Crochet Contest

I participated in a crochet contest at Elisabeth Andree's About Crochet Blog.  I chose to make a pillow cover, mine came out about 13"x20".  I used two of the variations of the ch.sc stitch, mostly the first variation and added in the second variation here and there.  I used Bernat Softee Chunky in three different colors:  Light Taupe, Grape and Too Purple (although in my pictures I believe the colors look like blues instead of purples.  The recommended hook size for this yarn was U.S J/10 or 6mm, I used U.S I/9 or 5.5mm, I wanted my stitches closer together with not too much gap since it was a pillow cover.  I ended up using the stitch back and forth in rows, then also added it as a border, which was a bit of a challenge as I needed more rows on the sides than the top and bottom on one side and on the other side I needed more rows at the top and bottom and only one row on the sides, I'm happy to say what I pictured for the border did work out nicely after a few trial and errors.  One side of my pillow the stripes are horizontal and the other side are vertical and I purposely tried to be random with different lengths and widths of stripes.  I sewed the two long sides together and I sewed 3 buttons on each side of the short sides.  I used the chain one space as a button loop, worked out great.  I hope it is okay that I posted it on Sunday, instead of Saturday, somehow I had the deadline in my head as the 15th.

Thanks for introducing me to a new stitch, I'm already thinking of more ways to use it.  I think it would make a great baby blanket, and my mom wants me to try to make a hat pattern from this stitch.  It was lots of fun.
René