One Sleeve Finished

Last week we had some construction going on in the house, so I was staying with my daughter on the peninsula.  I needed a portable craft project so I took the Soft Serve sweater and got a lot done on it.  Today I finished up the first sleeve:

It is surprising me how well the pattern turns out, and I still like this coral color even after looking at it for several weeks.  It's been a long time since I made a crocheted button band on a sweater.  These bands look nice, but they have a tendency to curl up at the ends as shown on the left side, below.

The right side is where the yarn ended, so I wove it into the back of the band at the bottom, and this provided enough extra structure to prevent the curling:

When I finish the second sleeve, I will go back and reinforce the back of the left band.  I think I'm going to like this sweater a lot, and it should get lots of wear.

Another Yarn Caddy

 I am crocheting away on the Soft Serve Sweater, mostly while I sit in the living room watching TV.  My yarn kept falling on the floor every time I bumped my handy folding TV table, so I made a yarn caddy cover for the table.  My first version is shown above.  I like the way the pockets hold the yarn skein upright so that the yarn can feed out easily.  However, I needed another pocket to  hold the growing project so that I could use the table top for my instructions.  I added a large pocket with a box pleat onto the side.  With this pocket available, I can put the project away safely while I am off doing something else.

At first, I had the instructions flat on the table, but then I remembered this book holder that I found at the local thrift store.  I only paid $3 for it so it was worth a try.  It is excellent for instructions but not necessarily for book reading since it is not very convenient for turning pages constantly (you have to lift back those page  holders every time you turn the page).  In addition, the back section of the book holder is like a bin, so you can keep your pincushion and pencils back there.

The nice thing about this sweater is that it is crocheted from the top down so you can try it on as it grows larger.  I am having to make some adjustments to the length of the yoke and the length of the underarm addition, but so far, so good.  I am loving this color, too.

I finished all the flowers for the afghan and am ready to start putting it all together next week.  I need to plan the placement of the colors first though.

September

My unexpected interest in  crochet continues.  I got this book out of the library, and I am very impressed with Doris Chan and her designs.  They don't have that clunky look crochet garments often have so I decided to actually try one.

 This is the 'Soft Serve' sweater.  I saw a picture of Doris Chan wearing this sweater in pink and she says it is her favorite, most-worn sweater.  I am going to close it with three buttons instead of the tie because I hate ties.  Someone online mentioned making this out of Simply Soft, and that seemed like a good idea because it is drapey and fits the pattern requirements.  I found this pretty apricot color and have already started the yoke.  The instructions could be clearer, but I am figuring it out.

So far, I am finding Simply Soft a pleasure to crochet.  So much more relaxing than thread crochet, and the available colors are wonderful.

We recently celebrated our anniversary.  Both daughters took us out to the Basque Cultural Center in South San Francisco, and I enjoyed it very much.  After dinner, we went over to A's house for dessert.  She had made a chocolate mint pie with whipped cream and it was delicious:

The chocolate pie crust stuck to the pie dish resulting in lots of humorous efforts to pry the pie out.  The effort was worth it, though because the pie was excellent.  Those are mint 0re0s crumbled on top.