The Eagle Soars!

Goood Morning and thanks for stopping by.

I've been working on my Japanese flowers but I will wait until tomorrow to share them with you. I still haven't decided what I want them to be but right now I am working towards the shrug/shawl/scarf shape and then it can always be made into a blanket by adding more flowers! Since I don't have any new crochet photos to share with you today, I will share with you some of the beautiful nature we have here in Florida. First some more pink flowers in my garden. I had to plant them from a pot but they certainly brighten my day every time I look at the big blossoms.

Each day I see a different bird here. This bird is usually found around water. We don't usually see him in our backyard but at places like Sanibel Island, they are plentiful around the mangrove trees. If we had mangrove trees in our backyard, I bet we would see some there.

We have unique birds all over the place!

 AND... something you probably really didn't think I would be showing you a photo of: a manatee. The manatees come to the curves of the Gulf of Mexico in the winter to stay warm. We were very lucky a few years ago to come face to face with some while kayaking at Ft. De Soto state park near St. Pete Beach, FL. This one was a baby and swam around us for a while, then went and got his/her mom. The mom was quite larger which you can see here on the bottom of the photo.

Little Manatee next to the Mom

Well I hope you saw some things you didn't think you would get to see today. Have a fabulous day and I look forward to showing you my homemade pieces of nature with my Japanese flowers tomorrow!
XOXO Susan

Another Day in the Sun

Hello Everyone,
Thanks for stopping by today. I hope you had a nice Valentine's Day yesterday and received whatever you wanted from your special valentine. J and I are not big on gift giving for Valentine's Day because we don't like to have "stuff" laying around that we don't need. We prefer to go on trips and enjoy time together. I did make some brownies the night before and we ate them up fast. Mondays J has off from work, but I always have to work, so after work we had a nice dinner, enjoyed some of the nice weather, and then went for a run together - a lovely little V-day.

My ripple blanket is turning out quite nice. I started this project exactly one month ago and I have been smitten with crochet every since. I now have about three projects going at once but that is normal behavior for me. Although the weather is superb here right now, I am jealous of the people up north in the cold who are making lots of progress on their knit and crochet projects because the mounds of snow have them stuck inside. The photos on the blogs and flickr are amazing!

The yarn on this blanket feels so soft (Vanna's Choice), much softer than it feels when I use it for other things. I used a G (4.25MM) hook which is the same as I have used for other things, but there is something about the way this blanket feels. The pile of yarn I purchased over the last few weeks is starting to get thinner. I went through one whole ball of white from the granny circles (white is the final round and connecting color). The red is almost gone, after using it twice in the ripple blanket photographed above. I am not sure if there would be enough for another two rows of it (each ripple color is two rows).

Tonight I hope to make some more Japanese flowers to add to my WIP. More photos to come...
Have a fabulous day!!
XOXO Susan

Happy Valentine's Day!!

Hello and Happy Valentine's Day!!!
I hope you had a lovely weekend. The weekend started off a little chili, so I made some chili! We found "cold weather" food tastes the best when the weather is a little cold here. So after I felt the cool air outside on Saturday, I made some chili - it was scrumptious!  I added sour cream and some cheese to make me feel like I am eating it at a cafe somewhere.

We had a wonderful Sunday visiting Sanibel Island and visited our favorite little food stand Schnapper's for lunch. The island was busy which it usually is on the weekends. Sometimes Schnappers has a long line out the door, but we must have gone at the perfect time because we ordered our food right away and were even able to sit on one of the picnic tables. We didn't go out to the beach on Sanibel Island as the parking is very limited but we enjoyed the scenery and time for relaxation.
I saw some beautiful flowers around my community, which all happened to be pink. Flowers have always been one of my favorite things, as I said in some earlier postings, when I used to paint and draw in art class I always added in some flowers. Back to the pink thing. We do have other colors of flowers around here, but it must be pink season which goes nicely with Valentine's Day! Pretty soon the trees with yellow flowers and orange flowers should be blooming and I will be sure to capture them for you to see.

