Moving to littlepreciosstitch.blogspot.com

Hi all. This blogs will move to littlepreciosstitch.blogspot.com. That's because I think it's easier to manage a blog with the same email address as the title. And I think the new blogs reflects my new crafting cravings (designing patterns and create more lovely yarn crafts) currently. Hope to see you there. 😊

Elf Pixie Hat Inspired Natural Baby Bonnet

Hi all, this is my first crochet pattern to share with you all and I'm so excited! I made this for my brother's unborn son and I can't wait to see him wearing it! 

I'm inspired by the famous Crochet Elf Pixie Hat and the interesting texture of sc-dc combination on a dishcloth shared by thelittlemonkey.com. I thought the combination of these 2 pieces would be perfect and it's really lovely!

STITCHES USED 

• front post double crochet (fpdc)
• back post double crochet (bpdc)
• single crochet (sc)
• double crochet (dc)
• slip stitch

It's an easy pattern even for beginners.

SIZE

It's suitable for newborn as well as infant up to 6 months old.

MATERIALS

About 40g of natural tone (ombre brown-grey) polyester worsted weight yarn (brand unknown)
A little bit of white yarn (probably less than 10g)
Crochet hook 4mm and 5mm.

PATTERN

(Abbreviation: st-stitch, ch-chain)

Let's begin!

Hat

Row 1: Chain 43 with a 5mm crochet hook. Then, using 4mm crochet hook, skip first 2 st, 1 dc into each ch. (41 st). The reason I chained with a bigger hook as I always found that my foundation chains are too tight compared with the first few rows. You may disregard this if you don't have any problem with it.
Row 2: Ch 2. *fpdc on the first dc st below, then bpdc and repeat from *.
Row 3: Ch 2. *sc and dc into the first st, skip the next st and repeat from * until the end of this row. 
Row 4: Ch 2, skip the first sc-dc combination below, sc and dc into the second sc-dc combination on the row below.

Repeat row 3 and 4 (I repeated each row by 9 times) until you have a rectangle that is formed by 2 squares, I followed classy crochet's suggestion by folding in half, then folding the square(s) into a triangle to see if the edges line up. 

Edge: I used white yarn and sc into each st. It'd be nicer if I could find any fluffy yarn. =(
Fold your hat into halves and slip stitch at the last row of sc-dc combination.

Chin strap
Ch 30 (I think I've overestimated the size of a baby's jaw, lol, you may chain less eg. ch 20).
Then 1 sc in each st down one side, 5 sc into the end, hdc down the other side, 5 sc into the end and slip st to the beginning.
2 sc into a st, 1 sc into a st, 2 sc into a st and 1 sc into each st until 3 st from another end, then 2 sc into a st, 1 sc into a st, 2 sc into a st. Repeat this for the other side.
Edge: Turn to the wrong side. Reverse sc (crab st) from left to right. I prefer the look of the wrong side of crab st, anyway, you may work on the right side if you like the right side.
Leave a tail at the beginning and the end so you can sew one end to the hat, and use the other tail to sew the button onto the strap.  
You may also use a contrasting colour yarn like I did. By the way, I didn't make any button holw as the hols at the end of first row is big enough.

It's my first ever written pattern. I hope you enjoy it and please kindly let me know if you find any mistake. If you find my design lovely and you want to sell item made according tot this design, you're welcome to do so but please do not resell this pattern as I'd like it to remain free. Thanks!

Hakone 1 Day Getaway

Last Saturday, we went to Hakone. Due to my poor planning, we didn't manage to enjoy Hakone to the fullest. I bought a 2-day freepass (1-day free pass is not available) at the night before, which ended up the expiry date is the next day (how foolish I was, I should have bought it on the morning we were going). We did view the beautiful autumn leaves of different shades of colours, ride the ropeway and enjoyed the beauty of Mount Fuji and bubbling steam of onsen from atop and ride the pirate ship. What we missed were onsen experince (not that I dare to be naked in front of so many people though. If we had spent an extra day, we'd be able to go to private onsen in a ryokan), owakudani egg (which is said to be able to increase longevity - 1 egg equals to 7 years of life!) and visits to several museums and gardens.

Anyway, I managed to capture some nice views using my phone. Tadah!

Nice coffee at Naraya cafe

Naraya crafthouse

Isn't the railway awesome?

I did miss snapping a lot of picures as I was busy admiring the scenery. =p

Miette in progress

As the weather gets colder, I crave to knit my very first sweater and voila, I found the famous Miette. The pattern is extremely easily comprehensive and well written. It's a fast knit as well as I use approximately 3 weeks with unraveling and knitting again in between to reach up to this stage. Thanks Andi for the great pattern!

    Body on the way...

Crochet Items: Retrospective Documentation

Thanks to the lovely free pattern by Classy Crochet for the pixie hat and Red Heart yarn for the fingerless gloves. =)

Crocheted pixie hat for a friend's baby girl

Fingerless gloves for me

To Do List: Sewing

I received these 3 books I purchased online on http://www.abebooks.com three weeks ago. The delivery service was pretty fast and punctual. I must thank Megan Nielsen design for recommending the books as these books are very comprehensive, even for a beginner like me.

I plan to sew a beautiful scallop edge skirt as taught by Vivat Veritas using the pretty fabric I bought from Tomato at Nippori Fabric Town a couple of weeks ago. The fabric is extremely cheap given it's good quality at 100 Yen per meter.

How lovely the print of flying swallows on the dark blue background!

Yoyogi Park

Last Saturday, I went to Yoyogi Park. The best part about Yoyogi Park is free entrance! Yay! It is one of my to go list as I am a Japan cheapo. The scenery is superb with a range of orange-red leaves tone, accompanied by music played by some bands. Unfortunately, there was no flea market (one of my main motive, cheeky smile) but a lot of food stalls.

I love the ombre tone of green-yellow-orange and red colours.

There are many different types of flowers which really fascinate me, especially huge flowers with diameter longer than my finger. OMG!

Pansies of different colours

Huge rose!

Huge chrysanthemum!