Crochet Baby Blanket:
When first time I heard that my daughter was pregnant in 2011, I was very happy and excited because first time I will be grandma, what should I do for the special one who will call me grandma. I took out all the wool I had and then I started thinking, what to knit, crochet??? Because of over excitement I could not finalize the pattern for baby set and all. So what I did first was this....

Baby Blanket

It is a multi color baby blanket. This is very special for me because it is the first item made for my grand daughter, who is very special for me. One more reason is this blanket is related with so many memories for example, this color sweater I knitted when my daughter was in 5th grade or the combination of these two colors was used to knit sweater for my son or this one was for my father in law etc.

Final size: 3ft x 2 ft. Each motif  3.7" x 3.7"
Material: Different colors wool, crochet needle 2 mm, black silk cloth for lining
Instructions: Square motifs are crocheted separately and the joined by black wool.
Pedal: ch 2, dc 3, ch 2
Shell: dc 3, ch 2, dc 3

Take any one color, Ring of ch 4
Row 1:  Ch 3, dc 2 in the ring, (ch 2,  dc 3,  in the ring ch 2) pedal two more times, join with third chain of the first ch 3. Bind off.
Row 2: Join the second color wool, ch 5, (dc 3, ch 2, dc 3 in a next gap - that is shell, ch 2) repeat two more times then dc 3, ch 2, dc 2 and join with the third chain out of ch 5 worked in the starting. Bind off.
Row 3: Join new color, ch 3, dc 2 in the same ch 2 gap, then work shell at the corner ch 2 gap and pedals at the middle ch 2 gaps. Lastly shell in the corner, ch 2, dc 2 and join with the third chain of the starting ch 3. Bind off.
Row 4: Join new color, ch 5, dc 3 in the next ch 2 gap, then work shell in all corner gaps and pedals in the middle gaps. Lastly dc 2 in the first gap and join with the third chain of the starting ch 3. Bind off.
Row 5: With black color ch 3, dc 3 in the next gap, ch 2. Again as in the previous row work shells in the corners and pedals in the other ch 2 gaps. Lastly join with the third chain out of ch 3 worked in the starting. Bind off.

Make such 48 square motifs then join them with simple chain stitch. 8 motifs x 6 motifs.

Last row: Work dc in every stitch of the last row (after sewing) and dc 3 at the corner stitch, with black color.

Sew black silk lining and your baby blanket is ready. Your small baby will like to see these various colors in the blanket. Once the baby is big enough, you can use it as a table cloth.

Crochet Baby Blanket: Any Size, Baby Set Part 3

 

Hello friends,

This is the last part of that Baby set in which I made one Baby blanket. Ofcourse it's very very simple. This will also be the tutorial to learn how to make rectangular granny.

Size of the blanket is 24" x 18". I have to start with multiple of 3 plus 2 sts. Let us start with 17=15+2 chs                                                

R1: sc1 in each ch starting from third, place marker at the second ch of ch2-sp formed, sc1 in each ch till last ch.

                                       

R2: At last st make (ch3, dc2 in same st) becomes (dc3), [skip 2 sts, (dc3) in next] rep till end, at last corner's st make (dc3, ch2, dc3, ch2, dc3), [skip 2 sts, (dc3) in next] rep till end, in the last corner's st make (dc3, ch2, dc3, ch2), join by sl st with the third ch (out of 3 chs made in the starting.

Sl st till the space between two (dc3) groups.

R3: [(dc3) in each gap between two dc3s of R2, at corner in ch2-sp make (dc3, ch2, dc3) shell, in second ch2-sp again shell means (dc3, ch2, dc3)] 2 times, cl.

sl st till the gap between two (dc3) groups.

R4: [(dc3) in each gap between two dc3s of R3, at corner in ch2-sp make (dc3, ch2, dc3) shell, (dc3) in gap between two shells of R3, in second ch2-sp again shell means (dc3, ch2, dc3)] 2 times, cl.

R5: [(dc3) in each gap between two dc3s of R4, at corner in ch2-sp make (dc3, ch2, dc3) shell, (dc3) in gap between shell and (dc3) of R4, in second ch2-sp again shell means (dc3, ch2, dc3)] 2 times, cl.

Repeat R5 till the required width reached.

You may change the color as per your choice.

Last Round: Join light purple yarn at any ch2-sp of corner. ch1, [at corner, sc1, ch3-picot by sc, sc1 in ch2-sp, ch5-picot by sc, sc1 in ch2-sp, ch3-picot by sc, (sc1 in 3 sts, ch3-picot by sc) rep till other corner] rep  4 times, cl. BO.

Flower for embroidery: R1: with dark yarn, ch1, sc6 in a  magic loop, cl BO.

