Back to school

I'm home and normal service will now resume!

Wow what a fantastic holiday we had in Kefalonia

but it was 

HOT HOT HOT !!!

yes the sea really was turquoise no edit here!

the people were so friendly and we saw many beautiful things

but just to show you I wasn't idle

I hooked up 2 new scarves for myself

 using the pattern in this months Simply Crochet issue 22

this lovely pink scarf is made in Drops Fabel with a 4mm hook

using 3 x 50g balls and making it larger than the pattern for a bigger wrap

so now its back to school next week . . .

have you smelt it on the air?

there's definitely a nip and the nights are drawing in

I love the changing seasons

and it fills me with excitement

fairy lights candles socks and blankets

yes blankets

my favourite hooky pleasure is blanket making

and so my hooky thoughts are turning to snuggling under blankets

 and making more cosy comforts for my home

I will be back with new blanket makes soon

Heather

XXX

Starburst flower baby blanket

Last week

 I showed you the making of a gorgeous set of starburst flowers.

If you missed the rainbow colours do have a read 

HERE

as promised here is the finished baby blanket

which is now waiting in its new home for the birth

of a lucky little girl!

I am often asked about the pattern for this blanket

do please read the previous post for pattern details!

Heather

x x x

Afternoon tea

This week has been a week of celebration

 as we marked my step fathers 85th and mothers 80th birthdays

the week begin with a family meal at a local restaurant

where they both enjoyed all the families coming together

then on my Mum's birthday I treated her to a vintage afternoon tea

here at Patchwork House

using my newly collected mismatched vintage china

Oh what a delight it was setting the table

 with such beautiful cups and saucers

and using the hand embroidered table cloths

 that my Mum had made in her youth

at last it was time to give her the blanket I had specially made

Emily's Garden

 has been featured in a previous blog post and you can read about it

 HERE

Mum is still crocheting every day at the age of 80!

She is a gardener too and so I had created this blanket especially for her

 in her favourite colours.

She was very pleased with the gift

and I was very happy to give it to such a good home

 where I know it will be appreciated!

Heather

X X X

Hello August

Goodbye July and Hello August!

Pheww its been hot ... too hot for me,

 but at least we feel that we've had some summer now!

August has arrived with excitement

 as we celebrate the 80th and 85th birthdays of my parents.

This weekend they hosted a birthday meal to celebrate

 and 26 of us joined together in a very special afternoon.

 Mum and I decorated the restaurant with flowers from her garden

 which we love far more than any shop flowers.

I will be giving Mum the special blanket I have made

 on her actual birthday this week

 so do watch next weekend for the big reveal!

Socialising is not really my cup of tea

 and after 2 social events in 2 days today I was exhausted!

 So I took great delight in a much needed

 afternoon of total indulgence and relaxation

 here at Patchwork House.

 I know I'm tired when even crochet is beyond me!

This week I've been busy

 and as well as working on an Elmer blanket and a V stitch blanket

 I've whipped up another set of starburst flowers for a baby blanket.

 This is going to be a beauty joined in cream.

Feast your eyes on these beauties made in my favourite 

Stylecraft Special DK

in fondant pomegranate shrimp bright pink plum magenta

 lavender turquoise aspen spring green and citron.

This pattern is called starburst or sunburst

there are plenty available on the Internet and there is one

 HERE

 by Priscilla Hewitt that you can use

This week I will be surrounding these beauties with cream

 and will of course show you the finishes baby blanket next weekend!

I will leave you know with a view of my July

I hope that August brings holidays and relaxation

Happy Hookin!

Heather

X X X

Hexie love

Oh how wonderful summer holidays are for us teachers!

It is fantastic to have time to play

 to be me

 to indulge in yarny hooky pleasures!

I as you know am a Mathematician and get so much pleasure from crochet.

The shapes tessellate so perfectly and this gives me an immense sense of satisfaction!

Now the regular hexagon is a 6 sided polygon with equal sides and angles.

It is perfect for hooky creations yet is one I haven't used much at all.

So time to experiment ...

What better on a lazy sunny afternoon than sitting in the sun hooking daisies!

So my hexie making began.

 I didn't have a pattern so set about playing and came up with this!

As a small project a few of these hexies can be hooked up in no time

 and will make a lovely little table mat or runner.

I do love to fill my home with pretties!

I like to use Stylecraft Classique Cotton

 which has fabulous stitch definition

 and is

available in lovely bright summery colours.

 Its is a DK yarn but

 for mats I work with a 3mm hook to give a firmer texture

I must admit that I wasn't sure if I liked my table mat at this point

but it's amazing what a difference a good edging makes!

So yes the table mat stays

 and now has pride of place in Patchwork House!

As I know you will all be asking for the pattern

I have dug out a suitable suggestion from

Simply Crochet

magazine issue 5 on page 63

I am loving having time to peruse my stash of Simply Crochet magazines. Each time I look I find new patterns that tempt me. I would highly recommend it at £4.99 it is packed with patterns and lovely articles, features inspiration from our favourite hooky writers and bloggers and is always a total joy.

