Crochet Pattern: 'Inspire Me' Textured Basket

Click here to purchase an ad free version of the pattern on Etsy!

So I made this cute basket for a Craft Fair coming up in a couple months. I kind of had an idea of what I wanted to make. But I couldn't find a pattern for exactly what I wanted. So, I made one up myself! And I am thrilled with how it has turned out. So, without further ado, here it is!

Materials:
4mm/G hook
worsted weight yarn in 4 colors, holding 2 strands at once
yarn needle

Terms:
MR = magic ring
ch = chain
sc = single crochet
sl st = slip stitch
hdc = half double crochet
tc = triple crochet
blo = back loops only
fro = front loops only
rev = reverse

Pattern Guide:
hdc x 3 = put one half double crochet in each of the next 3 stitches
2hdc = put two half double crochets in the next stitch
tc puff st = (yarn over twice, put hook through front loop of previous row, yarn over, pull through 1, yarn over, pull through 2, yarn over, pull through 2) ← do this 3 times, then yarn over, and pull through 4 remaining loops
rev sc = (worked from left to right) insert hook in next st to the right, yarn over, pull through 1, yarn over, pull through both loops on hook

This pattern is worked very tight, so at times, it may feel like you need a bigger hook, but working this tight ensures that the basket will be more sturdy and not limp.

In row 15, the pattern is worked in the back loops only to create a lip on the basket. This makes the sides more defined from the base as opposed to just flowing from base to sides.

Finished Size: Approximately 8 ¾ inches tall and 9 ½ inches wide

Pattern:
1. Using Color A and holding 2 strands at once, sc 10 into MR, sl st to close (10)
2. ch 2, 2hdc in each st around, sl st to close (20)
3. ch 2, (hdc, 2hdc) x 10, sl st to close (30)
4. ch 2, (hdc x 2, 2hdc) x 10, sl st to close (40)
5. ch 2, (hdc x 3, 2hdc) x 10, sl st to close (50)
6. ch 2, (hdc x 4, 2hdc) x 10, sl st to close (60)
7. ch 2, (hdc x 5, 2hdc) x 10, sl st to close (70)
8. ch 2, (hdc x 6, 2hdc) x 10, sl st to close (80)
9. ch 2, (hdc x 7, 2hdc) x 10, sl st to close (90)
10. ch 2, (hdc x 8, 2hdc) x 10, sl st to close (100)
11. ch 2, (hdc x 19, 2hdc) x 5, sl st to close (105)
12. ch 2, (hdc x 9, 2hdc, hdc x 10, 2hdc) x 5, sl st to close (115)
13. ch 2, hdc x 10, 2hdc, (hdc x 22, 2hdc) x 4, hdc x 12, sl st to close (120)
14. ch 2, (hdc x 11, 2hdc) x 10, sl st to close in flo (130)

15. ch 2, turn work so that the right side is facing up as the base of your basket, hdc in blo around, sl st to close in both loops (130)
16. ch 2, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
17. ch 2, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
18. ch 2, hdc around, switch to Color B, sl st to close (130)
19. ch 1, sc, (sc, sc spike 1 row below, sc spike 2 rows below, sc spike 3 rows below) x 32, sc, sl st to close (130)
20. ch 1, hdc around, switch to Color C, sl st to close (130)

21. ch 1, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
22. ch 1, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
23. ch 1, hdc x 2, (hdc in blo, hdc in both loops x 3) x 32, sl st to close (130)
24. ch 1, hdc x 2, (tc puff st in front loop of row 23, hdc x 3 in row 24) x 32, sl st to close (130)

25. ch 1, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
26. ch 1, hdc around, switch to Color D, sl st to close (130)

27. ch 1, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
28. ch 1, sc around, switch to Color A, sl st to close (130)
Leave as long of a tail of Color D as you can
29. ch 1, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
30. ch 1, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
31. ch 1, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
32. ch 1, hdc around, sl st to close (130)
33. ch 1, skip st directly to the right, rev sc around, sl st to close (130)
Finish off and weave in ends.

To Finish:
Pick up your long grey tail from row 28, and using your yarn needle, sew around the rows of Color A to mimic the spike stitch from row 19. Do this all the way around.
Finish off and weave in ends. This gives the effect that the spike stitch goes in the opposite direction as before.

Feel free to sell any products made from this pattern. However, do not try to sell this pattern or offer it for free in any way. Please link back to me if you post your basket anywhere!
Tag me in any pictures. I would love to see them! Instagram: @kerry_1105 Facebook: K L Crochet
If you have any questions about this pattern, please feel free to leave a comment and I'll answer it the best I can.

Facebook Marketplace

I feel like ever since my son finished his last day of school, it has been non-stop crazy at my house. And when it's not crazy, I'm so exhausted I just want to lay around. And that's how my house became a freaking disaster! Ah! It's so frustrating! Please tell me I'm not the only one.

Well, after cleaning a little, we realized we just didn't have enough space for everything. And coincidentally, our neighborhood's bi-annual garage sale was happening on the first weekend of June. We got everything prepared and it turned out we had a ton of stuff! And some big things, too! I was excited. With so many big things, we were sure to get rid of things and make a little money.

