BLOG LINK-UP: Heart Garland ~ Crochet Pattern!

Posted by Ethne~

I made this lovely crocheted Valentine’s heart garland in perfect timing for the our fifth house love blog link-up today.  I love to decorate for all the holidays, and of course a red and pink holiday is about the best there is.

I’d been crocheting quite a few things over the fall and winter, mainly scarves; but having given many away at the holidays, I was totally over that.  I have an extremely short attention span for crafts, which is why Lori’s dream of a quilt/craft shop or etsy store isn’t gonna work for me.  I wouldn’t wanna make enough crafts to sell before I got TOTALLY sick of making them. It's a beautiful dream tho, Lor.

I found the instructions for this pattern on a website called Skip to My Lou, and she’s got a lot of great stuff, but I COULD NOT make her directions for this heart pattern work.  So, I had to tweak the pattern myself.  Here it is, and my tweaks work!

(If you wonder about the lingo, ‘sc’ means single crochet; ‘dc’ means double crochet’; ‘trc’ means triple crochet; ‘hdc’ means half double crochet.  A great place to check if you’re unsure is the website allfreecrochet.com where they show the stitches, and a lady named Teresa on youtube who calls herself Crochet Geek.)

Use size J crochet hook and worsted weight yarn - the cheap Red Heart kind is great.

Heart

Round 1

Chain 4.  Make all of the next stitches in the first chain. 3 trc, 3 dc, chain 1, 1 trc, chain 1, 3 dc, 3 trc, chain 2, slip stitch

3 triple crochet

3 double crochet

Slip stitch and the first round is complete

Round 2

Chain 3, in first trc make sc and hdc, in next stitch 3 hdc, in next stitch 2 hdc, sc in next four stitches, chain 1 dc in trc, chain 1, sc until only three stitches remain (not including the chain three), 2 hdc in next stitch, 3 hdc in next stitch, hdc and sc in next stitch, chain 3 and slip stitch in center

I have completed the stitched pattern for the first three stitches (following the chain 3)

If you count to the right of my hook, there are 3 stitches - start the finishing stitch pattern here - because the bigger stitches at the curve are the unattached chain 3 from the previous round 1 (for reference, the heart is upside down in this picture)

Round 2 finished

Round 3

Chain 3, sc in top of chain 3 from previous row, sc in each stitch all the way around (until chain 3 from previous row).  I chained one at the tip of the heart to get around the point easier.  At beginning of chain 3 from previous row chain three and slip stitch in center of heart.  Pull the loop to the back and fasten off.  Weave the yarn end in.

1 single crochet in each stitch

Stop the single crochets when you get to the loose chain stitches from round 2; chain 3 and slip stitch and fasten off.

All done, and matching my nail polish quite nicely.

To make my garland over the sliding glass doors, I made 12 hearts.

Garland

Chain 45, in top of heart sc, chain 6, sc in top of other side of the heart, chain 12, sc in top of heart, chain 6, sc in top of other side of the heart, chain 12. Repeat until all hearts are joined, chain 45; fasten off.

Lots o' chains - my arm isn't long enough for all 45

Single crochet in top center, now 6 more chains to other side

Adorable, I know.  Shaun loooooooves it.  He loves all Valentine’s Day decorations, in fact.  If you’ve read this blog for a while, you know that’s a flat-out lie.  If you’re new (welcome), well, that’s a flat-out lie – he thinks my craft stuff is loveable and totally obnoxious.  [In fact, when we still lived at our condo, we decided to put a kitchen island in, so he told me the trade-off was that I was to be put on a one-year craft ban (to save money) and only could do crafts that I already had the materials for in my stash.  Wanna know how I got around this?  I cooked a year’s worth of new recipes.  Totally genius.]

To be fair, I whined about the flash until Shaun took this picture, so he may have died a little inside, but he supported the decoration and the blog in a roundabout way.

I also made a super cute pink one of these.  And other decorations are new this year – the dangling hearts in the window are old Valentine’s cards the girls received from family members that we re-purposed; and I got the pink twirly garland on after-Christmas sales for $1.  I had the girls make the button hearts out of a bunch of old buttons Thrifty Nana (my mom) gave me.

How cute is the heart garland in the background?

 

I love nothing better than homemade crafts from the girls like on the left coat closet.

This ivory and red crochet hearts are from the Crochet Geek's tutorial on youtube (search crochet heart).  The pink heart is the pattern here.

The Valentine's fairy has been visiting the girls already with little treats in their envelopes.  I made those here.

Multi-colored buttons would be pretty, but FREE buttons are even prettier!

Happy early Valentine’s Day everyone!  Lori and I will come back with a few more love updates – we have our Love Note Jar going, and so far the girls have been thankful for things like their blankies and Theodore, just to give you a sneak preview.

I got the little white dish to hold the love note paper at Target for $3 - and re-usable for cooking the rest of the year!