Bougainvillea plant

Pink Oleander

Of course I also added to my own flower collection inspired by Lucy's post at Attic 24. I am not sure if I will make it into a shawl/shrug or if I will make it into a blanket. Maybe I will make both. I love making them, they look so nice in person, I don't think the photo shows their true beauty. I am using Vanna's Choice yarn because it is the yarn with the most color variety I have on hand.

Well, I will stop going on and on about flowers and get back to work. I hope you have a fabulous Monday
XOXO Susan

First Japanese Flower

Hello Again,
A few days ago Lucy over at Attic 24 revealed her newest WIP and I think everyone fell in love. She found some great photos and a pattern for a japanese flower shawl/shrug. There was only one problem for me... the pattern was in French. For those of you who know me personally, you may remember I did take a year of French as an undergraduate college student, however... I could only translate the last part "bravo!" and that part was mostly because my elementary school music teacher, Mr. Lady, used to tell say "Bravo!" whenever we would do a nice job playing our instruments.

So, I really didn't think I could wait for someone to post an English version of this, many people on flickr and Lucy's comments section have provided additional pattern links but still in French, or at least not in English. This evening, I had some time to try to translate the diagram here into the flower. AND I think I did it!

Go to the link and look at the diagram. From looking at Lucy's photo and other crocheter's flowers the first three rows are pretty easy to make out.
To start: Ch 6 and slip st to make a circle
Row 1: ch 3 (counts as first dc),  11 dc into the circle = 12 dc (1 is the chain 3), slip st to connect
Row 2: ch 3 (counts as first dc), *ch 2, dc into the chain space and ch 2*, *repeat for each chain space = 12 dc total (1 is the ch 3 and 11 dc)
Row 3: add new color in a chain space and ch 3(counts as first dc), 3 dc in the chain space, *ch1, 4 dc in chain space*, * repeat into each chain space = you will have 12 groups of 4 dc's around the circle

Here is where it gets tricky. Note: this may not be what the pattern really should be, but this is what I did and I think it looks like it works.
Row 4: Start your new color in the chain space. Slip st until you get to the second stitch of a group of 4 dc. Ch 5 and slip st into the third dc stitch. Continue to slip st until you get to the next group of 4 dc's. So you are going to slip st around the entire circle and making a chain loop at the second and third stitch (the middle) of each group of 4 dc's.

Finishing Row 4: Once you have gone all around the circle you will do a single crochet connecting the 4th row to the third row (connect by the chain in between two dc clusters).

Then do 8 dcs inside the chain 5 space you made. *Sc connecting to the row below, then go directly to the next chain five to make the next petal with 8dc*, repeat until all of the chain 5 spaces are full petals. End with the final sc to the chain space in the row below and slip st and fasten off!

I hope this helps others who could not translate from French to English. I was just telling one of my students earlier this week that my next thing on my "After the dissertation to-do list" is to learn some more French, and these great "French only" patterns provide another incentive! Isn't it funny how these things all come together?
XOXO SH

Hat Happiness

My very first posting was a baby hat which was made for the Caps for Good program. The university I work at, FGCU, has a strong commitment to service learning and our students complete service learning projects each year. We have a student who is working on a project to make hats/caps for new babies in need, so the majority of the hats I have posted will contribute to her project. Several of my co-workers have been knitting and crocheting the last two weeks to help make baby hats. We have some cupcakes, some flowers, and some pom poms! My friend Carolynne made the four hats in the top right photo, and the two hats on the bottom right photo are my attempts to make the green sparkly one she made (the pattern is free and can be found here). My colleague Gil made the other cupcake hat and is working on a little pumpkin hat right now. Her cupcake hat inspired me to make the pink and blue one! We've been having a great time talking about crochet every chance we get the chance (during break time of course).