The day of our garage sale came, and the weather was beautiful! I had high hopes for the day! Unfortunately, I didn't sell most of our big stuff, and we ended the day with just over $100. It didn't feel like a failure, but I definitely didn't feel like it was a huge success.

Since we did have so many big items left over, I knew I wanted to try to sell them still. My husband suggested Facebook Marketplace. I'd never sold anything on there before so I was a little nervous. And I definitely had no idea what I was in for. In the end, I sold everything that I wanted to in less than 2 weeks and made $221.

Here's how you start. Go to Marketplace (located at the left hand side toward the top on your desktop). Again, on the left hand side, click on “Sell Something” and fill out the prompts. They make it very easy! Make sure you add some great photos of the item you have for sale. The thing that sells your item the most is the photos. It's best to have them from every angle.

Tip 1: I only put 6-8 things for sale at a time and that worked great for me because even with just a few things for sale, it can get hard to keep track of all the people messaging you. I love how they keep your item for sale at the top of each conversation to help you keep everything organized.

Tip 2: Don't consider anything sold until you have agreed on a time, place, and amount. I had so many people ask “Is this available?” and when I said yes, they never said anything else. There were also plenty of people that asked questions about the item, seemed like they were going to buy it, and then just never said anything else. So I started replying “Yes” whenever anyone asked if an item was available until I considered it sold. I only had 2 people (out of probably 50) that got upset because I sold it while they were still thinking about it. And that's just how it goes. You can't miss out on potential sales while someone takes forever to reply that might not buy your item.

Tip 3: Don't feel bad about moving on. I had someone set to meet and then they messaged me a couple hours before that they wouldn't be able to meet until 2 hours later. That's fine. I'm flexible. Then, they messaged me again that it would be better for them to do the next day. Ok, starting to get annoyed, but again, I'm flexible. The next day, they message again, that they would really appreciate it if we could meet the day after that. That was enough. They offered to pay through Facebook to show they were serious about getting it, but I was annoyed. So I told them it wouldn't work for me and I relisted the item. Lucky for me, I had it sold and delivered with cash in my hand within 24 hours. The point is, move on if people seem like they're just there to make your life more stressful.

Tip 4: If you feel uncomfortable meeting with people at your house, it's perfectly ok, if not expected, to meet someplace public. I met at our local police department multiple times! But I was also flexible with my meeting location. I also met at Sam's Club, the library, Wal-Mart, and a couple other places. I only had 2 people pick up at my house and it was only because my trunk was too small.

So if you've ever thought about getting rid of stuff, definitely try Facebook! It costs nothing. It's super easy to set-up. And you have the opportunity to make some money without the hastle of a garage sale. I'm still glad we had our garage sale and in the end, with everything combined, we made about $330. And that's not too bad.

Recipe: Homemade Lemonade

I took a couple weeks off, but now we're back at it! My summer has started off great! With lots of things going on. I don't know about you guys, but having my son at home all day, I feel like I need to plan at least 1 fun activity every day to make sure we're not just sitting around. Don't get me wrong, I have a list of things we do each day including reading for 1 hour, working out for 30 minutes, and cleaning for 30 minutes each day. As a reward for these things, I put a limit on phone use to no more than 2 hours.

Here are some of the things we do to fill our time:
1. The Library
Ours has some great public activities and even when there's nothing going on, they always have pages to color, books to read, computers to play on, toys to play with, and fun displays to check out.
2. Berry Picking
There is a fun little berry patch within half an hour of our house that we like to visit from time to time. 3. The Zoo
We have a small local zoo, but beyond that, there are 3 other zoos within an hour. Plus, 2 large named zoos within 3 hours. 4. Paint Your Own Pottery
These places are becoming more and more popular. We have a fun little place in town. We try to only visit once every couple of weeks because while fun, it can get expensive.

We also do lots of crafts and projects. My son has been getting into cooking lately, so I thought as a quick little project, I would teach him how to make homemade lemonade.

You Will Need:
1 cup of water
1 cup of sugar
Enough lemons to make 1 cup of juice (we used 5 large lemons)
7-8 more cups of water

First, combine 1 cup of water and 1 cup of sugar in a small saucepan and heat on medium until the sugar is completely dissolved (your water will appear clear again). You have now made your simple syrup. It only takes about 5 minutes. Take your pan off the heat and set it to the side to cool.

While your syrup is cooling, you can juice your lemons. If you don't have a juicer, you can squeeze the lemon while twisting a fork to get every last drop out. Make sure you strain the juice to get rid of seeds and most of the pulp.

It's time to mix together your lemon juice, simple syrup, and 7-8 cups of water. I put a rough estimate on the amount because it's all about your personal preference on taste and how strong you want your lemonade. After everything is mixed together, place it in the fridge to cool. Cold, fresh lemonade is the best. Something about making it from scratch truly makes it taste better!

If you have any other suggestions on fun, small projects I can try with my little 8yo, please, let me know in the comments below. We're always looking for new things to try out.

