Baby Granny Blanket

Back again! Yay! First off, I'd like to say a great big thank you to my friends who left me some lovely and encouraging comments on my last post. I really appreciate you stopping by, especially after my long absence. :) And I'm happy to post another project today.

Back at the beginning of May, Jessica came home from her assessment day with a piece of math homework. It was a decoding assignment that had some "breaking news." She had to solve the math problems to figure out the code. By the time she was partway through the assignment, we had a pretty good idea of what the breaking news was. Jessica's teacher is going to have a baby! I thought was a pretty clever way to announce the news to the class. :) I wanted to make her a little something before the year ended, but ran out of time, what with the other gifts I had planned to make. And I felt bad, since I had made gifts for the other teachers the girls have had that had babies. 

So, I decided to work on a small baby blanket last weekend. I had seen the pattern on a list I am on called Hooked on Crochet, from All Free Crochet. (All the patterns are free,  and many I don't care for, but often enough I find one that I really like and want to try). The pattern is called Nana's Favorite Baby Blanket. It's all double crochet stitches (my favorite) and it is small, like a "lovey" so I knew it would work up quickly. I found some great neutral yarn colors in my stash and started the project on Memorial Day. I finished it up Wednesday night. We took it to Jessica's former (!) elementary school and the wonderful ladies in the office assured me they would make sure she got the gift. Happy sigh.

I really like how the colors looked together and wanted to share the project with you. I ended up adding another round of each color to make the blanket just a bit bigger. My thought is that they can use it to tuck around the baby in the car seat or something. I didn't measure it but I think it's about 22 inches square. The color that looks blue in the photo is really a seafoam green color. The lighting around here today isn't that great, I guess. Oh well!

I had thought about making a card to go along with the gift, but I originally planned to take this to the school yesterday and I didn't have time to make one as we had errands to run. So the girls and I picked out a card while we were out that had a teddy bear holding a blanket, which we thought was too cute to pass up. 

I've also made a tatted bracelet for Amy and one for Jessica since I last posted as well. They are the same design that I showed before. This time one is purple and one is pink. 

Now I need to decide what to work on next. :)

Thanks so much for stopping by! I hope you have a wonderful weekend. 

Jeanne

Made it to Summer Break!

Hello there! 

Oh my goodness, what a crazy time it's been for our family these past several weeks. Not bad, for the most part, just busy with the end of the school year approaching at breakneck speed and mom furiously trying to keep up and get everyone where they needed to be at the right time. I think this year has been the busiest yet in terms of activities. Friday was the last day of school and now we can all release a huge sigh of relief along with a heaping feeling of accomplishment. Yay! I know I have been very quiet and I am really hoping to be able to sit down and create  projects to share now that our summer vacation has started. Fingers crossed!

Hope you don't mind a photo heavy post right about now. I thought I would share the gifts I created for the teachers and staff at Jessica's school. This was her last year in elementary school and I wanted to give a gift to a few more people than usual to let them know how much we have appreciated them over the years. 

First up, though, Amy and the girls in her Girl Scout troop had worked very hard most of this year on earning the Silver Award and upon running a weekend encampment for Junior Girl Scouts in April, they succeeded. The award is service based and the girls planned the activities so that the Juniors would earn various badges by the end of the weekend. Amy taught the girls about making campfires. Amy and her troop had their end of year meeting and awards ceremony last week where she officially received the award. Yay, Amy! 

Here is Jessica with her teacher. 

I think great minds must think alike as she was coordinated outfit wise with her teacher, her best friend and the principal! *Ü*

This set was for Jessica's teacher. She had kind of a tough group of boys this year and when I saw this counted cross stitch pattern, I thought she'd appreciate it. I have tried to crochet a lion (school mascot) for most of the teachers over the years. Jessica liked this one with the cute belly button for her teacher. 

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The school had a new principal this year and she has been an amazing addition to the staff. I had to make her a lion, too and love the loopy mane. :)

After lots of thought and searching and trying out different ideas, this is what I came up with to give to some special people at the school. 

I used a technique called needle tatting to create the bracelets and earrings. 

Tatting has been around for a very long time and is more commonly made using a shuttle (or two). I don't know how to tat that way(looks way too confusing to me), but a few years ago I came across a book on needle tatting. I really like the lacy look. It's not hard as there are only a few "stitches" to learn, but it can get confusing figuring out which way to turn this or that. Thank goodness for You Tube videos! :)

Detail shots

Jessica and Amy both helped decide what color would best suit each recipient. 

Thanks so much for stopping by.

I hope you have a relaxing Memorial Day weekend.

Keep a thought for those who have served and sacrificed so that we can enjoy our many freedoms. 

Hope to see you again, soon!

Jeanne