Your Favorite Team Colors Scarf: Crochet!

I love personal gifts. That's why homemade stuff is the best! I would much rather receive something my children made than a trinket from the store. Hoping that other folks feel the same, I definitely push homemade stuff on them - teehee! Even teachers. I figure one can only have so many apple shaped pencil sharpeners ^_^ So this year I thought I'd get the inside scoop on what my kids' teachers are into and see if we can't make them something unique this year. However, I had to stop and wonder what I could possibly make for my son's male teacher that he may actually use?

As I mentioned, I'm sort of into scarves this year, so I asked my son to figure out what his teacher's favorite sports team is. Well, he did his homework and reported back that the Bears where top on his teacher's list of favorite sports teams. The Chicago bears have great colors: Orange, White and a dusty Midnight Blue. Here's what I came up with:

Colors aren't showing true, but you get the idea!

I am a sucker for sacrificing yarn types for color. Now, this can turn out poorly if the weight is so dissimilar, but in this case, it was close enough! I grabbed a Sugar n' Cream in Indigo (100% cotton) because the color was spot on. I used Orange and White Red Heart Super Saver Yarn. Now, to be sure the stripes are a touch wider than the length of the blue, but honestly, I cannot find a good orange color in any other yarn type (let me know if you know of one!).

I used the hdc stitch throughout, which is my favorite stitch right now and edged the ends with the reverse single crochet or "crab stitch" (check out the tutorial here)

You can see the crab stitch better here

What I like about the crab stitch is that it is a decorative edging, but not a girly one. It sort of creates a corrugated tube when it is worked up. I rather like it!

So go forth and make scarves in whatever team colors you like! Personalize them with their favorite team colors, kids' school colors, or alma mater colors. Use the crab stitch edging and give them to the men in your life ^_^

Lil' Apple Pot

It is mid-August, the time of year the mommies and daddies are thinking back-to-school thoughts while the kiddies are treasuring the precious few days they have left of summer vacation. I admit that the seeds of school-y thoughts have indeed drifted down and found purchase in my mind and I can practically smell the chalk and erasers from the classrooms of my youth (does the same nostalgia come from dry erase boards?). I can nearly feel the weight of a backpack full of books and my new supplies up on my shoulders and almost taste the crisp morning air as I wait for the big yellow school bus. As I these thoughts continue to grow roots I find my eyes are drawn towards all things with primary colors: folders in glossy red, rulers painted yellow, and notebooks in brilliant blue! What a great time of year!

It is in this vein that I post my adaptation of Ana Paula's Amigurumi Apple Pattern.
 I call it: Lil' Apple Pot...

A fun little pot for rainbows of coloring crayons! 

Also, a perfect home for our Lil' Garden Friend...

I think Lil' Caterpillar and Lil' Apple Pot might just sneak her way into a backpack 

on the first day of school ^_^

Apples & Teacher Appreciation Banner

I am in charge of our teacher/staff appreciation Potato Bar Lunch at my kiddos' elementary school this week. I thought I'd decorate the teacher's lounge with a cute banner of some sort. Looking for inspiration, I stumbled upon this adorable website How Does She? with free printables for special occasions such as....teacher appreciation! I printed and trimmed up the banner letters and lay them out...

After a few moments of staring at the mini banner (they are sitting on a 12x12 piece of paper for size comparison) inspiration did, in fact, hit: I needed to string them together with yarn and punctuate it with crocheted apple slices!

So after a bit more searching I found a pattern for the type of apple slices I wanted and adapted it to fit my mini banner. You can locate the original pattern from lion brand yarn here. Below are my modifications:

G hook
White, Red, Black & Green WW yarns

Worked in the round

Apple Slices (using White)

Magic Circle (6)
Rnd 1: 2 sc around (12)
Rnd 2: *sc, 2 sc in next st* around (18)
Rnd 3: *sc 2, 2 sc in next st* around (24)
Rnd 4: *sc 3, 2 sc in next st* around (30)
Rnd 5: *sc 4, 2 sc in next st* around (36)
Change to Red
Rnd 6: *sc 5, 2 sc in next st* around (42)
F.O. and weave in ends

Embroider black seeds and fold in half and whip stitch together with red yarn.
The rest of the pattern is according to the lion brand website.




I really wanted to crochet into the paper banner and after a trial run I used this method:



Using a small hole punch, punch 2 holes in each banner letter (or banner apple).

Using an E sized hook, I inserted the hook into the left hole front to back and gently pulled through a loop.

yo and sl st

Ch 4

With yarn on hook, insert hook into right hole front to back.

yo and sl st

Ch 5

Take next banner letter and repeat this process, gently using the sl st to pull the yarn through each hole, chain 4 while on the banner and chain 5 when connecting banner letters.
















I chained an equal amount on either side of the banner and attached the apples. The end result made me smile! I can't wait to see it all hung up in the teacher's lounge, adorably proclaiming our appreciation of Walnut Grove Elementary's awesome staff!