S's New Hat

I got to crochet tonight! Even though last night was not productive craft wise, tonight I was able to sit down while watching "The Terminator" with Aaron and crochet S's hat. I found a pattern online to get me started but really it is my own pattern. Here's what I did:

1. Chain 4, double crochet 11 in the 4th chain from the hook, slip stitch into the first chain.

2. Slip stitch into the top of the next two double crochets. Then chain 3. Double crochet into the same stitch. Skip a stitch and do two double crochets. Continue in this manner around the circle. Slip stitch into the third stitch of the chain (that was made at the beginning of this step).

3. Continue in like manner until the hat is large enough. I continued to increase stitches by adding two double crochets right next to the original chain of 3 in each row.

4. Tie off (can finish by slip stitching around the rim but I didn't do that so that it would be stretchy).

That's it. Simple. And then I turned it inside out because I liked the look of the ribs that were inside the hat. And viola! Here's the finished product. Can't wait to get a picture of it on my little one's head!

The finished product:

Upside down but here you can see some of the details:

Next to the model:

Idina's New Dress Part I

I have never made any kind of clothing (doll, dog, human) without a pattern before. I thought it was about time I tried. But rather than be overwhelmed by making something that was made for a myself or one of my loved ones (the human variety) I decided to start with something for my little dog.

First of all let me preface this with the fact that she loves to wear clothes. Weird, I know. But she gets so excited when I put clothes on her and gets upset when I take them off. I discovered this shortly after adopting her. It was winter and she kept shivering and burying herself under blankets. I was at the store and saw a cute little sweater that was around $5-10. I got it for her and brought it home, having no idea what she would think. Well, she didn't even want me to take it off the hanger that it came on, she was so excited about it. Since then I have done my share of buying her clothes and she has a nice mini wardrobe.

Last August I had to take her to the vet for a uti and while she was there the vet said that she needed to lose some weight. She has done an awesome job of it but it has made it so that many of her dresses are just a bit too big for her. Plus, her favorite dress (picture included) is getting a bit raggy. I'm not going to retire it quite yet but I thought it was time to try my hand at making her a dress.

The fabric that I am using for the skirt is some that I picked up years ago on sale at Joann's for some project and it has moved around with me. The top part is left over from Christmas projects, and the yellow is binding from S's quilt. It will have the binding (probably) as straps and some red ribbon as well. I am a bit concerned that it will be big enough for Idina's belly and if it is not than I may add little buttons and loops on the bottom. As you can tell, I am still in the designing phase and am basing things on what will fit my little girl who still has some weight to lose in the belly. I may just tie ribbons as the straps and under her belly so it can adjust as she gets smaller. But we will see.

Idina's favorite dress (bought at Target):

The beginning of the dress (the red is the bodice even though it has no shape right now):