A new year...a new stitch

Diamond crochet basket

While wandering through a thrift store a while back

I came across a giant ball of grey yarn for $4.

Way too hard to resist even though I 

was already in danger of being buried under my stash yarn.

But I had the perfect pattern in mind since

it not only eats yarn but also it uses a stitch which

I've never tried before.

And as a bonus it also stores some of my yarn stash.

It's from a free pattern by Esther Chandler on Ravelry 

Diamond Trellis Basket 

 

It did take me awhile to get the hang of the new (to me) stitch.

As you can see my lines on the basket aren't perfect

 but I'm still happy with it.

This video by moogly was really helpful to me.

It explains the  

front post triple crochet 2 together stitch.

 fptrc2tog

 My cat Mew on the other hand wasn't particularly helpful

although she was nice company.

Xmas ornaments love red cups

One thing that I really hate about Christmas

 is putting all the ornaments away.

Unlike the tree trimming part there is no party 

with family and food.

There's just me and the cat and a lot of tissue paper.

I wrap the paper around the ornaments 

and put them away in boxes.

She jumps into the boxes and tears apart the tissue paper.

But this year, thanks to Pinterest 

I did something different.

First I glued a bunch of red cups 

to the bottom of a plastic tote.

Then I filled them up with ornaments,

putting a delicate one in each 

followed by a couple of soft ones to cushion it.

I also stuck in some of the pre-torn 

tissue paper (thanks kitty).

I made a second layer using cardboard 

as the base.

It was ridiculously simple and hassle free.

Pinterest link