Christmas is coming!

A friend of mine spotted some crochet baubles and fell in love a couple of weeks ago, and asked if I could make some for her. So after a bit of googling for some patterns I came across this one.

It looked pretty simple, so I bought a load of polystyrene balls to go inside from Little Crafty Bug and thought I would give it a go! I bought the polystyrene balls as we both have very lively small children and didn't think glass baubles are a good idea for us!

So after a bit of playing around I came up with this



 

The one on the left is made using Caron Simply Soft Yarn which is available at Woolwarehouse for £3.99 a 170g ball. It is an aran weight in 100% acrylic, but it is the softest acrylic I have used. The colours are Dark Sage, Autumn Red and White.

 

It has a silky sheen to it and is beautiful to work with. Its the first time I have used this yarn, but I will definitely be using it again.

 

I am also making some Christmas Stockings with it for my girls which I will post about later once I have finished them.

 

The one on the right is made using Stylecraft Special dk, in colours Turquoise, Spice, Lipstick, Magenta and Lavender.

 

Stylecraft Special dk is my usual go to yarn for pretty much everything. I was introduced to it though Attic24 granny stripe pack, which was one of my first blankets, and I have been using it ever since. It is high quality but relatively inexpensive to buy. There are quite often offers on it at Deramores or Country Crafts, however if I am doing a order for a customer and need it quickly you cannot beat Woolwarehouse for speed of delivery. I have once had an order arrive the following day (within 24 hours!).

 

A note when buying Stylecraft Special the stock images for the colours are pretty rubbish and quite often look nothing like the actual colour I have found! What I normally do if I am choosing a colour that I have not used before is to check on Ravely of pictures of people projects to get a better indication of what the colours look like.

 

So back to the baubles.... I had to play around with the pattern to make the covers fit the baubles tightly. I used a 3.5mm hook for all of it as I wanted the stitches to be tight, and the holes smaller so you cant see the polystyrene ball underneath. As I used a smaller hook had to add another row 3tr clusters. With the Caron, which is a heavier weight yarn, I dropped down to 10 stitches on the first ring, but kept with the 3.5mm.

 

I was soooo pleased with them I started making a load of them (and I wasn't drinking wine...honestly...!!!)

 

 

And here is a picture of the finished items

 

 

These baubles are now available at my Etsy shop for £5 each, 3 for £12 or 6 for £20

 

Thanks for reading and I hope you all have a great day and Christmas!

 

Bye