Moving on up

I've decided to make the leap to a self-hosted blog. This site isn't going anywhere, but for new posts check out craftycori.com I combined this blog with one I started a couple years ago, so as a bonus, more posts! I'm just learning Wordpress, so forgive me if the site looks weird or changes frequently.  I hope to get the wrinkles ironed out shortly.  Wish me luck!

Crocheted Granny Square Baby Blanket

The first of many baby posts. All babies need a cuddly blanket to have as a lovey. This is actually the second blanket I crocheted for my new baby niece. The first was a really cute owl blanket, but that was before I started this blog and I neglected to take pictures before I gave it to my sister-in-law. You'll just have to trust me that it was adorable. This blanket is still cute, but definitely simpler and designed for utility rather than "aww" factor.

I first made a blanket like this for my son before he was born. He loves it so much that I had to make another one so there was always one clean. It is soft and cuddly and he loves to stick his fingers and toes in the gaps between stitches. Plus the loose stitches and gaps make me less worried that he'll suffocate himself with it. Which due to the SIDS educational material they hand out, was one of my biggest fears as a new mom.

This is really more of a stitch than a pattern. It really is just a giant granny square. Once you get the pattern of stitches it works up really fast with little thought. Great for keeping hands busy while watching TV. My favorite yarn for this is Red Heart Soft, but you can't find the color you want I have good luck with Vanna's Baby yarn. It doesn't feel as soft as you work, but it washes up nice.  I only use acrylic for baby items. Anything that could get peed/pooped/spit up on needs to be completely machine washable and dryable.

This pattern also lends itself well to customization. You can easily change the number of colors and width of the stripes and get a different look. Also, this is my first pattern, so let me know if anything is unclear or if you find a mistake.

Granny Square Baby Blanket

printer friendly pattern

Materials:

• 1.5 -2 skeins each of 4 colors of worsted weight acrylic yarn. 
•    For the blanket shown:
• Color A - Vanna's Choice Baby in Goldfish (2 - 3.5 oz skeins)
• Color B - Red Heart Soft Baby Steps in White (1.5 - 5 oz skeins)
• Color C - Vanna's Choice Baby in Sweet Pea (1.5 - 3.5 oz skeins)
• Color D - Red Heart Soft Baby Steps in Aqua (1 - 5 oz skein)
• I-9 (5.5 mm) Hook
• Yarn needle for weaving in ends

Gauge:

• Exact gauge is not important, just be consistent. Finished size is approximately 32 inches square.

Notes:

• Blanket is worked in rounds with right side facing at all times.
• To keep blanket square, join new colors in a different corner each round.

Abbreviations

• dc - double crochet
• st(s) - stitch(es)
• sp(s) - space(s)
• ch - chain
• sl st - slip stitch

Blanket

With A, ch 4. Join with sl st in first ch to form a ring

Round 1: Chain 3, 2 dc in ring, ch 2, (3 dc, ch 2) x3, join with sl st in top of beginning chain. This creates a square with 3 dc on each side and 4 corners made of ch 2 spaces.

Round 2: Sl st in next 2 dc, (sl st, ch 3, 2 dc, ch 2, 3 dc) in first ch 2 space. This creates the first corner. Ch 1 *(3 dc, ch 2, 3 dc) in next ch 2 space, ch 1. This creates the next corner. Repeat from * around. Join with sl st in top of beginning ch. Fasten off.  Now the square has sides of (3 dc, ch 1, 3 dc), with ch 2 in each corner. 

Round 3: Join B with sl st in any corner ch 2 space, ch 3, (2 dc, ch2, 3 dc) in same ch 2 space, ch 1, 3 dc in next ch 1 space, ch 1, *(3 dc, ch 2, 3 dc) in next corner ch 2 space, ch 1 3 dc in next ch 1 space, ch 1. Repeat from * around. join with sl st in top of beginning chain. Fasten off.

