produced a pentagon….  not terribly useful as they don’t tesselate or fit together easily.   I might turn out a pattern for a ball (think football/soccer) at some point using these and a hexagon or two 🙂  I will put the hexagon pattern up on here in case anyone finds it helpful for a five sided project!   I suppose you could just keep going round and make a pentagon shaped blanket.

My other project on the train has been a little bag.   I am quite pleased with this so far.   It looks a bit basic as it still needs handles, decoration.  I think I might include a lining.   Again I am thinking about putting this pattern together as a kit on Etsy but I will share the pattern for free on the blog as soon as I can get it written up.

I have been using a lighter weight yarn for these two projects, Drops Muskat.   Another winner from Drops as far as I am concerned.  This yarn again is incredible value and consistent quality.  I have yet to find a knot!  The yarn is 100% mercerized cotton with a lovely sheen and tight twist which means that it doesn’t split much if at all when being worked.   Easier if you want to be looking up from the work a bit!  I have been using a 4mm hook for this yarn which seems to work well.  The finished work has great stitch definition so would really show off complicated stitches.

Finally, a team project has started in my house.    It started with me worrying about the cost of yarn.   I began wondering whether it would be possible to get hold of some yarn very cheaply by buying old knitwear and dismantling garments to recover the yarn.   This is where my Mum came in and if I am honest has completely taken over!   A trawl of local charity/thrift shops turned up a number of candidate garments.    We got to work (carefully) with scissors, unpicking and balling and the results have been amazing.    I will put up a separate post on the process and results as I could fill pages with what we found and learned.   For this post, in summary, we have recovered a huge quantity of yarn so far for a tiny outlay.   My Mum is now unstoppable in her search for woollies to dismantle and I have started my first project using this recovered yarn!    I am trying to top up what we find with yarn from my stash but as it stands far more is going into my stash than is coming out!!

Here are some of the pics of the project using the recycled yarn.   The inspiration for the project was the first yarn we recovered – a soft brown boucle yarn flecked with yellow and orange.    I came up with a pattern for a block using a cluster stitch (another new one for me).    I will share the patterns in a separate post.

My husband loves drawing and designing and was once an engineer before moving on to other things so he likes a bit of geometry and maths.    I enlisted his help for this project as I was short on time.   He came up with this layout below which I really like – I think I will be asking him for designs more often!   Here is his sketch.

I have had a very exciting time with the blog this month.   One of my posts on pricing of handmade work seemed to catch attention out there and drove far more page views than I have had previously.   My income from ads ‘soared’ to £1.83 in one month 🙂 clearly still a long way to go to being financially secure!

That’s all from me for this post – I have promised a number of follow on posts and patterns so I had better get working!   Please get in touch either by leaving a comment or joining my mailing list.   I love hearing from you all.

Happy crocheting!

Annie 🙂

 

Crochet blog – update #6

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Hello and welcome to my sixth update!   This week I made more progress on my blanket project.   I realised I have been calling it different names as is has progressed.   It started life as my Shades of the Rainbow blanket but more recently I have been calling it Hearts and Spots!   Whatever name it ends up with I have to confess, I am ready to move on… I have never been great at finishing things but this blog acts as a conscience so I will get it done!

This photo shows four more completed rows of squares.   Only four more to go and I can start the making up.   I have already made the majority of the blocks for those last four rows but still need to fasten off the ends.

I started to look into pricing of this project, researching on Etsy and google for similar items and found a huge range of pricing.   Some of it was incredibly low and looks to cover the cost of materials at best.   This got me thinking!   I built myself a little spreadsheet to calculate the cost of producing the blanket.   I know what the yarn cost including shipping and I used the UK minimum wage to value my time. The blanket isn’t finished yet but when it is I will know what I should be charging. The spreadsheet has a section to record the number of hours worked.   I think I will use one for every project from now on.   I created it as a PDF and set up a FREE DOWNLOAD HERE.   Pricing basics (590 downloads)   I wrote a longer post on pricing which you can read here – pricing basics.

As a break from my big project this week I designed this new block in the picture above.   I have made it up in a few colours with some of my left over scraps. I am very pleased with the way it turned out.   Here is a link to the FREE PATTERN. There are no complicated stitches so it should be suitable for beginners.   I have listed the instructions in both UK and US notation.   I haven’t decided on my next big project but I would quite like to make a blanket with this block.   I worked it in Drops Paris yarn on a 5mm hook and the finished blocks are about 14cms square.

The problem with these little side projects is that they hold up work on the main project.   I do tend to get a bit distracted by new things.   Confession time, I have three other side projects on the go.   I am working on a cushion design, a summer top and a shoulder bag design.   The good news is that I will be able to share those patterns with you soon I hope.

