WIPs Wednesday

Waves Ripple Afghan

Basket weave

 

Shells n Diamonds

Lucy inspired flowers

Newly laid pigeon eggs

Golden yellow crochet purse

Hello friends, I hope you had a lovely weekend. I have been busy trying out various patterns which may be the reason I have not blogged as frequently as I really want to. 

But unfortunately my crocheting has not gone as planned and I have frogged 3-4 projects recently as the results were not as expected. All the said projects have been for tops or boleros. For a long time now I have been wanting to make something wearable, something with measurements, something that is supposed to fit you. I know what you are thinking...there are tons of patterns out there. Yes, I know, but somehow the ones I like are on foreign language sites - Japanese or Russian with only diagrams for reference. So far I have not been successful in properly deciphering any of those patterns. Very frustrating and also a loss of precious time!!  :(

Inspite of all this, my WIPs basket is overflowing with the dozen odd projects going on simultaneously. But enough about PhDs, now I want to show you the FO I promised the last time. Yes the crochet purse that I was working on. 

I was going to show you the purse after finishing it up with a lining and zipper. But no... I have still not gotten over my fear of my sewing machine. And zippers!!!.....certainly on my bucket list but just not right now.  :(

So here is the Golden Yellow Crochet Purse:

I knew I had to make it when I saw THIS PATTERN.  The material is a cord, easily available in Mumbai as purse making cord. Also known as macrame cord. I used a 4.5 mm crochet hook.

The handle is a Pin-spiration i.e. an idea I found on Pinterest. It is made by braiding three cords and to make the cord I did 200 chains and then sc into each chain.

Here is a link to the TUTORIAL for the braid. If you are planning to use this method for a bag handle remember to make the cords a few inches longer than required as the resulting braid will be much shorter. My cords were 40 inches each and the resulting plait is 34 inches.

I am quite happy with the result of combining two different tutorials. What do you think?
Hmmm... a lining and zipper would really make this purse look so finished and lovely. Maybe I will give it a try soon.

And now, would you like a peep into my WIPs basket? Hehe...as if I need to ask!!

Any guesses what this might be?

I am not sure I have got the "heart" right, so will post about it after working on it some more.  :)

So, what have you been up to? Do write to me. I love your comments (a big Thanks to all of you) and I really look forward to them. 

If you come across a good pattern for a bolero do send me a link. Here's wishing you a happy successful week ahead.
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Awards and Pies

Hello dear friends. How are you? I hope you are enjoying a fabulous weekend. We had a fun time celebrating the kite festival during the week, which is an important event in Ahmedabad.

My posts are getting further apart. And I can only plead TMI. TMI = Too much information. The internet gives us easy and quick access to so many things at a time. I have been flitting from site to site, greedily downloading patterns and wanting to do it all at once. The reason I have not completed any WIP or posted anything is that I seem to have my finger in too many pies.

This pic will give you an idea... :-)

So, as you can see, lot of things going on but nothing near completion.

I did say that 2013 has begun in a great way for me and now I have some more good news. I was surprised to see a message from Rajeswari at Diapermum nominating me for the Liebster Award. Now that made me very happy. It is these little unexpected surprises that bring joy to blogging. The fact that someone somewhere is thinking of you, liking your blog and also making the effort to actually pass on the award to you.

So, you can imagine my utter delight and amazement when within a few days I received another message, this time from Shikha at I Love Handmade awarding me the Liebster Award again!!!  :-)  I was thrilled, two awards in one week. 

Thank You, Rajeswari and Shikha. Then how come I was so quite up until now?

Well, you see "With Great Awards comes Great Responsibility". (Hehe...sorry, just could not resist slipping that in.) But the fact is that the awards come along with a list of tasks and as I was a bit scattered last week I could not do justice to it. But fear not I will be tackling them soon.

I am so disappointed at having missed the "Grow your blog" party at 2 bags full. It would have been a great opportunity to make new friends and of course increase my own readership. But I will certainly visit most of the 400 bloggers who DID participate.

Now off I go to do my award duties ie: draw up a list of my award nominees and frame eleven (hopefully sensible) questions. I have moved the awards to a separate page in a bid to keep the homepage tidy. As far as answering the questions posed by Rajeswari and Shikha, I am thinking of doing that on an "About Me" page. After eight months as a blogger I also think it is time for my readers to know a little more about me. Do you think that is a good idea? Do let me know.

I would love to know what you have been up to during the weekend (only the crafty things of course and not the naughty ones...hehe)   ;-)

Take care and happy crafting.

Love xxx