Summer Bucket List

Every summer, my son and I like to make a list of things that we want to do before school starts back up. We got together and pooled all of our ideas and came up with this list of 50 things we want to do this summer. Here is our summer bucket list for 2018!

Click here to view a PDF and download.

Pictures to take while you're in Universal

Like anything else that has to do with our vacation, I did a lot of research about what pictures we should take while we're at Universal. I used a mix of some ideas I saw online and things I remembered from when we visited 3 years ago. That is how I made our list to take with us. It served useful as we wanted to bring home some special photographic memories to display at home. Here's our list:

Click here to view as a PDF and download.

Pictures to take while you're on vacation

We just love to take pictures! And I love finding lists of things to take pictures of and then challenging myself to do them all! So my son and I decided to come up with our own list before we left for vacation to see if we could do them all. Here's our list:

Click here to view as a PDF and download.

Legoland Florida

Legoland Florida We decided absolute last minute (less than 2 days prior) that we were going to go to Legoland. We arrived shortly after opening (mostly due to the parking situation – it took us FOREVER to get through that line) and there were already a TON of people.

After we waited in the super long line to get in, we made our way to the photo counter to buy the photo package. I always think it's worth it for the ride photos. You can take as many pictures as you want, but you'll never be able to get those ride photos without buying them individually or just splurging to get the package and getting as many as you want. There are currently 5 different rides that have offer on-ride photos. Plus, there are multiple meet and greets. Times are posted in a pamphlet given to you when you first enter. However, they don't tell you who the meet and greet is with. We also saw a photographer at the very front before you enter to take a picture with the Welcome sign and one right after you enter. I'm not really sure what he was taking a picture with, but we were paying for those pictures, so we got them!

We walked straight to the back to Lego City where Tom and Owen rode the flight school ride. They seemed to really enjoy it and there was absolutely no wait.

Next up was Ford driving school. We waited about 15-20 minutes. They take your (kids only, aged 6-13) picture while in line for your license. Then you go into a room (with benches! Woo!) to watch a video about 'how to drive.' Then, you go outside and the kids get in their cars to drive. Owen loved it. And afterward, he bought himself a drivers license! Plus, it came with a lanyard. You get a couple different options for which kind of license you want. My son chose a firefighter license. It's pretty cute.

Also located in this area is junior driving school for younger kids, boating school, and Rescue Academy.

Then we headed over to the Lego Ninjago World. It's very neatly themed in this part of the park. There are a lot of cool Ninja training things you could do. We headed straight for Lego Ninjago The Ride. There was practically no wait which was nice. It was a really fun ride, but it was kind of weird because you use your hands and arms to shoot energy balls at things. I just couldn't seem to make it work, but Tom and Owen did. And we also looked like total doofuses in the picture!

Later in the day, this is also where we did the Kai meet and greet. That was fun, too. But I always think it's fun to take pictures with characters.

In the Land of Adventure, Tom and Owen rode Coastersaurus. They had a ton of fun. It's like your normal wooden coaster. Their picture turned out really well. They probably had to wait about 20-30 minutes in line.

We also really enjoyed The Lost Kingdom Adventure. We just love this ride. Apparently, we're big fans of shooting rides. It's so much fun.

Also in the part of the park are Beetle Bounce and Safari Trek.

We decided to walk over to the Great Lego Race and check it out. The line didn't look THAT long so we went ahead and got in it. Well, after we'd already waited about 20 minutes, they told us it was a 2 hour wait. Really? I mean, I understand that this is a brand new ride, but that just seemed crazy. But after we talked about it, we decided to go ahead and wait it out. After all, we'd never been on a VR ride before. We really missed those Express Passes from Universal though. We made the most of our time by having Tom get out of line to go get food and then bring it back. I know that's bad line ettiquette, but we were starving and we forgot to bring snacks. Luckily, there were also a couple places in line that had Legos to play with. The 1st time we rode, Owen's VR went black and the very beginning and didn't work so they let him go again. I decided I only wanted to go once so Tom and Owen went by themselves. The VR ride was so cool! You were completely immersed in the ride. It was a little freaky because you couldn't always tell where you were going next, but I understood why everyone was ok with the wait. It was a very slow-loading ride.

We walked over to Lego Kingdoms to ride The Dragon, but unfortunately, after about 5 minutes in line, they told everyone the ride was closed and they weren't sure when it was going to open. Also in this area is Merlin's Challenge and Royal Joust.

Those were all the rides we rode since we had a very limited about of time to spend at Legoland (only about 5 hours).

The rides in DUPLO Valley are DUPLO tractor and DUPLO train.

The only ride in Imagination Zone is Kid Power Towers.

We were disappointed that we didn't get to try Mia's Riding Adventure in Heartlake City.

The only ride in Fun Town is The Grand Carousel.

The only ride in The Lego World of Chima is the Quest for Chi. You will probably get a little wet on this ride.

In unspecified areas, there is also Technicycle and Aquazone Wave Racers.

We love visiting Legoland. And hopefully we'll be able to make it back at least one more time before Owen gets too old to really enjoy it.