Ta-Dah! JulieAnny's Summer Mosaic Mystery CAL

It's done! It's finished! And I absolutely love it :D We took advantage of the glorious spring sunshine and went downstairs to our apartment courtyard to get some photos :)

I've been having such a wonderful time with JulieAnny's Summer Mosaic Mystery CAL - it's my first big project using 100% cotton yarn, and the Moda Vera Portsea Cotton from Spotlight has worked up excellently! The finished afghan is quite light weight, and I can see it being just perfect for when the breeze comes up on the balcony at the lake on summer evenings. 

I joined the pieces using slip stitch in the back loops, from the reverse side. This made nice even joined with the little front loop ridges on the front, and only low ridges on the back (as opposed to chunky single crochet ridges, which I don't like the feel of). It came together pretty quickly!

I chose to leave the corner pieces off - they were "optional" in the pattern, and I quite like the octagonal shape without them :) The border took a little bit of adaptation, but really it was very simple and straightforward.

And, it really does look like a tiled mosaic! Such a talented designer - if you haven't checked out Julie Yeager's designs on Ravelry yet, I thoroughly recommend her work :) 

Have you made any of Julie Yeager's patterns before? Link to your photos/blog/Ravelry project page in the comments and we can all have a look!!

JulieAnny's Summer Mosaic Mystery Afghan CAL - Part 1

Hi everyone!

Just because I don't have enough things to do, I've picked up another CrochetALong from one of my very favourite crochet designers, Julie Yeager. I made her Stained Glass Afghan last year, and loved the design! It's still on the couch being used to keep us cosy (and fabulous!) during this stupidly cold winter.

The new CAL is the Summer Mosaic Mystery Afghan. The pattern calls for Scheepejeswol Stonewashed XL which is so pretty, but so expensive to buy here in Australia. I have substituted Moda Vera Portsea Cotton - still 100% cotton, but only 8 ply, and only $2.20/50g on sale at Spotlight! One day, when we win the lottery or Kiah becomes a rich and famous nurse, I'll splurge on some Scheepjeswol yarns :) 

I love the stonewashed look of this yarn - and such pretty colours! I'm using the Camel as the main colour, with Turquoise, Purple, Green, Navy and Burgundy as accent colours. 

The first clue came out last Friday. I wasn't going to do this CAL, I was going to just collect the patterns and get to it when I could. But then Mum was at Spotlight, and she rang to say that the Portsea Cotton was 50% off and she had an extra 15% off voucher... I can't deny those sorts of signs from the universe! 

I've decided to have Purple as my accent colour A, and I'll decide which letter the rest of the accent colours correspond to when I see the next clue :P 

The pattern is very straightforward so far - very clear wording, and stitch counts after every row! 

I'm glad to have had some overlay crochet experience before, both with Sophie's Universe, the Stained Glass Afghan and of course our very own Flame motif :) There hasn't been much overlay crochet yet, but looking at the teaser photos there's a bit more to come!

The ruffle in the centre is made using fpsc and chain stitches - quite effective! It's going to need some careful blocking though because cotton has very little natural stretch, so where I have sewn the ends in looks a bit wonky at the moment.

I guess at least with all these CALs and projects humming along at the same time, I'm never going to have to wonder what to blog about! :)

Love these colours :)  

How many WIPs do you have going at the moment? 

Hugs,

Michelle xx

Catching up!

Hello everyone! 

I haven't blogged much about everyday things for so long - between patterns and Melbourne, it's been a bit busy! Here's a little update on what's going on for me :) 

First, since it has been so long, a Sophie's Universe CAL update in pictures! I love the butterflies and the little plum tulips :) It is also big enough now to keep my knees warm while I work on it - very useful now that the weather is starting to get chilly of an evening. Only 3 more weeks to go!! 

I've also started on a new Crochet Along - Jane Crowfoot's Lily Pond Blanket together with Stylecraft Yarns. I wasn't that excited about it after I saw the initial photos, it seemed very dark. But now that I've made my first set of pieces, it really does look like ripples in a pond! I chose mostly Stylecraft Special DK colours to sort of match the Stylecraft Life DK set colours, but I think my choices are a bit brighter than the Special DK alternates provided.

I broke my yarn fast (again) last weekend at Spotlight's 40% off yarn sale. It was just too good to resist! I discovered some colourways of Moda Vera Bouvardia that I actually like, such as Tokyo:

and Sunset Dive:

And I am definitely excited about getting more of these yarns as they make such lovely Road Trip Scarves for my stall in June :) Fortunately Bouvardia is on sale for VIPs until 10 May, so I just have to get back to Spotlight before then! 

I also found a new Moda Vera Marvel variation called Magic Stripe - it has longer variegations in colour, and I think it works well for these booties! What do you think? I'm about to get started on a blue/green/white pair as well. 

But, our big excitement this week were the huge storms, rain and wind around Sydney and the Central Coast/Newcastle. We were fine here in Meadowbank (although the hot water was off for about a day due to damage to the hot water tanks), but up at the Lake House, things were a little bit different. There were trees down all over the place, they still have no power after 4 days, and the lake overflowed just a little bit! The combination of a king tide and the storm surge meant that the lake couldn't do its usual tidal thing at Swansea, so it got a tad overfull...

See that bench out in the water behind a tree? It's usually about a metre from the edge of the lake... The ducks thought it was all marvellous though :)  

We were meant to be going up there for this weekend to celebrate my mother's and my sister's birthdays, but without power we couldn't have hot showers or even make tea! Kiah and I quickly cleaned out the fridges and freezers, which were already defrosting, and just came home instead. It made for a long day, especially after getting evacuated from Spotlight at Tuggerah on the way! 

Tomorrow there will be birthday lunch at my parents' house - slow roasted pork belly, roast vegies and, by special request, red velvet birthday cake with salted caramel and white chocolate cream cheese icing! Wish me luck with the cake, I've never made red velvet before! 

I hope you are all having a lovely weekend :) Don't forget, if you are interested in participating in the Crochet Between Worlds Christmas Market, send us a message on our Facebook page! We are going to start organising in earnest at the end of May when I get back from the Great Ocean Road Marathon!