R2: (ch2, 2dctog, ch3, sl st in next st)  rep 6 times, cl., BO. 

Make 3 flowers like this. Sew them on the baby blanket as per your choice then with green yarn make little bit embroidery as shown in first photo or as per your choice.

The following video with English subtitles may help you.

ETC: Enjoy the Creativity.

Crochet Cartoon for Baby Blanket by C2C technique

Fig 1

Hello friends,
C2C technique in crochet is very interesting. This is oblique way of making things straight 😇.
In my video channel I have demonstrated, how to make square by C2C and how to make rectangle by C2C technique? The technique is generally used to make baby blankets.
How to make Square by C2C technique: https://youtu.be/l5uuHmgEkNY How to make reactangle by C2C technique: https://youtu.be/NrHalqGemCU

Here is the central portion of the baby blanket, I have made. It is so cute that you can also use it as a wall frame in kids room.
In this technique only three type of stitches are used, chains, double crochet (dc) and slip stitch (sl st). ch3, dc 3 makes one small square and

Fig 2

Fig 3

It is 22 sq x 26 sq, Row – R. Start from left corner of the picture.

First select the crossed picture then draw oblique lines on that from one corner as in fig 3. Count and write the colours of each corner as in fig 3,4.

Fig 4

Fig 5

Note: Background colour Yellow – Y, Mustered color – M, White – W, Brown – B, Black

R1 to R11 all Y.

R12: 3Y, 5M, 4Y. (12sq)R13: 3Y, 7M, 3Y. (13 sq)

R14: 2Y, 1W, 8M, 3Y. (14 sq)

R15: 3Y, 9M, 2W, 1Y.

R16: 1Y, 4W, 5M, 1Y, 2M, 1B, 2Y.

R17: 3Y, 1 B, 1W, 1M,1Y, 5M, 3W, 2Y.

R18: 2Y, 3W, 4M, 2Y, 1M, 1W, 1B, 1W, 1B, 2Y.

R19: 3Y, 1B, 3W, 1M, 2Y, 4M, 2W, 3Y.

R20: 5Y, 2W, 5Y, 3W, 1B, 1M, 3Y.

R21: 4Y, 1M, 3W, 1M, 6Y, 1M, 5Y

R22: 6Y, 2M, 4Y, 1M, 3W, 2M, 4Y (22 sq)

R23: 4Y, 2M, 2W, 2M, 2Y, 4M, 6Y (22 sq)

R24: 7Y, 1M, 3W, 2Y, 1M, 2W, 2M, 4Y (22sq)

R25: 4Y, 5M, 1Y, 4W, 1M, 7Y (22 sq)

R26: 8Y, 1M, 5W, 3M, 5Y, (22 sq)

R27: 6Y, 1M, 1B, 2W, 1 black, 1W, 2M, 7Y (21 sq)

R28: 6Y, 3M, 3W, 1M, 7Y (20sq)

R29: 6Y, 1W, 7M, 5Y (19sq)

R30: 4Y, 7M, 1W, 6Y (18sq)

R31: 5Y, 2W, 4M, 1Y, 1M, 1 B, 3Y (17sq)

R32: 5Y, 4M, 2W, 5Y (16 sq)

R33: 4Y, 1W, 1 black, 1W, 3M, 5Y (15sq)

R34: 5Y, 3M, 2W, 4Y (14sq)

R35: 3Y, 3W, 2M,5Y (13 sq)

R36: 5Y, 2M, 2W, 3Y (12 sq)

R37: 2Y, 1M, 1W, 3 M, 4Y (11sq)

R38: 3Y, 4M, 1W, 2Y (10sq)

R39: 1Y, 2M, 2Y, 1M, 3Y (9sq)

R40: 2Y, 1B, 5Y (8sq)

R41: 7Y.
R42: 6Y.
R43: 5Y.
R44: 4Y.
R45: 3Y.
R46: 2Y.
R47: 1Y.
The following video may help you.

ETC: Enjoy the Creativity.

Tulip Flowers Bunch: Seven Colors of Life:

Tulip bunch

Hi friends,
Every knitter /crocheter has much leftover yarns and what can be the best use of them, other than making a bunch of beautiful Tulip flowers! I made this bunch and the flower pot / vase too.
These flowers are made as per,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfbU_fVF3ms.

Thanks Natali Korneeva for sharing the video of very cute and simple Tulip flowers, otherwise if it is a written pattern in Ukrainian language then I could not make these flowers.

I have number of different colored leftover yarns which I used here and made these flowers. Putting them in a blue glass in my kitchen I took this snap but then I saw an old bottle and it inspired me to make vase.  I also wanted to use this yarn which I brought from USA. I simply wound this yarn around the bottle and glued it's ends.
If you want, you can decorate it more with small beads on that.

