Allison: Today, we're crocheting fabulous bedroom accessories with members of Crochet
Nation. Now Keisha, I know that you have actually never used a pattern. Why the
aversions to pattern? Do you have a phobia we need to know about?
Keisha: You know, I do. I never learned how to crochet from a pattern. So, being a
creative person that I am, I decided I'm just going to do it from scratch And just
let it flow.
Allison: Work it out as you go along.
Keisha: Work it out as I go along. And get all the key side of it, so that when I do finished
my project I could go back and write it for a pattern if needed for somebody else
to do it. But other than that, no. I like to be creative.
Allison: Fantastic, and today you're going to show us a Keisha original.
Keisha: Yes I am.
Allison: Keisha’s pillow sham uses the same window pane stitch that the valance did, so
both projects will match in both color and design.
For this pillow sham, we're using 4 skeins of Lion Brand incredible ribbon yarn in
city lights. But you can use any comparable ribbon yarn. And a size Q crochet
hook. We’ll be using the same stitch pattern as the valance, so we're rating this
project intermediate as well.
Okay Keisha, I notice that you actually started off with a pillow. You made your
own.
Keisha: I made my own pillow because I wanted the fabric to contrast the yarn or any
yarn. Or give accentuate the yarn itself.
Allison: So it’s part of the design as well.
Keisha: Its part of the design itself. But you can by the pillow from any store if you like.
Standard size is fine.
Allison: So you just stitched it up and use stuffing it.
Keisha: I'm stuffing it with fiber fill. Easy, and you can leave it flimsy or you can actually
just make it a hard pillow.
Allison: Make it nice and full. But you can get a regular pillow and a nice colorful pillow
case.
Okay. So how do we start making this sham, because this is where the fun part.
Keisha: Now with this yarn, it’s a ribbon yarn, so it’s very, very difficult to work really.
To see the stitches, so what we did was we use a measuring tape. I did 10 chains,
so this said its 7 inches for the 10 chains. So we will multiply the 7 chains by the
overall length of my pillow.
Allison: The dimensions of your pillow. And then just multiply the chains and then you
know where to start.
Keisha: Yes, exactly.
Allison: Okay, so once you’ve made your foundation chain to the right length, you're
going to start working in the patterns, this window pane pattern.
Keisha: This window pane pattern.
Allison: Show me how you do that.
Keisha: Just like I said, this yarn is really tricky. So you have to really be careful with it.
And then of course using a big hook, so sometimes it’s awkward for people to use
it.
Allison: But once you get in the flow of it, it’s okay.
Keisha: Once you get the flow of it, it works magic. So what I do here is I just chain the
double crochet and then what I do is I chain one after I pull it through.
Allison: Okay, so here's your chain one.
Keisha: I'm chaining one and then I skip a stitch and go to the second stitch.
Allison: And double crochet.
Keisha: And double crochet. And you just keep doing that for as long as you want for the
dimensions of the pillow. And then you get a fabulous design.
Allison: So we open that up, yeah. Nice and breezy.
Keisha: Nice and breezy, yes.
Allison: And you can see that beautiful color of your pillow case coming through. Right,
let's move along and you're actually, to the point where you're stitching up your
pillow sham.
Keisha: Yes. What I did here was I crocheted 20 rows, 40 stitches wide. What I did was I
added 10 stitches.
Allison: Let's look at that this way.
Keisha: I'm sorry. 10 stitches each side so that you can get the effect of a sham.
Allison: You just make it slightly bigger.
Keisha: Slightly bigger so that the pillow doesn’t slide around. What I did was to prevent
it from sliding around was I took my needle and my ribbon yarn and I just stitch it
along here.
Allison: Just a straight running stitch?
Keisha: Just a straight running stitch. In and out, weave it through. And then you get this
fabulous pillow.
Allison: And of course, before doing that, you would have stitch it up on this side as well.
Keisha: On this side also. Close it up for you right here.
Allison: So this is more like a decorative pillow. You throw it on the bed for a little bit of
fun.
Keisha: Exactly.
Allison: And that’s why you stitched it up so that, I guess you could just throw this whole
thing in the washer if you wanted to.
Keisha: Yeah, you can do that. Or if you're really not sure, just get it dry cleaned.
Allison: Fantastic. Really, really fun. I love these bright colors. Thank you so much.
Keisha: You can always switch the colors if you want.
Allison: Excellent.