Round 4: Join C in any corner ch 2 space, ch 3. (2 dc, ch 2, 3 dc) in same ch 2 space. Ch 1, (3 dc in next ch 1 space, ch 1) to next corner. *(3 dc, ch 2, 3 dc) in corner ch 2 space. Ch 1, (3 dc in next ch 1 space, ch 1) to next corner. Repeat from * around. Join with sl st.

Round 5: Sl st in next 2 dc (sl st, ch 3, 2 dc, ch 2, 3 dc) in first ch 2 space. Continue as in Round 4

Round 6: Repeat Round 3.

Rounds 7 & 8: Repeat Rounds 4 & 5.

Continue in this pattern for 29 rounds. This will be 3 2-row stripes of each color A, C, D, with a single row of B in between, then a final two rows of A. Do not fasten off after the last round of A. Continue to Trim.
Color Pattern: {AA,B,CC,B,DD,B,AA,B,CC,B,DD,B,AA,B,CC,B,DD,B,AA}

Trim
With A, chain 3. Dc in each dc or ch 1. For the corners, 5 dc in each ch 2 space. Join with sl st to top of beginning chain. Fasten off. Weave in all ends.

Oh Baby!

No, not me. My little one is only 10 months old. It is not even close to time to start thinking about another one.

My sister-in-law, however, gave birth to a beautiful baby girl on August 25th. So in anticipation of her arrival, I spent most of August creating cute baby things. This also explains why August was short on blog posts. I was busy!

So this just serves as a warning. As I try to get caught up on my posts, be prepared for the onslaught of projects for baby.

Zucchini Muffins

I do not have much of a green thumb, but I plant a small veggie garden each year.  I usually get a handful of decent tomatoes and a couple of zucchini, but this year one of my two zucchini plants is out of control happy. I am getting 2-3 giant squash every few days. The other one didn't produce a single fruit. It was getting close, but this weekend the damn dog dug it up. But that is okay, because I already have more zukes than I can eat. I've started conveniently forgetting them when I visit family members. "Sure I can bring a zucchini to grill with dinner? Oh, you don't think we'll need all three for the four of us, that's okay. I'll bring the rest home with me. Oops... they completely slipped my mind, must have been that one whole beer I drank. You know I can't hold my liquor since the baby... Anyway, you can keep them." You get the idea.

So if you've found yourself with some mystery zucchinis you don't remember asking for, here is a perfect recipe to use them up. This started as a zucchini bread recipe, and you can certainly use it to make bread (2 loaves, bake for 45 minutes), but I think muffin's are easier and more convenient. I grab one on my way out the door each morning, perfect breakfast. And if you have giant zukes like I do and you end up with extra shredded zucchini, do not fear, I keep it in a tupperware in the fridge, it will last a couple weeks before it gets too soggy to use. And the muffins are so good you'll want to make another batch. I promise. Plus they freeze well. Muffins all winter!

These muffins are super easy. The hardest part is shredding the zucchini. I used to shred it by hand on a cheese grater, and that works just fine. But it is tiring if you are doing a giant zucchini like the one below, so if you have a food processor I recommend using it. Much easier. I don't bother peeling the zucchini, the skin is soft enough in the muffins that you don't notice it. I don't drain the shredded zucchini either, the extra moisture makes really soft moist muffins. Yummy.

Cut into small enough segments to fit in food processor. 

Shred, shred, shred.

This giant zucchini is enough for several batches of muffins.

Now its time to start mixing ingredients. I do this all in one bowl. In the pictures I'm using a mixer, but honestly it is just as easy to do by hand. I just like excuses to use my pretty Kitchenaid Mixer.  Start with the eggs, oil, sugar and vanilla. Beat until well mixed.

Add eggs, oil, sugar and vanilla to bowl.

Beat.

Until well mixed.

Then add the flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda and cinnamon. Technically this should probably be mixed in a separate bowl first, but I haven't had any issues with just adding the dry right to the wet and it saves me from dirtying another bowl and whisk. Mix until dry ingredients are completely incorporated.