Cluster type wool

Vase with matching flower

Vase looks beautiful

Everything handmade

So I feel satisfied when I see such a hand made triplet: crochet motif, vase and Tulip flowers in that. W...O....W!

When I saw this in my guest room, a thought came in my mind that these seven coloured flowers represents seven colours of life.

White: Purity, Spirituality
Blue: loyalty, wisdom
Yellow: confidence, energy
Red: passion, lust
Orange: Health, Happiness
Green: Growth, fertility
Purple: Royalty, nobility
Pink: Unconditional love.

Refer the link:
https://www.color-meanings.com/colors-of-the-rainbow-and-their-meanings/

One more post on left over yarn I have already shared with you on this blog whose link is,
https://alkaandart.blogspot.com/search?q=crochet+baby+blanket

So life is full of colours, enjoy it....

Knitted Baby Poncho 13

Pretty Poncho:

Fig 1

Hi friends,

In 2011, when I went to USA  for the delivery of my daughter,  I took hand made 3-4 small sweaters, one crochet frock, baby blanket etc with me. I lived there 3 months. After the delivery I used to get some free time. In the cupboard of my daughter, I saw this wool waiting for being knitted ( My daughter also knits, crochet and tat etc). I asked her whether I could use it? Of course she permitted. Then as sweaters, frock have done already but poncho was not made so I decided to make poncho.


Poncho: I searched for the poncho pattern and I got this,
https://lifestyle.howstuffworks.com/crafts/knitting/easy-baby-knitting-patterns6.htm                

Fig 2

Yarn used in the link was multicoloured but I have single coloured yarn so I used contrast colour border and two tassels at neck and then mixed colour fringes to the bottom edging. She wore this poncho till she was 4 years old.

First time I made I-card for this poncho and I liked it so much that later on I used it so many times.

Cap: The cap should look matching with poncho, so I decided to use two colours in the pattern I found on net,
https://heyjulie.wordpress.com/2006/06/27/basic-earflap-hat/

I-cord: For i-cord I used the following link,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJ0s_2TBwCQ

Pom-Pom: I generally made pom pom by the old iron ring as shown in fig 3, which I have at Amravati. So I made this pom-pom simply on hands.

Fig 3

I have recently started you tube channel "Kalopasak" in Marathi with subtitles in English.
So this video is from the you tube channel Kalopasak, which explains how to make pom-pom.

Recently when I was video chatting with her, what I saw!!! she wore that poncho as a skirt. 😛. (Colour change due to video chat screen)

This use of poncho, I never knew 😜.

Fig 4

Fig 5

Happy knitting.

My Mom's Creations:

Fig 1

Friends,
The month of March which is actually my birthday month but this year March had totally moved me. It gave a shock of my mother's demise. At the time, we all sisters and my brother were with her in Bangalore at my brother's place where she was living since two and half year. We saw her breaths slowing down and down. She was bed ridden since one month, her age was 85 still her demise made us orphan. 

Mother is always special in every one's life. Every one has lots of memories about her / his mother. I also have number of memories, out of which I will share one memory with you. 

My parents wanted me to be a singer as I had already mentioned in my post of "Music: the divine art". They always wished to hear me (songs by me), both classical as well as light music. After the death of my father my mom lived in Amravati with my younger sister Sadhana, I used to go there frequently, many times she asked me to sing a song and I used to sing also; but this was only in the last month when I realized that how much my mom used to be delighted on hearing my songs, when Aparna (wife of my brother) told me this incident.
My mom's Sodium level was reduced, she used to talk irrelevant since last one month. 

One day she said," Alka sing 2-3 songs". (though I was not at my brother's place at that time) 

After some time she said to the wife of my brother,"Aparna, today I am really so satisfied as Alka sung 4-5 melodious songs".
Hearing this I could not control my tears 😭.

She was very efficient manager. She managed the business of my father "Liberty Art Service", a business of painting, the movie advertising boards. It was very hard core business due to it's dependency on the working artists. Big banners like 60 ft x 20 ft, 100 ft x 20 ft size were painted in the studio for talkies decorations. Some of the photos of talkies decorations made in our studio (Fig 2, 3 and 4),

Fig 2

                        

Fig 3

Trade mark of our studio

Fig 4

As I have already written in "About me" of this blog, she was (and will be always) the only inspiration behind all my arts. Though she never did knitting or crochet work but she was interested in every new creative thing she forced us to learn that.
Not only she inspired us but she herself creates number of things based on various arts. But I had very few photos of her creations. So to share them with you I have devoted this post to "My Mom's Creations".

