summer seeds

I've been dying to tell you all about this! Stephanie from N.E.E.T. Magazine contacted me a while ago and asked if I'd like to be a part of the June issue! I think I about died from hyperventilation and then after I had several people pinch me, I got to work on a little feature similar to my spring seeds post but for seeds that will grow perfectly well in the summer!

I'm so thankful for the opportunity! I don't think I've gushed enough about N.E.E.T. Mag, but I'll say it again -- if you're not reading it, you should be!

Head on over to N.E.E.T. Magazine to check out my feature (and other fantastic articles and inspirations)!

it's june!

And it always makes me think of George.

I love the tree in the front. It's a snowbird hawthorn and it's blooming right now.

I don't know what tree we were supposed to get, but I pretty much dropped everything to bake chocolate chip cookies that day so I could bribe the landscape guys into getting a flowering tree.

It was totally worth it.

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My free printable June calendars are also available now!

crafty

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DIY: crocheted rag rug part 3

Changing colour by attaching a new piece of sheet yarn couldn't be easier!

Simply line up the edge of the sheet you were crocheting with, with the edge of the new sheet.

Then grab that needle and thread I told you to get (here), and join the two pieces with a quick stitch.

I use a blanket stitch, but you can use whatever stitch you feel most comfortable with.

I don't really knot it much more than just going through with the needle a couple of extra times at the beginning and the end of the stitch. I haven't found that they come apart, and I have put a smaller round through the washing machine a couple of times already.

Finally, continue on crocheting as if the new piece of sheet is part of the old piece. Go around as many times as you like with that colour and change again if you desire.

Next week will be the end of this series when I tell you how I finish up a rug.

If you need a refresher or if you missed them, read part one and two.

friday fixations: peony tulips

If you're a peony lover like I am, plant peony tulips so you can experience the ruffle of a peony well before they actually bloom. These look so much like real peonies that I'm never planting regular tulips again.

Also, if you happen to follow my twitter, you probably would have guessed that our basement flooded last night. Thankfully, we caught it early so the damage is pretty minimal, but our basement is a complete mess and there are four huge fans and a dehumidifier running like jet planes down there. So I'm truthfully more fixated on that today.

These things always happen on a Friday when you've got a million things to do, don't they? (I would have been completely fixated on the tulips today -- as I have been all week -- but they're really more to cheer me up now than anything.)

DIY: crocheted rag rug part 2

Now the fun part! Or the tricky explaining part if you're me!

Grab one end of the sheet yarn and make a simple slip knot. This is going to be the centre of your rug.

Insert your hook into the loop.

Pick up the long end of the fabric and loop it once over your hook

And pull that loop through the first loop (the slip knot loop)

Pull it through to make a new loop.

I also made a video to help you see the process a little better:

Continue making a chain of loops until you have between 5-7 chains. I'm never really precise with this either and I probably should be. I usually just listen to what the fabric tells me since it tends to naturally want to curve into a circle on its own after a certain amount of loops.

This is kind of the tricky part. You have to find your original loop hole and, with your hook still in the last loop, stick it into the original loop

Loop the long end of fabric over the hook (just as you've been doing all along)

And pull that fabric through the original loop

Then keep pulling it through the loop your hook was already through (or the last loop in your chain) and close the circle.

Here it is in video form to help you see a bit better again:

Now you have to continue around the circle by finding a loop, pushing your hook through

pulling a new loop through that hole

and pulling it through the last loop

Another video helping you to see this a little clearer:

Continue around and around like so.

Some important things to note.

Try to keep the stitches (loops) tight but not too tight. If you make them too tight, the round will start to curve up on itself and you'll end up with a bowl (I've made my fair share of these!). If the stitches (loops) are too loose, then the rug will be too stretchy and you'll end up with gaps. This is something that takes a lot of practice to get perfect, so take your time figuring it out and don't feel discouraged if you have to take apart a whole rug and redo it. That's part of learning.

You'll have to add double stitches (loops) as you go along to help with keeping things comfortably loose (not too loose) and to help the rug lay flat. Double stitching basically means that instead of pulling one loop through a hole, you're going to pull two. So you'll pull your first loop through both loops (so many loops!) and then you'll pull another one through that same loop just as before.

Here's a video to help explain:

I usually don't have to make too many double stitches at the beginning, but as you get larger, you'll be using a lot more double stitches. The larger you go, the more space you'll need to take to make the rug lay flat. This just takes a lot of practice to know when, but generally, if my last loop doesn't match up with the next hole and I feel like I have to stretch it over to get into that spot, I'll make a second stitch (you don't want to pull it tight).

As I said before, if you mess up, don't be discouraged, just pull out the loops and start again. The great thing about this is that no matter how big you get, you can always pull out any mistakes you make and start over. I've had rugs almost finished and I find that all of a sudden, a round is getting a little tight and curving up. So I've pulled out the entire round and started again. It sucks but it's not the end of the world.

Practice this up and then next week, I'll show you how to switch fabrics!

And if you missed it, here is part one: how to make sheet yarn.