Crochet Blanke and Fibonacci Throw

I finished my large blanket for my bed last week.  I added on tassels down the two sides.  This was mainly to mask where I had missed a few stitches at the sides.  The blanket is really heavy.  I spent roughly £200 in wool on this.  I am very pleased with the final result although it took over a month to make and cost rather a lot in money.

  
I then spent 4 days teaching myself how to make Granny squares and made a throw arranged in the Fibonacci sequence.  This costa far less than the last blanket and took 4 -5 days to complete.  I spent £80 on wool for this piece.

 I used two strands of wool for this as apposed to the four that I used for the previous blanket.

 My cats helped in the process as well making sure the throw was effective in warmth and comfort.

Cushion Cover

Today I have managed to finish one side of my cushion cover.  Only another 11 to go!  While I was making this piece I noticed my hook was occasionally snagging the wool making the piece less tidy.  I have decided I am going to reprint the hook in ABS plastic as apposed to the PLA and then smooth it down afterwards using acetone.  This will also give me the opportunity to make the handle a little larger.  I was constricted by size on my last print because of the size of my home print bed.

  

Crochet

I haven’t posted much of the crochet I have been making over the last month yet.  I have had a few projects on the go so here they are:

My first project I finished was a snood.  As it was my first finished item I wasn’t entirely sure what I was doing.  I set out to make a normal tube shaped snood.  However, after a few rows I realised that I was making a Mobius loop.  This happened at the stage where I joined the first loop together.  After crocheting the second row I skipped over to the other side which meant as I continued to crochet out the snood grew from both sides.

My second project was a pair of hand warmers.  However I didn’t take into account the amount of black wool I had left, so I am waiting for more to arrive in the post to finish the second one.  With the hand warmers I figured out how to crochet straight after the first row not creating a Mobius loop.

I thought I would then treat myself to a warm headband to keep my hair out of my eyes when I’m working. This took about two hours to make and again is a Möbius loop as I think it adds a subtle bit of interest in the piece when worn.

I have started making my first cushion covers for adding the soft finishing touches to my home.

This is the first one I started, however I made some mistakes at the edges of the pieces.  I am going to take this one apart and start it again.

This Is the second cushion cover I have started making.  I am much happier with the edges of this as I have perfected the changing stick at the end of the pieces.

This is my biggest project so far.  I have began to make a blanket to be used either in the bedroom or as a throw in the living room or the container.  So far I have spent two full days making this one and as I have ran out of wool I will need to wait a few days to continue.  I plan to add in a lot of black and monochrome strips to this with a few hints of bright colours.  I also plan to add tassels to the edges.  I suspect that by the time I finish this piece I would have spent a few weeks time making it.  I really love the feel of the piece and it is already quite heavy and warm.  It will be a very functional piece and I feel the fact it is entirely handmade will add to the unique feeling.

3D Printed Crochet Hook

For most of my life I have had a real adversion to making anything in textiles or fabric.  Today I got over that fear and decided that I should lean in order to be able to make the fabric items for my house.  I started by looking up YouTube videos on how to crochet.  I then made a crochet hook in Rhino and printed it from my home M3D.  I printed using the highest quality settings and it took 2 hours to print.

First attempt at crochet from para cord.

I managed to sort out the problems I was having with my printer changing where it was building on the bed mid build.  This was down to the filament catching and not unraveling properly while printing.

First piece, half made.

Second sample.

The crocheting took a few attempts and unraveling before I got the hang of it.  I was worried about the hook not being strong enough  however it held up throughout the day’s work.  I printed the hook at around 4mm thickness.  The tool was easy to use, however the part the finger should grip was a little low and so I need to develop the handle of the design to make it a little more comfortable.

3D printed crochet hook.

One of the other problems with using the hook straight off the machine is the support structure left on the handle.  When removing the support it left small spikes of plastic that weren’t comfortable on the hand.  I could either file these away or print on a machine that builds from the base rather that supports.

Underside of crochet hook showing rogue support material.