Christmas 2014 - All about the crochet

So I've been scrambling, and the weekend before Christmas I was all finished with Christmas presents.

For my mother-in-law, I crocheted a simple shell border around some high quality towels using Sarafina cotton (size 2) yarn.   To do this, I first sewed, with the same yarn and a sharp needle, a blanket stitch around 2 towels and 2 washcloths.  Then I crocheted a single crochet row, then 5-double crochet, skip 2, slip stitch, skip 2, 5-double crochet etc around making the shell row.  That's it.  Easy peasy, and well worth it, my mother-in-law loved it!  Perfect gift.

///////////////////////////

For my grand-niece, well, I finished that blanket and pony!  Woohoo!  Her birthday is Dec 29th, and they are coming down for Christmas on Jan 1st, so what I'll do is wrap the blanket up as a birthday present, and the pony up as her Christmas present.

///////////////////////////

I've already begun the new baby's blanket.  And, since I made Princess K a toy, I suppose I'll make Princess ? one too.  I'm about 6 rows past what is shown in this picture.

Princess K's blanket/pony update

It's time to post an update on the blanket and pony I'm making for Princess K.

On the blanket, I've just started the border.  What a pain.  All those ends!  I knotted them together, then simply crocheted over them, but it's not nice and neat like I think it should be.  I'm going to experiment with the next row being a DC or TC over it, or something.   Maybe I'll leave that, but in the spirit of keeping this blanket reversible, maybe I'll turn the blanket around and cover those ends up again on the next row.  Keep them from trying to work loose.  I'm just not happy with this, though. 

So I'm in a problem stage right now, with these ends, or problem stage in my mind.  Here are the pictures so you can see what I see:

Lumpy the Pony is in my bedroom, and I don't want to get up and go get it.  Back in 2006 I somehow herniated my L5-S1, pretty badly.  I couldn't stand up straight at all without incredible pain.  So I had to have surgery in spring of 2007, and basically that little sac between my L5 and S1 disks had exploded.  No idea what I did.  So I was doing wonderful after that surgery, until a 2008 hurricane came along, we flooded, completely remodeled while living with my parents, and when we moved back in in January 2009, I pushed something I shouldn't have pushed.  Too heavy.  Reherniated.  But it wasn't so bad that I can't live with it with a heating pad, ibuprofen, and Vicodin when the pain gets really bad.

Then this morning I was as fine as I usually am, showered, shaved the legs, stepped out of the shower, and as I was toweling off I had sudden sharp pain in my right lower spine.  Very painful.  Akin to that herniation pain.  So here I am, with a half Vicodin + some ibuprofen + a heating pad, sitting in my chair working on this blanket edge, and not in the  mood to walk 20 steps to my bedroom to take a picture of Lumpy the Pony.  I'll save that update for when this blanket is quite finished and I can take a picture of that.

All I have left on Lumpy is mane, tail, and eyes.  And for the eyes I've decided to not use buttons, but instead use crochet size 10 thread in black and crochet a little circle or ball or something.  Princess K just turned 1, and I don't want her careful mama to not let her play with Lumpy because of button hazards :)

Princess K's Christmas/Birthday present. Far from finished.

Princess K will be ONE year old tomorrow (so will Daughter#1's dog, Kane).  I think Niece #2 and Nephew #2 (her husband) will be coming in, they live in a state north of us.  Princess K is their baby girl.

For Christmas / birthday I was trying to make her a pony using Heidi Bears Fatty Lumpkin pattern.  I started this pony on Dec 15th as I began a staycation week off work. 

I got about halfway through and ran out of Violet.  So while it was on order (I order Stylecraft DK yarns out of England, from Deramores), I started the blanket, using Attic24's interlocking Neat Ripple pattern. Well this is a bit addictive to crochet as you see it coming together!

Today I'm finishing up the orange color set, then will have a Violet color set, then a Daffodil, then that Bright Pink .... then I'll repeat the entire thing except go backwards, beginning with Daffodil and ending with Meadow then Bright Pink and then a simple border using the same pink as in the pony.  

The violet/pink pony's mane and tail will have all the colors that are in the blanket, and that is how I'll make them match.

So. Tomorrow is Princess K's birthday and I'm about halfway through both pony and blanket, and the only way I could possibly finish either of them is to take another week off work.  Ain't happening.  She'll be getting them late.