KARABOUTS

Let it snow

We're having a snow storm today in New York City...

so I thought it would be a good day to blog about my first attempt at making crocheted snowflakes. 

I was inspired to make snowflakes by my friend Johanna who sent us a crocheted snowflake with her lovely handmade holiday card.

I'm not sure which pattern Johanna used, but I used this free pattern I found on the blog Attic 24.  I made half a dozen snowflakes out of some natural wool I had in my yarn stash. Since I learned about starching from my crocheted lampshade project, I decided to starch my flakes.  

Below is a comparison of a blocked and unblocked snowflake.  You can see from the photo how starching and pinning really brings out the beauty of the crochet stitches.

My snowflakes look great on the tree...

but once the tree comes down I think I'll hang them on my windows so that I can enjoy them all winter long.

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

Crocheted Lampshade

Mike and I found a floor lamp at Bed Bath and Beyond that was around 15 bucks because it had no shade.  We brought it home and I decided to crochet a shade for it.

I started by crocheting a big circular sort of thing with a hole in the middle.  I used Lion Cotton yarn.  I alternated rounds of single and double crochet.  On the single crochet rounds I increased the same way you would if you were going to make a crochet ball.  When I was done it looked like this.

Next, I cooked up a stiffener.  I used regular old cornstarch and water.  I mixed about 8 tablespoons of starch into 2 cups of water and cooked it until it got thick, shiny, and translucent.  

I poured the starch into a bowl and let it COOL DOWN (very important!!).

Then I threw my crocheted circle into the bowl of starch and worked the starch evenly into the cotton yarn with my hands.

Next, I rolled the crochet circle in a clean towel to get rid of the excess starch.  When I was done it looked like this (it grew quite a bit).

Then I stretched the crocheted circle over a big bowl (covered with saran wrap) and let it dry.

Once the shade was dry, I attached it to the top of our lamp with the existing hardware and flipped the switch!