For now it is back to finishing of little Hearts and Spots squares.   I hope you have a good week. Happy crocheting!

Annie 🙂

Crochet blog – update #5

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Hello and welcome to my fifth weekly update!

This week has been all about getting my heart and spot squares finished.    I have completed all the blocks for four of the colours.   Sewing in the ends has been a long long job!   I laid out the finished blocks  in the order I want them to sit in the finished piece and I am preparing to start joining them up.   I plan to join them using the mid shade in each colour way but I might change my mind on that after testing a few styles.   Here is the layout I am working on.


The picture shows almost all the squares in a row and there are are another eight rows to complete!  I was given a single ball of every colour of Paris Drops cotton yarn for Christmas and this is the project I came up with for that yarn.   The pattern would be great for using up oddments though and the design would look very different with random colours instead of these single colour stripes.   I am planning to make it again mixing all the colours up as an experiment 🙂

Yarn Review –  Drops Paris – this is a strong cotton yarn that works up using a 5mm hook/needles.    The yarn comes in a wide range of colours – 47 available at the time of writing.  Some of the colours say that they are made from recycled denim and those tend to be more harsh in texture.   In general the yarn is relatively soft for cotton.   Drops Paris is made up of many thin strands and does have a tendency to split.  This means you have to watch carefully as you work but if you do find it splitting it is easy to pull back out and correct.    One really big plus for me is that I have hardly found any breaks/knots in the yarn.   It is very reasonably priced – I am picking up odd additional balls as required for around £1 per 50g ball.

Stash buster project – Even though this blanket project is a stash buster itself, using small bits of yarn, I am still finding that I have oddments left over.   As a break from sewing in the ends on all these blocks I came up with a use for those oddments.    This is a hair accessory I made.

I have put up a separate post  – hair accessory instructions in case you want to have a go at this.    It is soooo quick and I am really pleased with the results.    I am using fairly thick cotton per the review above, but if made using lighter, softer acrylic yarn the strands form lovely spirals which you can mix and match with the straighter ribbons.

In other (non-crochet) news, I have been working on two knitted blanket patterns which I will be sharing next week.   One of them is a chunky, soft and cosy blanket made with some lovely 100% merino wool (shown below) that I picked up at a craft show.   The other is a much lighter baby blanket with stripes and hearts.   I am looking to back the baby blanket with fleece and put some crochet edging round it but at this stage the blocks are waiting to be sewn together.

I think that is all I have this week – back to sewing in ends and sewing up blocks for me!   Happy crocheting!

Annie 🙂

Sample Squares

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Last Christmas I asked my husband for what he thought was a very strange present.  I asked him to get me one ball of each colour of a certain type of yarn.     I wanted to be able to play with the colours and to put together a blanket design based on all the colours available.    The yarn I had picked was Drops Paris.   I chose this because I wanted to work in heavy cotton and this yarn is so inexpensive it made the project affordable.     Apparently ordering the yarn one ball at a time was quite a lengthy process so my husband called the online retailer and some very helpful people processed his order by phone!

I designed a pattern for a small square and produced one of every colour except black.    I decided to use black to edge all the squares so didn’t want a black square.   Here is a picture of my finished set of one of every colour sample squares 🙂

I designed the blanket by laying these all out on the kitchen table and moving them around until I saw the design I wanted.   I then worked out how many more squares of each colour I needed and calculated my yarn requirement based on that.   I have placed a yarn order and I am now waiting for delivery.    Whilst waiting for the yarn to arrive, I used the single ball of black yarn that I did have to edge a few of the squares.   I am never sure whether I want to edge in black or white but I do think black is more practical.

When the yarn arrives I will be able to make up the rest of the blanket and will be sharing photos here.   I will put the pattern and the finished product up on my Etsy shop.   I have found this method of designing very quick and easy once I had made all the small squares.   It did take quite a long time to make up the sample squares though and I have ended up with a few that I will not be using.   I wouldn’t want to do this with a more expensive yarn.

This is the final theme for my project.   I have arranged the squares in a rainbow with a pastel, muted and bright row of each colour.   This is only possible because of the large range of colours in this particular yarn.   I hope you like the idea 🙂

If anyone would like the pattern for the coloured square it is available in the patterns section of my blog.     The blanket would be  a great stash busting project if you have a lot of oddments of yarn of similar weight.    I would recommend  using one colour for the edging of each square to pull the blanket into one design.

That’s all from me for now.  On to the next design…..

Happy crocheting!

Annie 🙂