My first pillowcases are finished!

After pulling out my floss and various unfinished projects last week I set my mind to finishing up the pillowcases that I had started...I don't even remember when.  Well over a year ago, I'm sure.  

It's a similar pattern to something I remember embroidering when I was young and once I got back to them I enjoyed the nostalgia factor as I worked on them.  I'm so happy with how they turned out.

These pillowcases had a serged edge and attaching a crocheted border to them is done differently from how one would attach a crocheted border to say, a deeply hemmed pillowcase.  I referred to this example to get me started, but then created my own lacey crocheted edging.  I've written down the pattern for the border and have shared it below. 

I found it helpful to have a mark at each spot where I needed to punch through the fabric with a crochet hook to make the single crochet base.  I found this Dritz Marking Pen at Walmart and it worked great:

You can barely see the small dots I made on the fabric, but I think the picture shows what I did with the marker.  And the disappearing ink truly does disappear within about 24 hours.  

Let me say, even though my little marks were uneven in relationship to the edge of the pillowcase, they still were very helpful in my keeping some consistency in where I made these stitches.  That said, I'm not sure how important true consistency is when doing this foundation row.   It's just not the part that anyone is likely to focus on once there is a pretty border to look at.

So here's the pattern I created: 

Simple Crochet Pillowcase Border

The following stitches were used:

chain (ch) 
slip stitch (sl st) 
single crochet (sc) 
double crochet (dc) 
picot (sc, chain 3, sc into the front/bottom of original sc, sc)

Rnd 1: Using a 1.0 mm (or smaller) steel hook (to punch through the fabric), crochet sc’s all around the edge of a pillowcase that has been serged or rolled and hemmed. Join first sc with a sl st.

At this point I changed to a size 1.5 mm hook (because it’s easier to crochet size 10 thread with).

Rnd 2: Ch 3, dc into same first stitch (this creates a “v” shape); skip next 2 stitches; *dc, ch-1, dc in next stitch, skip next 2 stitches*; repeat * to * around and join to top of beginning ch-3 with sl st. If fudging is required, so be it. It will not show.

Rnd 3: Sl st to first ch-1 space. Ch 1, *picot into ch space; 5 dc’s in next ch-1 space*. Repeat * to * around. Join to first sc with sl st. Again, if fudging is required it won’t show once the pillowcase is finished, and definitely won't be obvious once it is laundered.

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Some things I feel are worth noting:   

My pillowcase was a blend of polyester and cotton.  So I did not expect it to shrink much at all when laundering it.  The thread I used to crochet the edging was 100% cotton.  I did expect it to shrink somewhat.  

As I crocheted the edging, it produced a little bit of flare.  One way to minimize that was to skip three (instead of 2) stitches occasionally in Rnd 2.  But mostly I decided to not worry about it and trust that the process of machine washing and drying would shrink the cotton thread a bit and the flare would reduce.  And it did.  Perfectly, I thought.  

So my thoughts about this (if using 100% cotton thread and a synthetic/cotton blend pillowcase):  a fair amount of flare is acceptable, but if it gets too ruffly, adjustments should be made while crocheting to tone it down a bit (unless you like a ruffly edge, of course).  It's all subjective, but I hope mentioning this helps someone else not to worry about it much if they give this crocheted edging a try and they see it start to flare out.  

If you work with acrylic yarn or a 100% cotton pillowcase you'll have different issues of shrinkage.  Just be aware of what you're working with it and accommodate it.  

Please let me know if the pattern written above doesn't make sense anywhere.  I think this may be the first time I've tried to write a pattern down.

And that's all there is to it.  The first round of sc's (punching the hook through the fabric) was the hardest part - and I'll make no bones about it, it was tedious.  But after that round it was kind of fun.

And I just love how it turned out!

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And finally...

I hope all who celebrated had a 

Happy Mother's Day!

Alley Cats...

My Alley Cat Kitty Cat Afghan is finished!  I love how simple this pattern was to do, and how fun the finished design is.  I've dubbed it Alley Cat because the variegated gray I used for some of the rows makes me think of tattered, gray alley cats.  It's a yarn I almost got rid of once upon a time because I didn't like how it looked crocheted up.  I'm glad I kept it, though, because I think it found its destiny in this blanket.   Now, I LOVE it.

After searching and searching for a border I liked, I finally just made up something.  I needed the border to be simple, but interesting.  I think this fit the bill: 

My border was made thus (to the best of my ability to remember and see what I did):

First, with the lighter variegated gray, I slip-stitched a foundation row down both sides of the blanket, taking care to crochet into only one loop for a smoother look on the "back side".  Note:  the ends of the blanket don't require a foundation row  - and in my opinion, you don't want to do a foundation row on the top and bottom edges or you'll have a thicker border there - because the slip stitches virtually disappear along the sides when you single crochet into them.

Then I did a round of single crochet stitches all the way around.  It appears that I did 3 sc's in each corner - my goal here was to just create a pleasing shape at each corner, so I suggest doing whatever number of sc's does that for you.

Then I did a round of half-double crochets in every single crochet stitch, making 4 or 5 hdc's in each corner (again, whatever number created a pleasing shape around the corner).

