My Very Own Sampler In The Making.

Good afternoon!  I'm preparing for a dear friend to come visit us within the next week but before I lost myself too deeply into all the house cleaning that needs to be done I wanted to share and update on my sampler that I'm finally knitting for myself.  There are a few more samplers and afghans that need to be finished but I'm taking a quick break on those so that I can get a decent head start on my own project.  

Here are rows one and two before I sewed them together. As you can tell from the picture, some of the top and bottom sections up my squares curl up naturally.

This was taken right after I finished sewing the two rows together.

 

Twenty squares are needed to complete this sampler and I've completed eight so far and I'm currently working on the ninth.

 

I sure was feeling my hair this day! Here's to Natural Hair Success!!

This was the very first time that I was able to get my low pony tail layed like this without having to blow dry or press my hair  It took a lot of product and time but my hair turned out cute!

 After going through recent photos that I had taken to showcase my 4C natural hair goodness I just HAD  to write a quick post to share some snap shots that I took, and  I wanted to write about the progress my hair has been making when it comes to the breakage that my hair had suffered a few months back.

These photos were taken earlier today and I'm happy to share that, even though my edges all around my hair are super short, my hair and scalp are making wonderful progress! I even used to have a thin rounded spot towards the middle of my scalp and that's grown back in as well!

About two or so months ago I shared that I had experienced pretty bad breakage towards the front and back edges of my hair and towards the top section of my hair.  This was very devastating for me because I had spent so much time, patience and money on making sure that my hair was growing to be everything that it could be, so for it to break on me was almost like a big slap in the face.  Luckily I quickly took action the moment I noticed my breakage and switched things around in my regiment and products to make sure that my hair and scalp could get itself together!

The trick that has helped my hair to grow back in a healthy manner has been to KEEP MY HAIR CARE SIMPLE.  I wash and condition my hair at least twice a week now and I use a whole bunch of coconut oil, thick creamy moisturizers, Blue Magic, Eco Style Gel and edge control every time I style my hair.  Every style that I have been doing for the past three weeks have been protective styles and they've ranged from low pony tails to pinned up twist. That's it!  I don't do different rinses or methods, and I stay away from attempting twist outs and braid outs.  I am well aware that this practice isn't necessarily needed to make everyone's  natural hair growth a success but it's been working pretty well for me. 

And another thing!  Silicons and sulfates are my friends again and I have missed them greatly! I did the whole trying to use all natural products thing and it's simply too costly for me to continue to do so for myself, so I'm back to using my faithful Herbal & Essence :-D  You'll be seeing me write about a few other low cost products that I've brought back in my regimen so be on the watch for that post!

Anyways, that's what's new with this 4C gal here:-D

Developing A Green Thumb, Slowly But Surely.

This is a picture of my lavender plant about two weeks ago!

My marigold and lavender a few days ago :-D

Never once growing up did I ever think that I would actually think that I would growing a desire to try to create my own garden, but here I am doing so now and it's been pretty interesting.  I've had  A LOT of failures along the way and a few good successes in this adventure, so I think it's easy to say that I have a LONG way to go when it comes to knowing exactly how to garden.

The whole reason behind me starting my own garden little by little is that I'm simply tired of having to depend on stores to provide ALL of my wants and needs for my family and myself.  And when  I take a step back and really think about it, being that dependent on an outside source to provide our every day needs make me pretty nervous so yeah.  Yes there is a big chance that I may be overthinking a little bit or I may just be a little bit on the dramatic side but I can't run away or hide from the true feelings that I have.

My main goal is to have a small farm for our family where we'll have an abundance of fruits, veggies, chickens and at least 2 goats.  This may be an over the top goal that I have for us but it's something that I'm slowly but surely working towards.

So with that said, cheers to dreaming big!

Just Completed Another Square!!

This pattern is called Checkered Fleurette by Leisure Arts.

The lace areas of the pattern remind me of crawling spiders!

DIVERSITY IS A BLESSING.

So earlier this week I was looking through my recent pictures that I had taken to help keep record of my natural hair journey, and I couldn't help but be reminded of how diverse my hair really is.

It took such a long time to appreciate the blessing that God bestowed upon me and I'm not going to waste anymore time not being thankful, because what I once thought was my curse actually turned out to be my blessing.  God is good.

Square Three Is Complete!!

The name of this stitch is Valentine Hearts by Leisure Arts Inc.

In my personal opinion this pattern isn't much fun, but it serves as a good filler for my afghan that I'm not.

I Finally Got My Natural Hair Layed!!

After YEARS and YEARS of trying to get my fly away hairs under control, I finally found a mixture of products to make my hair LAY down in submission!  All the products that I used where under ten dollars and they can easily be found in your local Sally's and grocery store :-)

My Very Own Afghan In Progress!

Waffle Stitch by Leisure Arts.

I kind of goofed up towards the beginning of this square but I pulled work work together and finished strong.  Again I have to say that I'm not a huge fan of this yarn like I used to be before, but it's getting the job done so I can't complain.

