I am a nervous front seat passenger in a car. My best bet is to do something to distract me while I am a front seat passenger (especially when my partner John is driving, ha!)
So I started carrying around either a little knitting to work on in the car or a crochet project, commonly granny squares in this bag:
Last year, after I finished making the granny squares for the granny square blanket I share my finish of this in this – First Finish of 2023 – Granny Square Crochet Blanket Done, I began a new set of granny squares for a future blanket to have something to work on in the car. Here is what I have completed so far, laid out on the “design carpet”:
I am using black and gray acrylic yarn I got from the thrift store, including a variegated yarn of grays and black. So far I have 34 done and I think I will eventually make 100 granny squares to someday join into a blanket.
I am working very casually on this project (only when a passenger in the car with John and only if I am not working on knitting a hat) so who knows when it will be done!
It only took me a year but I finally finished the Autumnal Colors Granny Square blanket.
It measures approximately 70 inches by 70 inches and is made with 100 crocheted Granny Square blocks.
I wanted 2023 to be a year of finishing up old projects and now I have one down (and oh so many to go!)
It was a great project to finish up while I spend a lot of time in the recliner in our living room since breaking my ankle last week:
And now the blanket is on the top of my recliner awaiting my snuggle under it:
I had John take photos for me since I can only use one leg these days, and at first he took this photo (as a joke, little did I know) for this blog post:
I thought at first he thought this was a good photo for the post!
Now to decide what outstanding project to work on next…
Yesterday John helped me get my studio (from main bedroom, see post A “New” Studio) better set up to sew and craft in ready with my new reality – the knee scooter:
I am going to try spending part of the day tomorrow sewing in my studio instead of sitting in my recliner with hand projects (moping that I am no longer as mobile as I used to be).
Oh and I have to close this post with a photo my friend Wendy sent me from @themercerie on Instagram:
Is that not the ultimate granny square sampler? That would only take me 5 years to finish 🙂
I was going to write a post about my 2022 travel next (my excuse for the lack of completed projects in 2022 as I discovered when I wrote my previous post 2022 in Review: Crafting Projects Completed) but I decided to write about a project I am working on completing – a granny square afghan in Autumn colors.
Those are a lot of posts for a blanket that is still not completed. Luckily some of the previous posts included cute photos of Mike the Miniature Schnauzer with the blanket in progress to distract you – ha!
Searched through those posts to see when I started working on it – and the answer is January 2022 (whew it is barely a year old, ha!)
Part of my New Years Resolutions are to complete the projects I have uncompleted. I want 2023 to be a “Year of Completions”. So a couple of days ago I pulled out this dusty project and made a lot of progress (seven out of ten rows now done!!!):
I was laughing to myself as my original plan was to have this afghan completed by Autumn since it has Autumnal colors but then I realize the colors are all season as far as my house as they coordinate with my living room decor:
I have 7 rows completed and 3 more rows to go and then the border.
In previous posts about this blanket I discussed putting several rows of borders on using several of the colors in the individual granny squares.
I thought more about that and I think that will be too busy. I am just going to border it with one row of the brown I am using to attach the granny squares together.
Plan = focus on completing this project, work on it every evening while watching TV and get it done!
I was hoping to be further along, but at least I am progressing a little with crocheting together the 100 granny squares I made for my second granny square blanket.
Last time I updated you on my progress was on April 12, 2022 in the post Update on the Latest Granny Square Blanket, where Mike the Miniature Schnauzer was wearing one of the granny squares on his head:
Well now he can actually nap under the blanket as I’ve finished 4 of the 10 rows (and two additional squares – I am now 42% of the way done):
Here is the basket I use to house the rest of the squares for the remaining rows awaiting to be added; and the blanket in progress:
Here is my living room crafting area, where slowly I work on putting the blanket together (it is also where I am writing this blog post right now) while watching TV in the evening:
And to close this post, here is Mike napping under the partially completed blanket:
I’ve completed crocheting a 100 granny square blocks! Here they are in piles based on yarn combinations:
You will notice I do not have an even distribution of color combinations. That is because the blanket is very “scrappy” as it is made from a collection of coordinating thrift store yarns. I had similar but not exact colors and varying amounts of each color.
After sorting piles it was time to do the daunting task of laying it out on the “design carpet” of my living room.
My eyes were crossing as I tried to find a way not to have the same (or similar) squares touch each other but after a while I gave up and said “good enough” and settled on the layout above.
Mike the Miniature Schnauzer tried to distract me while I was sorting and laying out the squares, with his cuteness:
So I decided it was time for him to try on a granny square hat:
I am going to join the granny squares with brown yarn to make a lattice between the squares and then finish off the blanket with a green border, and perhaps a rust border too. We’ll see how it evolves, but first I have to put on a YouTube video on how to join the granny square blocks again (I forgot what I did on my first granny square blanket – Attack of the Giant Granny Square Blanket).