Finally, for the last round, I switched colors to the darker gray and crocheted around the hdc's of the row below - alternating front-post double crochet stitches and back-post double crochet stitches (just to provide a bit of textural interest) doing 5 dc's in each corner.  Note:  I had to fudge a couple of times as I approached the corners.  The best look here is to do a front-post double crochet bordering both sides of the 5 dc's in each corner.  Here's a super close-up of the corner detail:

And that's it!  Super simple.  It feels like the perfect border for my Alley Cat Blanket.  Simple, but full of texture.

As for the "running stitch" that was formed on the "back side" (when I slip-stitched into one loop on the "front side"...  it looks completely fine (as you can see in the above photo).  In fact, I took a whole set of pictures with that showing as the front side and I didn't even notice until I downloaded the pictures and starting looking for the running stitch.   I couldn't tell the difference which side was the "front" and which side was the "back" until I studied the pictures closely.  To be clear, I've written "front side" and "back side" in quotation marks because there really is no front or back to this.  You really can't see an appreciable difference when it's all finished.

This was a stash-buster  for me and the yarns I used were:
Premier Dream in Baby Fern
Red Heart Super Saver in Dove (the variegated gray)
Vanna's Choice in Charcoal Grey
Vanna's Choice in White

I love this blanket and can imagine making more (it's so easy and gratifying).  And I really love having discovered a new way to make a foundation row around the blanket before adding the border. I look forward to using this technique in some of my future (multi-colored) blankets.   If you missed it above, there is a link to a video tutorial in last week's post showing this slip-stitch border-foundation row technique.

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And as I wrap this week up, I'll just give you a tease as to what new project I started this week:

It's the beginning of the Uwila Shawl.  So far, it's working up perfectly.  I think I'm about half-way (row-wise) to the cabled owl border.  I say "row-wise" because as a crescent shaped shawl, the rows are getting longer and longer, and it's going to just get slower and slower to complete those rows.  I've got a feeling this could take a while...

To see what other Yoppers are up to, visit our group on Ravelry.

Cleaning up the edges...

No finishes this week, but I have some in-process pictures, and a new-to-me technique I'm really excited to share.

A few days ago I started making A Simple Pineapple Top Bag.  It should be noted that there is an error in Round 13. Little did I know when I was working the pattern the designer's page on Ravelry contained the errata for this error.  When I was feeling stuck, I was thankful to have a chart I could refer to and and pleased with myself that I figured it out on my own.  I'm not terribly adept at chart-reading, but maybe I'll get there...

It will take me another day or so to finish it and figure out a drawstring, so for now here is a picture of the beginning of the pretty top:

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And I nearly finished with my Kitty-Cat blanket.   Just as the end of it was nearing, a friend posted a video to Ravelry showing how to prepare an uneven edge for a border that is made of multiple colors of yarns.   Now, if you're adding a border to a solid color crocheted piece, the standard way to prepare the edge is to make a row of single crochet stitches all the way around the piece - using the same color yarn that is used in the blanket.

But for a piece that's made up of different yarns (and more importantly, different colors) doing the above can still result in a wobbly and messy "prep row" let's call it.  I didn't think there was any way around this, so up until now I've just carried on with crocheting sc's around anything I want to prep for a border - completely clueless that there might be a better way.  

Now, if you are familiar with Esther from It's all in a Nutshell, you'll know she has a wonderful way of explaining things and her video tutorials are terrific.  My first exposure to Esther's video tutorials was when I did the Mandala Madness CAL last year, where she made that project a piece of cake. 

This new-to-me video did not disappoint either.  Esther shows how to prepare an uneven edge using slip stitches instead of single crochets.    Here's the video in case you're interested:

If the video doesn't play for some reason, here is a link to it on YouTube.

Now, Esther uses a heathered or multi-toned yarn that blends well with the other yarns in the piece she's crocheting slip stitches around.   Using the color she did, her slip stitches pretty much disappear into the larger piece.

Mine don't disappear (yet), but they do make a neat row of stitches along the edge of the blanket:

Unfortunately, the first time I tried this, I found my slip stitches weren't so neat on the back.  Since all my colors contrast with each other, the back edge was still pretty sloppy.  (I wish I'd taken a picture, but just imagine a lot of uneven stitches visible on the back side of the above - the same as if I had just crocheted single crochets all around.)  A messy back kind of negates the whole point of using slip stitches - which are a tad more tedious to make than single crochets, I might add.  Hmmm... what to do?

Seeing that Esther sometimes slip-stitched under just one strand of yarn, I decided to try that all the way across and I noticed that the effect on the back was significantly neater.  It was still visible, but it was much, much better.  Rather than a bunch of uneven and jagged stitches, I got this cleaner "running stitch" effect:

And then, once the slip stitches were finished, I could begin crocheting single crochet stitches into the slip stitches, and that's when the magic happened...

My slip stitches virtually disappeared on the front of the blanket:

The edge is clean and straight - even where it runs along the contrasting colors.    Wow!  Is that cool or what?!?

When I'm all finished and can show a picture next week, we'll see if the back "stitched" lines bother me at all.  They don't bother me now, so I can't imagine they will bother me once a complete border is on this blanket.

Check out what other Yoppers are up to, by visiting our group on Ravelry.