I'm still Crocheting...a lot! I promise :-)

I haven't had a post about crochet in a while.  I checked, it was on August 1st.  This does not mean at all that I haven't been crocheting, quite the opposite actually. 

I have been working non-stop on my granny stripe that you have seen as a WIP here and here.  I only have 2 stripes left and then the border!!!

I have a couple scarves in progress, one is almost finished, and the other is just started. 

I actually just remember that I have a finished hat to show you.  I finished it a while ago, maybe in July.  I couldn't decide if it needed two buttons like the pattern showed or not.  Also, I couldn't get really good pictures, so I didn't want to post about it yet.  Good pictures or not, here it is.  (No making fun of my many facial expressions.  Do you know how hard it is to stand in a bathroom and use the mirror to see if you are aiming your phone correctly?  HARD haha)

Urban Revival Slouchy hat:

Details:

Pattern - Urban Revival by Vickie Howell  (I told you I loved her here)

Yarn - I did exactly as it called for and used Vickie Howell's Sheep-ish yarn in the color of turquoise-ish.  This is the first time I've used this yarn and I really like it.  The colors are amazing and the yarn has a nice sheen to it.

Hook - 5.5mm (I)

Here's the photo from the pattern:

Should I put two buttons on my hat or not?  What do you think?

Sam

Sun, Beach, Pools, Golf, and GARY ALLAN!

So, my title pretty much sums it up.  I was on vacation last week in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.  I have a very bad habit of not taking too many pictures.  I think I was having too much fun.

This was my family's vacation, so I got some pictures off my dad and my sister.

Here is the place we stayed at:



North Beach Towers

The pools were AMAZING.  There's more than what the picture below shows.  That picture is from our balcony.  There was a bar under the big roof in the pool and those are tables and benches in the water around it!

Here's a shot of my parents, myself, and my bf at dinner:

I went golfing for the first time while on vacation.  There were plenty of blunders and my dad kicked my ball into better position a couple times (I protested and he said that its my first time and have fun).

There is one thing that I was most excited for.  You see, each year when we go to Myrtle Beach, I search and see who's playing at the House of Blues while we are there and there's never anybody I like.  This year, I searched, and who's name came up? GARY ALLAN.  Now I say this with so much enthusiasm because he is my absolute favorite country singer.  His voice is just so soulful and his songs are amazing.  (I would post the video I took, but it was too big)  The House of Blues was an amazing venue.  It was amazingly small and intimate.  These pictures were all taken with my phone, so the quality isn't that good.

Seriously, look this guy up! 

Some of my favorites at the concert were:

Right Where I Need to Be

Watching Airplanes

No Regrets

Best I Ever Had

and most of all:

Live Ain't Always Beautiful

It was hard for me to narrow it down that far.

So that's where I was all week.  How was your week?  Do you like country?  Have you heard of Gary Allan?

-Sam :-)

Fun and Torture All Wrapped into One?

I had a lot of fun over the weekend, but I am in sooo much pain (it was worse yesterday, so YAY for it getting better today).  I had a soccer tournament over the weekend.  We played 2 games on Saturday and another 2 on Sunday.  We lost the final game, so we came in 2nd.

I played goalie for the most part, but I did play out a bit.  My team is either in Red or White (I think I'm in blue when I'm in goal).  We had another girl, Kristin, who played in goal as well. 

In the final game, we were dropping like flies with injuries.  I got hit in the head when I was on the ground (I already had the ball and the girl kept running and her knee hit my head).  Sara either got elbowed in the face or hit in the face with a hand because she most likely has a black eye right now with a cut.  Kristin went in for me and when she went to block the ball, she jammed her wrist pretty good.  She thought she broke it (x-ray says no, just a sprain).  I went back in goal (not a good idea) and we were all just dead.  We lost our lead and finally lost the game.  The team that we had all the injuries with was the orange team.

Here's some shots of the games. 


Team meeting at a half time.  I have my back turned in this picture, I'm to the right of the girl with logos on her back.



Me deciding where I'm going to send the ball



Our other goalie, Kristin



My sister, in white



Look at the dirty play of orange hooking our team member's arm!!! Shady!! haha

 

Me, playing out, after my injury and Sara's (I have the red stripe down the side of my shorts)



So, I said many posts ago that I needed to get some soccer pics up here.  This is what I do for fun and exercise.  This was my fun and torturous weekend all wrapped into one (you know I love it)!!

Sam :-)

Planned Random

Sarah over at Shabby Chic Sarah asked me last week if I was randomly choosing my colors for my Granny Stripe blanket.  I must admit, I can't handle true random.  What if I pulled the bright red to go right nest to the bright pink?!  So I do what I call a "Planned Random."

When I did my Ribbon Afghan that only had 8 different colors, I planned each color repeat as I went. 

Sorry for bad picture quality

With my Granny Stripe I have 26 colors.  Before I started I set them out in the order I wanted them.  There were a couple edits along the way, but this order pretty much held.

You can see the bright red in the middle of the bottom row (where I started) and the bright pink in the middle of the middle row.

After I finished those 26 stripes, I sat down on my floor, layed the blanket out and sorted the yarn until I chose my next order.  Voila!  Color repeat number 2! 



That might make the blanket wide enough.  I might have to add about 5 or 6 stripes after this color repeat.  If I do, it'll probably be my favorites that get a 3rd stripe.

This surprisingly took me a while.  I was sitting there (you can see my water bottle under the coffee table) and boy was I was indecisive.  I am doing rows of 2 and rows of 3 for my granny stripe.  If a color was a 3 row color in the first repeat, I was trying to make it a 2 row color, with a few exceptions.

Is this close to how you did your "random" granny stripe?