But before I work on joining the squares, I had to organize them into the layout I decided in someway, as I could not just leave them out on the “design carpet”.
So I figured out putting them in piles, with the top of the pile being the first square on the left for each row; and then numbering the rows. Here are the piles laid out:
As you can see in the images above, I ran a piece of yarn through each pile, so they did not get separated/out of order if a pile accidentally got knocked over.
I’ve been traveling a lot lately with my partner John going on his business trips with him and since I actually finished these 100 blocks a couple weeks ago now (so behind on blogging) and I can’t take all of them with me when traveling to start joining them into a blanket, I’ve started another granny square block series to work on while traveling!
I seem to be a little obsessed with making granny squares, they are the perfect portable travel project!
Here is an update on the second granny square blanket I am working on (the first post on it was in January – Granny Squaring Again!).
The weather has been weird in the Denver Metro area. We get teased with Spring with 60 degree Celsius days, and then the next day it is 20 degrees Celsius and a blizzard! I’ve been spending some of those blizzard days staying warm with a cup of tea and crocheting granny squares for my second granny square blanket.
Notice artificial sunflower in the background reminding me warm weather will return somedayStack of granny square blocks on the blocking board John made me
I completed 63 granny square squares so it was time to lay out what I’ve made so far on the “Design Carpet” so I could decide how many more I need to make for a decent sized blanket:
Getting ready to lay out on the “Design Carpet”…On the “Design Carpet”
I decided to make the blanket 10 x 10, which is a 100 blocks, so I needed 37 more blocks.
I also realized I need some additional combinations to keep the blanket visually interesting. It is made from thrifted acrylic yarn (I paid one dollar or less for each skein) and I worked with what I had so it is very “scrappy”.
Here are the combinations I have so far:
Since taking these photos, I’ve started working on new combinations and here are some of the centers I’ve made:
Making centers (lower middle of image) for 37 additional blocks..
I still haven’t decided what color I am going to set the blocks in (like a sashing crocheted between them) but I am still leaning towards brown. I made sure not to make the outer color of any blocks brown so they will not blend into the setting yarn color and look smaller than the other blocks.
I just love working on these little crochet squares and it is mindless perfect crafting for in front of the TV in the evening or even sitting around visiting with friends.
In November 2020 I finished my first crocheted “Granny Square” blanket after teaching myself via YouTube videos to make a granny square:
I’ve been itching to work on granny squares again – they are a portable hand work project and great to keep your hands busy while riding in the car, waiting around, or just sitting about watching television in the evening.
In my yarn stash I found some variegated yarn and some coordinating yarns that I thought would make a cool granny square blanket:
Here are the centers I started making:
And here are the granny squares in progress and completed:
I have two different types: 1) center green, surrounded by variegated yarn, framed by rust colored yarn; and 2) center rust, surrounded by variegated yarn, framed by green yarn.
I will update you on my progress on the blanket as it progresses!
Yes, of course my miniature schnauzer knows how to write blog posts, why are you asking?
Well Mike no longer has to be impatient as I’ve finished my first granny square blanket. I used the word “finished” loosely as I have many yarn strands hanging about it waiting to be woven in.
I wove in the ends as I finished each block but I got lazy when I was joining the 90 blocks into ten (10) rows of nine (9) blocks.
It measures approximately 70 inches by 74 inches (178 cm x 188 cm) and it is much bigger than I thought it would be.
Here is Mike stretched out on it as I tried to photograph it for this post:
Here it is once I removed the miniature schnauzer from it:
After joining the blocks with a dark grey yarn, I added a single border around the whole piece.
I am pretty pleased with myself now that I’ve taught myself via YouTube videos how to crochet granny square blocks and to join them into a blanket. Here are all the posts if you really need something to fill your day (smile, wink) of my first granny square blanket journey. Some of these posts include links to the YouTube videos I used to learn.
Now that I’ve finished the blanket (except for the weeks and weeks of weaving in ends..ha..ahead of me), it is time to finish up hand sewing my quilt Seattle Scrappy (see most recent post on this scrappy quilt – An Update on “Seattle Scrappy” – Haphazard Stitching… ).
Seattle Scrappy waiting to be finished…
I notice a pattern – I seem to be really into grey lately (or is it “gray” I can never decided which one to use).
I want to start my next granny square blanket (I’ve been watching more granny square YouTube videos) but I should not start a new project when there are old ones awaiting some love!
Postscript
How about that pandemic thing going around. Oh yes it still sucks and I have complete “pandemic fatigue” at this point (I know you are thinking: “join the club”).
A couple of my friends were recently diagnosed with COVID (I was not exposed) and have been on quarantine for a couple weeks. I did drop someone homemade chocolate chip cookies on their porch. They are doing okay and their worse symptom was not being able to smell.
Chocolate Chip cookies have special healing properties
But I will keep on crafting my way through and I might have some news in the next couple of weeks.
tierneycreates 