Summer! So much crochet time :)

A month ago I finally finished my first year at university and have thrown myself back into my crochet. I spent June and some of July in a reception class as a Student Teacher and completely left my crochet, spending every evening writing up observation notes, planning lessons and even making play doh. This meant that when I finally finished the 5 week placement I went a bit overboard on the crochet ideas; I found enough projects to last me the rest of my time at university, never mind just filling the summer! In 2 weeks time I will be in Cyprus with my boyfriend, and my only problem is how to fit all my yarn stash into my suitcase. If they do random spot check of suitcases they are going to have a giggle at the amount of wool in my bag, but I can't leave any colours behind or that will be just the colour I really need!

Despite promising faithfully to save money for my 3 weeks abroad I cannot resist yarn, and when there was a 10 for £10 offer on Robin Double Knit yarn...well... I'm going to spend the next 2 weeks rolling them into balls to try and fit them all in my suitcase.

 I am currently in the process of myself a beach skirt from a pattern on this blog by Katrinshine, and only have 2 rows left to do.

When I saw the pattern I thought it was so pretty and I was determined to try and make it, fully expecting it to be too difficult or if I did manage it that it wouldn't look anything like the lovely skirt in the picture. Much to my surprise I not only managed to understand the pattern diagrams (after painstakingly translating the instructions from Portuguese) I managed to actually make the skirt! However, it was not without a couple of problems and mistakes:

  1) My first problem was with buying the yarn. After finding the type of yarn I wanted, I spent about 10 minutes stood in the shop comparing the 8 or so different colours and desperately trying to pick one. I finally decided on a silver/grey wool, and bought one ball to try it out. After a few hours I finished the ball (completing the majority of the waist section of the skirt) and so I went back to buy more balls. Turns out I'd picked the one colour that the shop weren't buying in any more! Anyway, my skirt is now in this light blue picked out by my boyfriend :)

  2) I somehow managed to do a whole round of shells with 8 double crochets each instead of 9, and by the time I spotted it I had to unravel about 6 hours of work to correct it! Nightmare, but I didn't want to leave it and then be disappointed with the final result.

But I am really happy with how it has turned out, and soon it will be finished ready to wear over my bikini in the glorious weather :)