Add dry ingredients.

Mix.

Its starting to look like batter.

Then add the zucchini, nuts, raisins and craisins. Of course if you don't like nuts or raisins these could be left out, but they make the muffins so delicious. I've also made with chocolate chips instead. Also delicious, but then I have a harder time convincing myself that the muffins are healthy breakfast food. But really, they are still vegetables, right?  Be sure to mix this part by hand. It is next to impossible to get zucchini strands off of the mixer paddle. Trust me.

Add zucchini and "extras".

Mix it all together.

Now to transfer to muffin tins. This will make 24 standard muffins. I use liners, but you can grease and flour the tins if you prefer. I use a cookie scoop to make this easy. Mine is 1 inch and each muffin gets two scoops.

Line muffin tins.

Fill with batter.

Then bake at 325 degrees for 25-30 minutes. Make sure the tops of the muffins are set. If they are underdone the tops get gooey after they sit. If overdone, the muffins can get dry (but still tasty).

Zucchini Muffins

Ingredients:

3 eggs

1 cup vegetable oil

2 1/4 cups white sugar

3 teaspoons vanilla extract

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

3 teaspoons ground cinnamon

2 cups grated zucchini

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1/2 cup raisins

1/2 dried cranberries

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and flour 2 standard muffin tins (or use liners).
2. Beat eggs, oil, vanilla, and sugar together in a large bowl. Add flour, salt, baking soda, baking powder and cinnamon to the creamed mixture, and beat well. 
3. Stir in zucchini and nuts until well combined. Pour batter into prepared tins.
4. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until top of muffins are firm.

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Cabin Brownies

Yummy gooey deliciousness

I have no idea why these are called cabin brownies. I guess I can assume someone used to make them at a cabin, or they ate them at the cabin. I don't know. I don't have a cabin. But what I do know is that they are delicious no matter where you eat them. A mix between a brownie and a scotcharoo bar. Chocolaty, cakey, gooey, crunchy, fudgy, peanut buttery goodness.  And as a bonus, they are easy to make.

First, gather your ingredients. Now normally I shun recipes purporting to be homemade where the main ingredient is a boxed mix. But in this case, boxed is the way to go. The original recipe included making your own brownie, but it was way more work and way less tasty than what Ghirardelli has so kindly packaged for us. I suppose you could use a different box brownie mix, but Ghiradelli is really the best.

If using boxed mix you don't need flour, not sure how it snuck into my picture.

Start by mixing your brownie mix per the instructions on the box. If you are using my recommended mix, the instructions for Ghiradelli Chocolate Supreme are to preheat the oven to 325. Mix 1/4 cup water, 1/3 cup vegetable oil and 1 egg in a medium bowl. Add mix and enclosed chocolate syrup. Stir until well blended.

Mix brownie mix, easy.

Next, spread the brownie batter in a greased 13 x 9 cake pan and bake until brownie is done. The timing here gets a little tricky. The brownie mix calls for baking 40-45 minutes in a square pan. Since this is done in a rectangular pan, the brownie is thinner and therefore bakes faster. I baked mine for 30 minutes and the brownie was very soft. Another 5 minutes wouldn't have hurt.

Spread batter in pan.

Bake.

When the brownies are done, remove from oven and let cool completely before continuing the recipe.

Brownie is done, time for a break until it cools.

Once the brownie cools, spread a jar of Marshmallow cream over the top of the brownies. The key to getting the marshmallow to spread without ripping the brownie to shreds is a hot spatula. I kept running the rubber scrapper under scalding hot tap water as I went. As soon as it started sticking, the spatula went back in the water.

Marshmallow cream is very sticky. Don't get it in your hair...

Now for the topping. In a saucepan over low heat, melt the chocolate chips and peanut butter until smooth.

Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chips in the pot.

All nice and melty

Remove the pan from the heat and add the Rice Krispies. Stir so the Rice Krispies are evenly coated in chocolate mixture.

