what to do with a butterfly

I created this Irish Crochet butterfly during one of my enforced periods of resting. 

This is created by crocheting over a number of strands of cotton to create the padded appearance.  This was quite a challenging piece of work for many reasons.  The tiny gauge thread, working over multiple strands to create the padding and also the pattern was vintage.  The phraseology and ordering of instructions in vintage patterns can take great patients to work through.



Having battled my way through the pattern and the pain of stabbed fingers from the tiny hook I needed to use I finished the butterfly.  I think it looks quite pretty.

The final challenge is what to do with it.  I had considered;

1. Make a brooch
2. Thread it up for a Christmas decoration
3.  Attach it to a hair ornament

At the end of the day, I'm really not sure what to do with it - but it seems a shame to have put all the effort in and just leave it there.

Midsummer's night Shawl

After returning from my holidays again and having put my shawl to good use again I have decided to make another one.  This time for my mum.

I had a good look through my existing patterns but I found that a lot of shawl patterns are too light weight for what I had in mind.  I wanted to create something that had a little warmth but not heavy weight.

I found this pattern for a Midsummer's Night Shawl on Interweave Store.  It's just what I was looking for. 

It is substantial enough to have some warmth but also not too heavy.  The pattern is pretty easy to follow and has a really useful stitch diagram - actually after the first couple of rows I put the rest of the pattern to one side and just followed the diagram.

I am creating this using Adrafil Azzura 3 ply yarn, this is a 70% Wool and 30% acrylic mix.  It is lovely and soft, east to work with and comes in a pretty good range of colours.

Shade Card

I've chosen to use shade 33 Turquoise.  I've really only just stared with this project, but so far so good - I think its going to work out quite nicely, fingers crossed anyway.