If you are not already hooked on the mag why not take advantage of this special offer which is open to my readers for the month of July, but

 HURRY HURRY HURRY

 it ends tomorrow!

You can take a trial offer of 3 issues for £5

WOW

isn't that fab!!!

Follow the link

HERE

and I'm sure you will not be disappointed!

In future I plan to write more patterns and tutorials and provide links for you all to find these easily on my blog. Thank you all so much for your encouraging comments and emails that help inspire me to continue with my work. The Patchwork Heart is moving forward in a new direction this new academic year. As I work full time it does not leave me as much time as I would like for making orders. I will be blogging more to share my work with the aim of encouraging and inspiring. Rather than taking orders I am now moving onto creating for my own pleasure, trying new ideas and patterns and writing and I will be reopening my Etsy shop in 2015.

Have a wonderful hooky summer

Heather

 XXX

Emily's Garden ~ a blanket of flowers

 This blanket has caused quite a stir

 amongst my followers on Instagram and Facebook, 

so here as promised are some details of how I made 

Emily's Garden.

The blanket is a gift for my mother's 80th birthday.

She loves flowers and is also a crocheter

 so I wanted to create something really special for her.

I used my favourite Stylecraft Special DK

this is so beautiful for blankets.

 It is soft warm and snugly,

 can be machine washed and tumble dried

 and is excellent value

It comes in a wonderful choice of over 80 shades

and you can buy it

HERE

I used

 soft peach, candy floss and pale rose

 lavender, wisteria and clematis

aspen, sherbet and spring green

cloud blue and parchment.

To create a garden

 I decided to use many different types of flowers

the first type was my frequent favourite

the starburst or sunburst flower

I use the starburst pattern by Jane Brocket

 which was in Mollie Makes issue 2

but there are many patterns for the sunburst available on the Internet 

try this one here

  

next I wanted to add depth to give the blanket a 3D texture

so  I chose these popcorn flowers

you can find the pattern 

HERE

there had to be roses in the garden

and these were such fun to make

this pattern is by Nicki Trench in the book

cute & easy crochet

for more texture I wanted petals

and these little pretties came from

a pattern by Nicki Trench in

Simply Crochet magazine issue 5

so with 80 flowers made for 10 rows of 8

 I was all set to join them into a rectangular throw

and I decided on a random arrangement 

as would be found in a cottage garden.

My favourite method for joining is using the

join as you go technique.

I originally learnt this using the fantastic tutorial from

  Attic 24

and developed my own method

 for continuous join as you go

joining the whole blanket without cutting the yarn.

You will notice

 that some are of my flowers are circles and others are squares,

 so to cope with this just make double trebles instead of trebles

 in the corners when joining the circles.

The continuous join method is so fast and easy 

and has the fantastic bonus of no ends to sew in!

I am really pleased with the 3D flowers

and the continuous join as you go

adds another lovely texture to the squares.

Finally a deep border to set off the flowers

 made using block stitch to incorporate some seeds of colour

you can find some instructions

HERE

Tadaa!

Emily's Garden is complete

 and I cannot wait to gift it to my mother Emily

on her 80th birthday

I'm sorry this is not a complete pattern

 but I am not yet a pattern writer and do not pretend to be!

 However I am happy to share

 my inspiration and the links to the patterns I chose

 so that you too

 may have a go at creating a garden of love.

Happy hookin!

Heather

 X X X

The amazing V Stitch

This week I have made a new discovery

 and am delighted to share it with you!

V Stitch

surprisingly simple

extremely fast growing

addictive pleasure

over on Instagram there is a wave sweeping the nation

and one by one all my hooky friends have been making v stitch blankets

so eventually I caught the bug

and dived into my Stylecraft Special DK stash

coming out with this gorgeous range of autumn colours

It is an amazingly fast growing blanket

so simple to hook

and totally addictive

at the end

 I sew each end into its own coloured stripe using a darning needle

 thinking of it as embroidery

to obtain a neat professional finish

Simple Edging

in UK terms

To complete the blanket make a simple edging.

1 rounds of dc (UK)

followed by a 2nd round of

dc 3 chain dc in the same stitch miss a stitch repeat

these baby blankets are such quick fun 

 I have made 2 and started a 3rd in 1 week!

If you Google Vstitch you will find many free patterns

and there is plenty available on Pinterest Ravelry and You Tube

but basically you need a starting chain in muliples of 3 +2 +2

you start with a treble (UK) in the 5th chain stitch from the hook

and make 1 treble 1 chain 1 treble for the first v all in the same stitch

miss 2 chain and repeat

at the end miss 1 chain and end with 1 treble

the rest is easy

just make 1 v stitch in each previous v

and a single treble at the start and end of each row

go on you know you want to ...

join the v stitch party!

If you have enjoyed this post and my pattern advice

please consider supporting my crochet business

support my crochet business

have a wonderful relaxing Sunday my hooky friends

Happy Hookin!

Heather

xxx