My crochet

I have been crocheting a lot these days, but as usual I am too lazy to take pics and even lazier when it comes to uploading them. This is the first of the many that I have completed in July and August. I hope I can be more regular in sharing my crochet..isn't that why I started this?!..I know the "Brag" factor plays a very big role in this! These are the doilies I have made as DAL's (doily-alongs) with the ladies on Gathering Threads

This was the first DAL, mine is pretty unimaginative, I loved the way Brenda used colour, to make this a stunning doily.
I gave mine away to one of my colleagues as a gift.Brenda has inspired me to make this one again, I just might get bold enough to experiment with colour changes.

I made DAL II in a slightly thicker thread, I have a few balls in this thread in different colours. The thread is slightly thicker than #10 and I have always put off using this thinking that the doilies will not pretty.

I quite like the look of this one despite the thicker thread. I am now planning on using this as an appliqué on cushion covers. I hope to eventually make a set of 5 cushion covers using similar sized doilies for appliqués.

AAAAAAAARGHHHHH!
This had to happen!..I finally get around to updating my blog. ….spend time uploading photos…and then a power outage....makes me lose every thing!
So I am going to try posting in smaller segments..hopefully the connection will not die on me again

Exchanges

I love exchanges, the thrill of making crochet items, and planning the other things to go in the puffy. Mailing it and then waiting for the postman to see what someone has made so lovingly for you. So when Yasmin organised a doily exchange in Crochet India I jumped right in. I had two partners Pearlin and Lori.
Pearlin's puffy reached me in July....and did she spoil me silly
This is the doily she made for me











and she added such lovely things to the puffy to make it just perfect.
You made my day Pearlin!...

It's been raining crochet gifts

July was a wonderful month...it rained crochet gifts.
Yasmin just took my breath away, she sent me such a wonderful puffy with the Nylon thread I was dying to try out. I have been dreaming purses ever since this came in the mail. Thank you Yasmin ...what a wonderful friend you are.

Puffy number two came from Swapna, she very generously shopped for me on her visit to Guwahati, and I finally got to see what Chennile was all about. Discovered it feels like velvet that has been cut up..nice smooth yarn. The label says Vardhaman..so I went trawling the yarn shops here...and got the deadly blank look which I have come to hate. Finally met a sales girl in Groverson's in Pratap Market who asked me check back in October to see if they get it in this season's stock.

She has also very generously sent me a ball of Bernat chenille, sending me a ball of 'furrin' yarn which most of us are ready to kill for! and Boucle...

Now time for me to play with all the lovely threads and yarn

I need to get organised

An innocuous question by Ria set me thinking, she wanted to know what I was working on.
In all honesty I have to admit I really don't know what i am working on..a round of this ..a row of that.. a few stitches here..a few lines frogged there...the house looks like Katrina stopped by on her way back from the USA..debris..and i mean crochet debris all over the place!
i am working on more than a doz doilies (some of them would be better off being called UFOs), place mats to take for my SIL when we go visiting on 6 May, pondering over a teddy bear baby afghan that i saw on the net...the fendi bag.. i have the base done..need to begin work on the ruffles....
This seems to be a pretty bad case of crochet ADD.

It was my 2006 crochet resolution, to have only one ongoing project..or at the most one yarn and one thread project at a time.. so have to seriously start working on finishing stuff.

One way I guess i could do it is take one project to office every week..i get about 20-30 mins free during lunch break (not all days.) before i do that, i really want to list out my crochet WIPs/UFO's.

Sure hope I can get some FO's posted on a regular basis.

Vishu celebrations

I have been posting in my mind, but unfortunately this has not got translated into actual posts in my blog.
Our Vishu (New Year) celebrations went off very well. We managed a decent Vishu Kani, the first glimpse of prosperity on opening your eyes, despite limitations of living 3000 kms away from home











We really miss having bunches of golden laburnum to provide the touch of gold. You can see the few flowers we did manage to find after driving around the city.

Fendi

After pondering for months ..'to make or not to make' the Fendi bag..I finally took the plunge...but as usual life has ensured that I have to apply the brakes on what is presently tempting me.
It is our New Year's Day tomorrow..Vishu continues to be celebrated in Kerala with traditional fervour.... the fact that we are 3000kms away from home just makes us more inclined to hold on to the traditions.
So tomorrow will be spent in making the traditional feast "sadya" and then digesting it after an orgy of eating!
The food is totally vegetarian and served on plantain leaves...the only concession we are making is not serving it on the floor ... Venu cannot sit cross-legged on the floor and eat if his life depended on it!

Recycled Sari silk

After reading about all the discussion about recycled sari yarn, and trying to search for the yarn in India with no success, I finally decided to get adventurous and unearthed one of my old printed silk sarees which had disintegrated to a point where I could no longer think of wearing it.
This is the sari before I attacked it with scissors

I cut it up into 1.5" strips...and tried to crochet using different size hooks. I finally settled on a "I" hook as the most comfortable to use with the silk fabric strips.
I followed a very basic pattern, for a doily centre and ended it with scallops formed by 5 dc in st, sk next st, sc in next stitch.
This is the result of my experiments
I was expecting a soft, luxurious product, but the final result is a thick hot-pad. Now whoever heard of silk hotpads! the limit of luxurious living!

I barely used up 20% of my sari..so have a lot of fabric to play with, not to speak of the dozen or more silk saris languishing in a box.

Would love to hear your comments on this experiment..what do you all crochet-savvy people think of the end result? Is it worthwhile to painstakingly cut up the rest of the sari? Seeing the thickness of the final crocheted item, what else can i try to make with this?

my first post

I have been experimenting with hooks and thread with occasional forays into yarn. The one thing I have always missed is having a crochet friend to compare notes, to show off my latest triumph or sob about the current disaster.
So finally I have gathered courage to foray into the land of blogging..with very little hope that much traffic will flow this way.