I have been enjoying the photos many other crochet like Lucy and Jacquie are posting of their bulbs in bloom. Since we cannot plant bulbs in the ground here (doesn't get cold enough for them to freeze), I enjoy the store bought potted bulbs too. When I first purchased this one there were two flowers starting to show. By the next morning there were three as seen below and then the second photo was the third day! Each day more flowers appear. I love tulips but I can't wait to see some daffodils.

Well, the sun is shining and I must do some work on this chilly Saturday morning. Luckily I have my tulips to stare at in between breaks, and I will sneak in time to finish the charity baby hat to add to the finished pile. Hopefully my afternoon will be filled with some tennis and some Japanese crochet flowers attempts. Check back tomorrow to see how they turned out!

XOXO Susan 

Hearts

Well... my desk arrived! The desk was the easiest piece to put together out of all the different furniture we have purchased from the Canopy line. The desks and file cabinet are at home in our upstairs loft. Notice my lovely pink chair - this is my second pink chair, the first one cracked at the bottom and my husband found a replacement for me after the chairs were no longer sold in stores when we first started dating. Unfortunately this chair just started to crack at the bottom too. I suspect before long, I will fall out of it when the crack increases and a pieces breaks off completely. I applied some glue to the cracking area last night in hopes to make it last a little longer (J doesn't want to see it go, haha).

 I've been hearing many complaints of cold temperatures in the north, so here are some yellow hibiscus photos to warm you up. My pink ones tend to produce more flowers, but I noticed the yellow one had some blooms yesterday.

I've been crocheting a little bit too, but unfortunately this week didn't allow for as much crocheting as I would have liked, TGIF (for those of you who may not be familiar with TGIF it means Thanks Godness It's Friday!). Here are my two latest baby caps for the Caps for Good Charity. We are coming close to the end of the event. I tried a different type of flower on these ones to add a little variety.

I am looking forward to spending some time with my yarn this evening and Saturday and Sunday. I have some plans to try out some new patterns (flowers) that I am sure you will LOVE so be sure to come back and visit. :)
Happy Friday, XOXO
Susan

Ripply

Hello Everyone,

Today is not so sunny, but I have a busy day indoors so I don't mind. We have so many days of sunshine in Florida that I often welcome days of rain and clouds. When the sun is out I have a sense of urgency to get outside and enjoy myself - I think this is from living up north for so long. Sometimes you could miss all the nice days in a summer if they fell during the week.

Our new file cabinet came in yesterday so after work I was busy putting it together. I was trying to suprise J before he got home from work with the completed cabinet, but I ran into some trouble. The sides of one of the drawers did not line up properly so I couldn't put it together. I was going to call the company today (their phone line was 9am-5pm) and tell them I needed a new piece when I realized we could try to drill down some of the pieces to get them to align properly.

So after J came home he glady took out the drill and did the drilling for me (when he was out of town in October I tried to drill the curtain rod in the bathroom... I don't try to use the drill anymore). So the file cabinet is complete and looks lovely! The matching desk should be arriving via Fed Ex sometime today. So after work today we will put together the desk. If all goes well I will be able to share the photos with you tomorrow.

Slowly but surely I am making progress on my ripple blanket. I love the way the blanket feels, I am very happy with the Vanna's Choice yarn, this is my first project using it. When I lay the blanket out on the floor it makes me want to strethch out and lay on it. I think I may make a ripple cushion to go along with the blanket, or a cushion to coordinate but a different pattern.

I have been trying to keep my WIPs confined to certain places so J doesn't feel like I have WIPs all over the place. He hasn't said anything yet but we don't want him to start resenting crochet! So far he is really enjoying the outcomes of my work and only tells me to take a break when he knows I've been at it all day long :) I do have a pattern I am going to try this weekend that I cannot wait to share the work with all of you!!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope you have a fabulous day

Susan H.   XOXO