Add the Krispies

Stir to coat

Now spread the chocolate/peanut butter/Rice Krispie mixture over the layer of marshmallow creme. Refrigerate until the topping is firm.

Spread mixture over marshmallow 

Chill until firm.

Then dig in.

Eat it up. Yum!

I store these bars in the fridge because the chocolate will start to melt if you leave them out too long, but really, they won't last long enough anyway.

Cabin Brownies

Ingredients

1 box brownie mix and ingredient to prepare (usually oil, water, and eggs)

1 7-oz jar marshmallow creme

1 cup creamy peanut butter

1 12-oz bag chocolate chips

3 cups Rice Krisipies

Directions

1. In a bowl, prepare the the brownie mix per the instructions on the back of the box. Spread the batter into a greased 13 x 9 pan. Bake at temperature indicated by the mix, until the brownie is done. This is usually a shorter time than the mix calls for, approximately 25-35 minutes. Remove and allow to cool completely.
2. When brownies are cool, spread the marshmallow creme over over the brownies.
3. In a saucepan, on low heat, melt chocolate chips and peanut butter, stirring until smooth. Remove from heat and add the Rice Krispies. Spread mixture over the marshmallow creme. Refrigerate.

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Lined Tab Curtains

Continuing the first floor redecorate project (I'm so close, before and after pics of the new colors are coming shortly. I just need to clean before I document), I made some new curtains for the small window in our living room. I made several of these last year and they all turned out fabulously. These ones not so much. I used a shower curtain as my fabric which caused me a couple issues. First, because of some bad math, I didn't realize until it was too late that my shower curtain was not quite wide enough to make two curtains out of it. So I ended up ripping all hems out of the shower curtain to give me an extra inch of fabric, which was no fun at all. Then I fudged some of my hems so it worked, but it's not what I would recommend. Also, I am used to working with cotton quilting fabric and this was some sort of blend that has more stretch. This caused weird bunching at the bottom of the curtain once it was hung because the lining fabric didn't stretch with the front. (you can kinda see it in the pic above). I had to punt and make some modifications after they were finished, which were not ideal. This tutorial will cover the my normal method which is usually great. I'll add notes at the end for what I would have done differently if I'd known about my fabric stretch problem ahead of time.

This is the first sewing project I ever attempted. (Not these exact curtains, the ones I made last summer that no longer match the living room.) I didn't have a pattern, just existing curtains I had purchased at Target that I used as a guide. Everything is done in a straight stitch because that is the only one I know how to use. There could be an easier or better way to do this. If so, please let me know.

Lined Tab Curtains

Supplies:

Fabric

Lining Fabric

Matching thread

Sewing Machine

Iron & Ironing board

Pins

Washable/disappearing marker

Measuring Tape/Yard Stick

First step, measure and cut your fabric. It needs to 2 inches wider and 4.5 inches longer than the curtain you are making. My window measured 72" x 31" so I made two 41 x 32 inch curtains. The tabs add 3 inches. I made the curtains wider than the window so they would still pleat a bit when pulled shut.  Since these are lined curtains, you also need to measure and cut lining fabric. The lining fabric should be two inches narrower than the main fabric (the width of the finished curtain) and an inch shorter.

Fabric cut to size

Then iron the fabric. It is so much easier to work with when it isn't all wrinkled. Also, don't store your left over fabric bunched up in a ball. It makes it difficult to iron when you decide to use it later. Lesson learned.

The iron is your friend.

Next, hem the top of both pieces of fabric. To do this, fold the top edge down 2 1/2 inches. Pin in place, press to get a straight crease, then do a straight stitch about 2 inches in from the top. Repeat on the lining fabric.

Fold down top edge 2.5 inches and pin in place. Press and sew.

Repeat for lining.

Here are both pieces after the top hem is sewed.

