Hey Reader 👋

Who's tired of being hot? 🙋‍♀️

Yeesh. Ay, caramba as Bart would say.

My son likes to look up different parts of the world in the weather app on my phone and see what it's doing there.

Today, we looked up Death Valley, CA. You know, just for fun.

(This is what my 8 year old does for fun. He's also an avid coin collector. Love this guy.)

The Death Valley weather forecast for the coming week is practically the same as ours here in MO, plus or minus about 3 degrees.

That can't be right???.....

Sooooo... while that's happening, I'm indoors crocheting. And praying our air conditioner continues to work.

ANNND finally finishing a pattern to share with you that I've been working on since MARCH. 🙌

Well, I've been wanting to just crochet and chill, but my unfinished studio space really needs to be finished so I can move on with my life.

It makes it a lot easier to take pictures of finished projects to share with you if the background doesn't look like a construction site.

And it's at that stage where you already did all the painting, put up shelves, installed cabinets, and now you're just tired and over it.

So... you just ignore that it's 87% finished for about 2 and a half months.

And then you finally decide you're tired of looking at unfinished butcher block countertops and worrying that you're going to spill water on them when you water the fiddle leaf fig you've managed to miraculously keep alive for over 6 months...

And then you DO spill water on it, and you watch it absorb into the wood in 3.5 milliseconds and decide it's time to suck it up, put on your hot pink respirator, way too warm flannel shirt, rubber gloves and safety goggles (in a room that hovers at about 78 degrees on a good day) and sand and polycrylic the dang thing already.

So I did that. 3 coats worth with 2 hours of dry time in between.

And a bunch of sanding. And vacuuming. And wiping up all the dang dust.

And it looks pretty good if I don't say so myself.

So anyway, back to the topic at hand, which is crocheting things.

Here is a question for you.

Do you have a bag of granny squares in your house, car, or possibly she-shed that never turned into anything besides a bag of stuff that's constantly in the way?

Be honest. We've all been there. I'm currently still there in many ways.

BUT! I did finally use up 99 of them and I'm super duper excited to show you what I used them on, and share the pattern with you so you can make one too.

📌 ON THE BLOG

Introducing the Sea Glass & Sand Granny Square Blanket Pattern

First a confession: This is the first throw sized blanket I have ever finished that was not made with giant chunky yarn.

Seriously. In 20(ish) years of crocheting, 15 of which I actually knew what I was doing, I had *previously* never finished an adult sized blanket with normal sized (aka worsted weight) yarn.

I tend to start things, get distracted by a new project, start that, and repeat... leaving a trail of sad abandoned yarn and partially stitched pieces in my wake.

That is just who I am, or should I say it's who I WAS. Because now I finished this blanket, and honestly I'm excited to make more. 😎

Maybe you just need to finish one and prove to yourself you can do it.

Granny squares are what finally got me across the line, because you get a little mini finish every fifteen minutes or so instead of one enormous finish somewhere off in the distant future when we'll all be wearing jet packs and whatnot.

The medium throw size of this blanket is free on the blog, and it takes 99 total squares.

84 five-color perfect granny squares, and 15 solid one color ones scattered through on a diagonal.

(It's really not even that many, y'all.)

All joined with the easiest slip stitch zigzag join there is, and tastefully finished with a super simple and quick six round border.

P.S. - If you're wondering, it comes out to approx. 51 by 62 inches.

Here is the one thing I would tell you before you pick your colors.

OK first I would say, if you don't want to pick colors you can just use the ones I used. All the info is in the post. But if you want to pick your own...

One of your colors has to be the outer round of every single square. And also it'll be the color of the one color squares...

AND the join AND your first two border rounds. So be sure it's a color you like. (Or just go with what I picked if you want the whole beachy vibe.)

Mine is the sand color (aka beige). Pick whatever you want, just pick one you really like. Because there's a lot of it.

The full pattern for the throw blanket size, yarn amounts, the placement chart and the tutorials are all in the post.

And HEY!

If you want the full pattern in 8 different sizes, with all the yarn amounts figured out and a placement chart for all the sizes and everything, you can grab the printable PDF version in my shop!

It's 21 pages of blanket making fun, with links to the videos, a photo tutorial for the border, all for 6 bucks.

(But that's totally optional, because the blog post has the full free pattern for the throw size.)

🧶 ONE MORE TO LOVE

Easy Spiral Macrame Keychain

Switching crafts for a second, in case you're not feeling crochet-ish today.

This keychain uses three knots total and you can finish one in about 20 minutes, including cutting your cords.

It also makes a very good "oh no I need a gift by Friday" project. And I notice it is Friday. You know what I mean.

One thing that trips everybody up: your working cords need to be way, way longer than your filler cords. The two outer cords do all the knotting and eat cord fast, while the inner ones just sit there.

I promise, it's supposed to be that way and if you make them any shorter you will run out prematurely.

(And yes, I have gotten many... ahem... "spirited" comments on this subject over the years. But I know they weren't from you. Because you're cool.)

✂️ Speaking of running out of cord.

If you have ever cut short on a bigger macrame project, here is how I estimate cord length, plus a free estimator you can use right on the page.

That's a wrap for today, my friend.

Stay cool (literally, and like in a 2001 kinda way), and I hope you have a wonderful weekend!

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