She had worked some cross stitch embroidery on table cloths, mats etc. only one photo of  cross stitch work done by her with embroidery threads on Jute square is available. (see fig 5) This is a small mat used while worshiping God. 

Fig 5                                                   Fig 6

Fig 7

Another beautiful embroidery work made by her was the baby blanket with knot stitch (Fig 6,7 ). She made it at the time of her first grand daughter that is my daughter. After 36 years also, today we are using it as a washing machine cover.
She made patch work dolls, animals on the baby blankets of all of her seven grand children. I have photo of only one of the classic patch work embroidery which a small baby's photo (Fig 1).

Fig 8

She had done much of bead work. Beaded rangolies around the lunch plates. Each design was different (Fig 8). Some more rangolies were there but I don't have photo of them.






She made many articles by using white beads (we call it pearls) on velvet cloth. I had two photos, one of Toran, a strip used to put on the door. Blue velvet strip was decorated by bead flowers and small bells. See fig 9.
Another photo was of pair of peacocks which mom made as a rangoli but later on we used it for decorating any thing. (Fig 10)

Fig 9

Fig 10

Fig 11

One more special creation of my mother was "Halvyache Dagine", the jewelry made by halva. Halva  (Fig 11) is the special Maharashtrian recipe made from suger and sesamum or suger and poppy seeds. In Maharashtra jewelry of this halva is made for newly married ladies and newly born babies on the eve of Makar Sankrant. Fig 12 shows the complete Halva Jewelry set made by my mom which content crown, necklace, earrings, mangalsutra ( a special kind of necklace with black beads only married ladies wear it) different types of bangles, rings for hand and leg fingers etc In fig 13 my cute little brother and in fig 14 my beautiful sister wearing all Halva jewelry made by mom.

Fig 12

Fig 13

Fig 14

She also used to sew big banners required for our studio. She sewed her own blouse, our frocks etc.

At the time of arrival of every grand son / daughter she sewed many small dresses again I missed all those photos.
She also used to do quilting. Number of baby blankets she made by quilting and used small pieces of cloths she had.
I have only one photo of naming ceremony of my daughter (Fig 15) in which some of her creations in quilting can be seen and that knot stitch blanket (shown in fig 7) can also be seen.

Fig 15

She drew beautiful rangolies but again I don't have any photo.
Her affection about new thing and her creativity can be seen in her last few days also. She saw one soap case in TV advertisement. It was made of sponge, she explained that when the soap finished some stuff remained in the soap case which can be used from the sponge case to wash legs 😛. She ordered my brother and described him how to make that and her obedient son and my loving brother made it and the result was (it remains unfinished and she left us) ......

Fig 16

Crochet Butterfly for Home Decor, Applique (Patchwork piece) for Baby Sweater, Butterfly Rakhi

 

Hi,

Friends here I have made a beautiful Butterflies. It's very simple and beautiful. Before this also I made butterfly but they get heavy and could not be stick on wall due to their weight. So this time I made light weight butterfly 😁. 

You can also use these butterflies as patchwork and sew them on baby sweater or baby blanket etc.

Then because festival Raksha Bandhan is coming soon, I made Rakhi out of these Butterflies. I hope that kids and Nature's lovers will definitely love these Rakhi.

BUTTERFLY: With 3.5mm hook it's 3" with 2.5mm hook it's 2" and by 1,75 mm it comes out to be 1.8". I mention the size here because if you want to fix them on wall with decreasing size, you can make them.

Let us first see, how to make a Butterfly. Start with white yarn...

Leaving 6" yarn make chs 12, then skip first ch, sc 1 in 7 chs, ch4, leave 6" yarn and BO.

Join red yarn at first st after ch4, we shall make bigger wing here and smaller wing in next st.

Bigger Wing: (ch6, tr tr 1, db tr 3 in the same st, ch5 sl st in the same st). Then make sl st in next st for smaller wing.

Smaller Wing: (ch5, db tr 3 in the same st, ch5 sl st in the same st) 

From back side make ch2 and get the working loop out at the second st from ch4 on other side. Now I have to make smaller wing first and then bigger wing that too in reverse order.

Smaller wing: (ch5, db tr 3, ch5, sl st all in the same st), sl st in first st from white ch4.

Bigger wing: (ch5, db tr 3, tr tr 1, ch 6, sl st all in the same st), BO. 

If you want to attach beads then leave some yarn end and sew beads.

Lastly hide the white yarn by tapestry needle.

The following video with English subtitles may help you.

RAKHI: For Rakhi only I have to make additional cords to tie on both sides. So I made chs 40-50 and then 3dc-puff or you can also have beads at the ends.

Here is the video for making Butterfly Rakhi.

ETC: Enjoy the Creativity....