This is a picture of the third square that I'm working on called Valentine Hearts and this pattern is also available in the book called Leisure Arts 99 Knit Stitches.  To be completely honest with you, I'm not a big fan of this pattern all by itself but I have good faith that it'll look much better with its' other counterparts once they are all knitted and sewn together.

Knitting samplers that would require me to sew pieces together used to scare me to the point to where I would purposely avoid these types of projects all together.  But now that I'm a little older and feel more comfortable with knitting, I've come to realize how much faith I didn't have in myself to be able to do something as pretty as a sampler.  And to tell you the truth, I wish that I would have realized how simple these projects are because I would have been making samplers A LOT more often that what I had been doing in the past.  All one needs to get a sampler started are the right tools and the right set of mind.  What creative activity have you been up to lately?   :-)

My First Wash And Go In A REALLY Long Time!!

Minutes after I finished styling my hair!  :-)

 Well for a good couple of weeks writing about my hair seemed to be pretty pointless since there wasn't much to update this blog on until earlier this afternoon, and that's because  I finally decided to do a wash again AGAIN!

Three hours after styling my hair!  I have some shrinkage and I don't mind that at all.

For those of you who don't know yet, I have 4c natural hair and it's been quite a journey trying to find out what works and what doesn't work for my hair.  From hearing what's "supposed" to be

great or bad for my hair, to what I've personally learned about my hair myself, it's been interesting to see what I have found to be true and false.

After everything is said and done the best person who can judge what's best for your hair and lifestyle is yourself.  So take advice when it's needed but remember that you don't necessarily  have to live by every piece of advice that's offered or given.  Trust me because I've had to learn that the hard way.

My hair's dream team for the day!

Yes I'm At It Again. Knitting Afghan #2!!

Lacy Lattice by Leisure Arts.  This pattern can be found in 99 Knit Stitches.

It's only been a few days since I finished my nephew's afghan and I've already decided to restart on my very own.  I originally wanted to make long panels for my afghan but quickly changed my mind after I saw how lovely my previous project came out.  

Once again I'm using the same book I previously used and I'm using the same circular knitting needle as well.  The only item that's different this time is the yarn difference because I'm using Red Heart Super Saver instead because it's what I have on hand, and trust me it's not by choice, but I surely can't complain because I could have no yarn at all!  The thought of that seriously makes my stomach hurt so I'm thankful!  

Square two will be coming soon!

Another Peak At Baby Boy's Knitted Afghan!

I still can't believe that I actually completed my first knitted afghan this week!

Here's a recap on everything that I used to make this lovely afghan happen!

I used -Leisure Arts 99 Knit Stitches pattern book

- Three skeins of I Love This Yarn in the color of Terra Cotta

-size 10 6.cmm circular knitting needle
-Size H crochet hook for border

-Yarn needle

-Scissors 

-Bobby pins to help hold squares together while I sew them together since I didn't have any pins on hand :-)

-My imagination and optimism :-)

One thing that I was taught was that it was extremely necessary to block my work once I finished everything but I personally have found that to not be exactly true.  So instead of blocking my work I opt to simply wash and dry it and it's good to go! 

Another afghan is in the making now and I am excited to show you the progress on that one as well so keep a look out for my knitted afghan number two!

THIS KNITTED BABY AFGHAN IS ALL DONE!!

Words cannot express how thankful I finally am to have completed this today because I've been wanting to be done with this project for almost a week now.  Knitting this afghan up took a little under two weeks to complete which isn't bad since I had to continually stop in between knitting sessions to take care of my kiddos.

All together I knitted 9 squares till my work reached a little under 11 inches and then proceeded to finish the square off, so my finished squares are a little over 11 inches in length each.  I haven't been able to measure this afghan yet, since it's in the dryer, but by doing simple math I can guess that this afghan that I made for my nephew is a little over 33 inches in length.  The border that I crocheted on this project wasn't included in my estimate so I'm sure that I'm looking more so at 34 inches or so in length.

I used a size H crochet hook for my border and the only thing that I crocheted up for my border was a round of single crochets for round one and a round of double crochets for round to.  It was that simple!

Once this lovey is fully dry and I have fresh natural light to work with I'll take more pictures of this sampler, so you can get a better view of this afghan from all sides, since most of the squares are different. So yes this is a a show and tell of my finished work and I hope my nephew enjoys!!

THIS KNITTED SAMPLER RIGHT HERE!

I'ts been a little under a week since I started this sampler for my nephew and I'm already over half way done!  I just need to finish up the last row and crochet my border :-)  This is probably going to be one of my favorite baby gifts I've ever made, so I'm looking forward to having it finished hopefully by the weekend.

Where did I find the patterns for each square?  Look up the Leisure Arts book 99 Knit Stitches for all the patterns featured in this sampler and the size knitting needle I'm using is a size 10 6.0mm circular knitting needle.  When it comes to the yarn I'm using, I'm using my all time favorite yarn called I Love This Yarn from Hobby Lobby.