Rectangular Felted Soap Cozy

The holidays are approaching, and one of the things on my list of things to make is felted soap cozies. Using a bit of wool, any bar of soap can easily be turned into a washcloth/soap combination gift. The soap lasts super long, and the wool makes a nice exfoliator all at once. Plus, the washcloth wrapped around the bar means no more dropped soap!

This pattern will fit a pretty typically size bar of artisanal soap: 4x4x8 cm.

Materials:
wool yarn, worsted weight
hook: 4.25mm/G

Abbreviations:
ch = chain
fsc = foundation single crochet
sc = single crochet
slst = slipstitch

1. 12 fsc.*
   *If you do not know foundation single crochet, you can instead: ch 13, sc into 2nd ch from hook, sc through rest of chain (12 sc).
2.-6. ch 1, turn, sc across (12 sc).
7. ch 7, turn, sc into 2nd ch from hook, sc across (18 sc).
8.-11. ch 1, turn, sc across (18 sc).
12. skip first sc, slst across next 5 sc. ch 1, sc across (12 sc).
13.-17. ch 1, turn, sc across (12 sc).
18. ch 7, sc into 2nd ch from hook and across (18 sc).
19-23. ch 2, turn, sc across (18 sc).
On the last row, you can finish, leaving a tail for sewing together if desired.

Assembly:
It now looks like a type of tetris block. You will be folding it up into a box, then sewing it together. It will feel kinda snug on the soap bar, that's ok.

The finished crochet work laid out flat.



I've used plastic safety pins to hold the sides together and show you how it makes a box. The short flaps of the tetris piece make the litte square sides.



I recommended sewing the three seams together from one square side, then sewing the short two seamsof the other square side.

Then slip in the soap and sew up the last two sides.

This is how it looks all sewn up! After a few uses, it'll felt up all on its own. If you're giving it as a gift, you may want to go ahead and spend some time felting. Just rub it for a while using warm to hot water, and a washboard is helpful for faster felting.

Elemental Scarf

Way back in September, a friend suggested making a scarf to represent the four elements: earth, air, fire, water. I instantly fell in love with the idea and came up with a pattern to go along with the representative colors. Spirit was included as the fifth element tying everything together. After some writing, experimenting, testing, blocking, and photographing, I'm finally ready to share my typed up pattern for the Elemental Scarf!

The pattern is written in sections which are approxiamately the same length and width. Dimensions will vary somewhat with your crochet style and blocking/stretching technique. You can arrange the sections however you please or repeat a section as you would like. Colors are my personal representations of the elements, so change them to whatever fits well with you. As always, feel free to ask questions and leave comments.

Abbreviations
ch - chain
sc - single crochet
hdc - half double crochet
dc - doule crochet
fpdc - front post double crochet
bpdc - back post double crochet
tch - turning chain
cluster - group of stitches closed at all once together
shell - group of stitches worked into same space or stitch

Materials:
Hook, I/9 5.5mm (or hook recommended for yarn)
Approximately 100 yards each color of worsted weight yarn
Yarn needle recommended for sewing in ends
 

Earth:
green, solid stitches
1: ch 16, sc in 2nd ch from hook, sc across (15 sc)
2: turn, ch 1, 15 hdc
3: turn, ch 1, 15 dc
4: turn, ch 1, 15 sc
5-36: Repeat rows 2-4, ending with row 3
36 rows = 12 sets

Air:
white, clusters & shells
1: ch 3, dc across (15 dc)
2: ch 5, cluster in first 3 dc, *ch 2, cluster next 3 dc.* Repeat * to * to end; ch 2, dc in last sc (5 clusters + 2 dc ends)
3: ch 3, *3dc shell in top of cluster, repeat from * across. dc in 3rd ch of previous tch.
4-23: Repeat rows 2&3
Final row: ch 3, dc across
24 rows = 11 pairs + dc rows

Fire:
red, post stitches
1-3: ch 3, dc across (15 dc)
4: ch 3, 3 bpdc, 7 fpdc, 3 bpdc, dc in tch
5: ch 3, 4 fpdc, 5 bpdc, 4 fpdc,  dc in tch
6: 5 bpdc, 3 fpdc, 5 bpdc, dc in tch
7: 6 fpdc, 1 bpdc, 6 fpdc, dc in tch
8-21: repeat rows 1-7.
22-24: ch 3, dc across (15 dc)
24 rows = 3 sets + final 3 rows

Water:
blue, ribbed & wavy
1: 15 sc
2: hdc, hdc, sc, sc, hdc, dc, dc, hdc, sc, sc, hdc, dc, dc, hdc, hdc - all front loop only
3-35: repeat row 2
36: 15 sc
36 rows = 12 sets + sc rows

Spirit:
purple border
Single crochet around evenly. Following this general guidline for help placing stitches into the sides of rows: 1 sc into sc row, 3 sc in 2 hdc rows, 2 sc in dc row

Binary 'I Love You' Scarf

My boyfriend, Erik, programs mainframe computers. These are the ones that handle banking and credit card transactions, and they are huge. Programmers don't actually program in binary anymore; they have many many programming languages which the computer translates into binary. Still, I knew that binary would be relatively easy to convert into a pattern. I used this binary translator, but any binary translator you find on the internet should work, too.

There is lots of color changing going on in this scarf. Here is a video on How to Crochet Color Change Without Knots. I found it very helpful and useful. Alternatively, you can slipstitch up the side of the fabric. This means there are not tons of ends to weave in, but you do have some odd looking stitching going up the side. Adding an edging up both sides or all around will cover it up.


Here is "I Love You" in binary:
01101001-
00100000-
01101100-
01101111-
01110110-
01100101-
00100000-
01111001-
01101111-
01110101
Each 8 digits represents 1 letter/character. In this pattern, the space is coded for, partially because I liked the fact that it made for 10 lines of code. You'll have 160 rows when your done, and it's about 6 feet long if your double crochets are about 1/2" tall.

Abbreviations:
dc = double crochet
ch = chain

Color A = 0 (black in example)
Color B = 1 (red in example)
1 row = 3 ch + 40  dc
Turn work after each row.

In A, ch 40
*in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 2 rows
in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 1 row

in A, dc 2 rows
in B, dc 1 row
in A, dc 2 rows
in B, dc 1 row

in A, dc 6 rows
in B, dc 2 rows
in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 2 rows

in A, dc 3 rows
in B, dc 2 rows
in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 4 rows

in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 3 rows
in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 2 rows

in A, dc 2 rows
in B, dc 2 row
in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 1 row

in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 2 rows
in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 6 rows

in A, dc 4 rows
in B, dc 2 rows
in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 1 row

in A, dc 2 rows
in B, dc 1 row
in A, dc 4 rows
in B, dc 1 row

in A, dc 3 rows
in B, dc 1 row
in A, dc 1 row
in B, dc 1 row
in A, dc 1 row

Repeat from *star to make it long enough.
Fasten off final tail.

It will say "I Love You" twice.

16 lines: 10% Finished
"I L"

32 lines: 20% Finished
"I Lov"

80 lines: 50% Finished
"I Love You"

Finished. Showing half. Came out to 7 feet by 1 foot.

Finished, folded upto see better contrast.

If you have any questions, leave me a comment.


Binary 'I Love You' Scarf by Jessica A Prescott is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.