Next, line up the two pieces of fabric, wrong side together (right sides out?) so that the top edges line up. The sides should be centered so there is one inch on of the main fabric on each side of the lining fabric. There should be 2 inches of main fabric overhang on the bottom edge.

Line up fabric, wrong side together, lined up on top, centered on sides.

Now we need to sew the side hems. Fold the side in 1/2 inch. Pin and press. Then fold the pressed edge in 1/2 inch. Move the pins and press again.This should make a nice clean edge and a 1/2 hem that folds completely over the edge of the lining fabric. Sew the edge with a straight stitch, as close to the inside edge as possible. (My stitches usually end up right in the middle, I'm horrible at sewing close to an edge. Plus 1/4 inch is easy because the edge of the fabric lines up with the edge of the foot on the sewing machine.) Reinforce the hem at the top by back stitching a couple stitches. Repeat for the other side. When finished with this step you will have a curtain tube with open top and bottom.

Side hem pinned and ready to sew.

The next step is to sew the bottom hem. Just like on the side hems, fold up a half inch, pin and press, the fold again for the hem, only this time fold up an inch and a half. Pin, press, and sew, making sure to backstitch at the beginning and end. When finished with this step, the curtain is like an envelope, open on the top.

Sewing the bottom hem. Be sure to pull the pins as you go or you will break needles. Another lesson learned.

Bottom hem all ready to go.

Now the main part of the curtain is done. All that is left making tabs, inserting them in the top of the curtain and sewing it shut along the top. Easier said than done, the tab making is the most irritating part of the whole process.

First is measuring the fabric for tabs. Each of my curtains has 5 tabs, that are 2 inches wide and 3 inches long (6 inches folded in half) after folding over. So the fabric for each tab is 3 x 8 inches, allowing for a half inch hem on each edge and one inch to be tucked into the curtain.  Once you have cut out your tabs, fold the long side 1/2 inch on both sides of each tab. Pin, press and sew.

Pin the edges of each tab

Sew, sew, sew...

Now that the tabs are done, fold in half and insert the loose edge into the top of the curtain "envelope" between the front and lining fabric. There should be one inch inside the curtain and 3 inches above. Place on tab at each edge and space the others evenly across the top of the curtain. Pin into place.

Tabs pinned in place.

Now all that is left is securing the tabs by sewing across the top of the curtain. I try to sew 1/4 inch from the top, once again lining the edge of the fabric up with the edge of the foot.

I should have used a flash...

And that's it. Curtain is done. Just trim any extra strings and iron them again for good measure.

The double hem at the top is sorta decorative

All done, ready to hang.

So here they are on the window.

Closed

Open

From a crazy angle

Crazy angle open.

Now for the punting. It's not easy to see, but in the closed curtain picture, there is a weird bunching along the bottom hem. At first I thought I just didn't have the the fabric lined up right when I did the bottom hem, so I pulled it, ironed, made sure everything was smooth and hemmed it again. I got the exact same result. I finally decided that the problem is that the fabric has a little stretch and the lining fabric does not the stretched fabric was bunching up long the bottom hem because that's where it was connected to the lining and couldn't stretch any more.

My solution? Don't sew the bottom hem to the backing. Which would be easy if these curtains weren't already made. As it was, I had to get a little creative. I removed the hem (again), then cut the lining at the side hem so I could fold the backing up re-hem the front without sewing it to the lining. This made the front look nice again and now it hangs much smoother, but I had an unfinshed edge to the lining. I wasn't talented enough to figure out how to hem it in this state, so I used some iron hem tape to secure the hem. It isn't perfect, but you can't tell from the front and who is going to look behind my curtains. If I had it to do over again, I would  have made the lining the same length as the front fabric and sewed the bottom hem on each piece separately just like the top hem. Once both top and bottom hems were done, I would sew them together with the side hem, then add the tabs and sew the top, leaving the bottom open. Now I know for next time, but I am running out of places to put new curtains... unless I paint everything again, which I am NOT doing.

good enough is good enough

-Cori