More Grannies!

Granny Squares have actually become a sort of addiction to me. Whenever I pick up a fresh yarn and try to think something creative, the Granny pops up. And most often I give in to the Granny ideas. My recent crochet project is a table cover for a rectangular coffee table at my home in Kerala. My mom was planning to buy a table cover for it when I thought why not put in some effort with my hands and the needle.

Like always, I kept on thinking for days for a pattern. I found many on the web. Some were really interesting ones. But finally Grannies won the competition. Next was the colour part. We went shopping one day and both my mom and myself, we chose two colours for this table cover. As soon as we reached back, I was immersed in the process of rolling the skeins and keeping them arranged. It was a tedious process! And finally I made the first Granny for the project. You wanna see it? Here it is.

I was really thrilled when I made this first square. I kept on doing the same thing day and night. As soon as I reach home, I start my hooky business with the red and black yarns. The first three rounds were what excited me the most. I loved the red and black alternating rounds. I longed to make flowers out of it but resisted the temptation as I had to complete this. And I was a bit tensed too. Because this was my first BIG project. The squares piled up over some period of time.

When I made 44 of these Granny Squares, I started joining them together. You know something... I was sitting and crocheting in the car during our travel down to Kerala. It was raining and was cool inside. The pattering sound of the rain drops on the metal and glass was awesome while crocheting. Except for the occassional humps and steep curves, crocheting while traveling was really a pleasure filled one. And by the time I reached, I had joined the most of them.

When the whole thing was joined and blocked out, it looked like this.

If you have noticed, I did some edging as well to it.

I did one more round of the black edging and ran out of thread :-( I ll post the completed image when I buy more thread and finish it off finally to adorn the table.

Inspired

I was inspired by one of the Itty-Bitty bag crafts on Burdastyle. I don't have the url to the exact post now.

Out of that inspiration, I created an Itty Bitty bag for myself. Want to see it? Here it is.



I made it out of my brother's old denim. He was generous enough to give it to me for my experiment. I followed the instructions and made some customizations as well. Bought a zipper and attached it to the purse. I don't have a sewing machine. My mom has an electronic 24 stitch one from Janome though. But I didn't have it then in Bangalore. So had to hand stitch the whole creation. At places hand stitching was a bit difficult as the denim material had folds and was hard for the needle to go in.

You see the flower in the centre? Does it seem pretty to you? It was my first fabric flower. I made it out of an old garment which I no longer use. More apt would be that I made the decision right then that I won't use it anymore for the sake of making that pretty debutant flower!





The centre portion is made out of the denim itself.

I took around the whole of an evening to make it. I got stuck at places while adding the lining. Had to redo the stitches. And morover, sewing is something what I like but am not good at it. So it took me a lot of time also.

Now this bag rests in my cupboard and holds my itty bitty things ;-)

Block It!

Hi All... :)

Most of you would be familiar with the art of blocking your granny squares. Well, I came to know about it very recently. Initially I was a bit sceptical about the success of the process. But I can tell you, it was indeed worth the try.

Would you like to see my attempt at blocking my Granny Square? Well, here it is...

I had some leftover yarn which I couldn't use for a whole new project. I was wondering what to do with it when I thought of a mix and match sort of cloth piece for the kitchen and I started with it.

I won't call it a Granny Square, but probably a Granny Rectangle :-D Seeing those curled up edges I felt sad. Finally what I had read about Blocking dawned upon me. I thought of giving it a try. I used a big cardboard, a big piece of thick cloth, board pins, tepid water, and a sprayer from the kitchen.

After 8 - 10 hours, it looked like this:

Not the complete intended effect, but a big difference right? I was pretty pleased with the curls disappearing. And I happily carried on with my project. Added more left over colours to it.

And more to it....

And finally, it looks like this now!

I received a suggestion from a few - it should have been more colourful!

Next time... sure :-)

Pink Love!

I am an ardent admirer of 'pink'. Though I don't intentionally pick up pink coloured things, I love the color a lot. The crochet flowers I made have more of pink in it for the reason that I loved that yarn so much. Unlike seen in the picture, it is shiny and a smooth textured. I had bought without knowing what to make of it.

My current project - a shawl for my mom, also is a lovely shade of pink. Don't have the In Progress snaps right now :-(

Thought I did share my first crochet project with you today. See this.

Don't know what to use it for. I know it is not that perfect either. But still I love it a lot and each time I see it, the more inspired I am to get onto my hooky business.

Craft Stylishly

Have you people come across the website CraftStylish? I know most of you would have. But if you still haven't, browse through from here. There are different categories like crochet, sewing, paper craft, jewellery making, and the like. The members on the site are increasing each day. And I also became a CraftStylish member recently. And my first post is there today :-) Read it - How to Crochet a Cellphone Pouch.

I might keep posting if I do something creative :-)

By the way, I have started joining my crochet flowers.

Happy Crocheting!

Red and Greenish Brown!

Does the title sound like a good colour combination to you? Well it doesn't sound nice to me either. But I have done a project with that combination because it looked good together :-)

Looks good, rt? Well, for the love of it, I made one more. I know it looks prettier! I was confused what to make out of the two pieces. Still kept on making the second one the same size as the first. And then, I thought of doing this:

And finally it became this pretty cross bag or satchel, as you wish to call it.

The thing I liked particularly about this bag is the shell edging I gave. Somehow I am so delighted to see my crochet bag hanging like this :-)

Till Date

I have done a few projects till date. Thought I'll show those to you today.

This is my new mobile pouch. I love that mix of blue and dark pink. I had to use the light pink one in contrast to the dark ones as I ran out of blue. But I guess it looks nice. Don't you feel so? :-) And that golden button. It is actually one from an old dress of mine. It had come off and was waiting in my craft box from a long time.
This is a table cloth sort of thing. I have used Granny Square pattern for this and gave an edging. This is the unfinished version. I have added a few more rounds to it. And now it is on our old Griller making it a bit more beautiful.


And this is the latest thing I am working on. I started it as I wanted to make a crochet flower from so long. And once I made one, I couldn't stop. It becomes superfast. You can see the progress. Now actually I am confused what to make of it - a neck scarf, room decorator, or a dress embellishment. Pour in your suggestions as well :-)