Having recently re-discovered a love for crocheting I’m always looking around for inspiration for my next project. One such idea that caught my attention is the crocheted flower-square. After a few failed attempts at trying to make up my own pattern (converting a circle to a square didn’t quite work. My mum found this really good tutorial on nittybits blog.

I’ve used four different colours for the flowers and have so far made 16 that are all unique colour combinations.

This is still very much a work in progress and I can’t decide whether to stop at 16 squares, and make a cushion, or whether to carry on and make a throw. They are very quick and easy to make…decisions, decisions lol.

This plain and boring used jar has been transformed into a useful container for those bits ‘n’ bobs that were lying around. The cover has been crocheted using everyday string and trimmed with wool.

I remember wearing a poncho when I was a child, that my mum knitted for me, and I haven’t thought about them since. Until last year when I borrowed one to wear, as I was a bit chilly, and loved it and thought I’d knit one of my own. I started it in early 2012 and didn’t finish it until that Christmas (I was distracted by other projects) but finally, here is the finished piece.

I was planning to just knit it, but having completed it I thought the edges could do with a little finishing touch. Over the Christmas holiday my mum worked out a pattern to give it a curly edge. I played around with this and opted for three different stitch patterns, mostly to conserve wool as I was nearing the end of my ball of wool! It is so warm and fits perfectly.

Last Christmas I was given a felted bag knitting kit. It took me a while to get around to starting it and then it took a while longer to knit (but I was determined to finish it before the following Christmas!).

I hadn’t felted any knitting before, so the process was unfamiliar to me. The bag was knitted on circular needles and was quite large and flimsy when finished. I then knitted one long skinny handle (only 4sts wide). The next step was to felt the bag and handle. To do this I put them in the washing machine with a little washing powder and a large towel (which apparently helps with the felting process) and put them on a hot wash. When I took them out I was surprised how much smaller the bag had become and how much thicker the pieces were. The next step was to attach the handle and I also added a small button fasten to the top using a simple crochet chain.

I wanted to add a little finishing touch to the bag and thought of making some crochet flowers. I came across a crochet flower tutorial on Mollie Makes and set to work with some oddments of wool I had lying around; sewing a bead to make the centre of the flowers.