Snow Capped Orange

Hi friends,

Yes, its me! Still alive and playing hooky as usual. I know I am writing after many, many days and that is because I was busy with some "behind the scenes" activities. More about that later.

For a change I actually remembered something that I promised earlier and that is, to show you the matching hat I made for the orange and white scarf. So here it is:

Cute, isn't it? It does look like any simple crochet hat but I am very proud of it. Why?  Because I made it without any pattern. Something which I very rarely do as I am a slave to the written word and also because I just do not have the patience. But this time I had to rack my brains as I wanted a matchy matchy set.

 

The trick was in adapting the scarf pattern to the hat. While the scarf is worked by crocheting back and forth the hat is worked in the round. But I managed to do it without any gaps showing in the pattern. 

I will discuss more about adapting patterns in my next 'scarf and hat' post. I chose white for the crown as I thought orange would look too bright and even kiddish. So the white cuts through the orangey-ness. But I kept the cuff orange as that is the part which is handled the most while putting on and taking off and white may get soiled quite easily.

The set looks just lovely. What do you say?

Here is a closer look at the stitches and cuff

And here is some unknown model wearing it.....   :)  LOL

Now, about those "behind the scenes" activities, you may have seen the advertising banners and links on the blog. I know that they are a bit irritating but please bear with me. Recently I came across many articles about monetizing your blog and I thought I should give it a try. Also the real reason is that I am hoping in the long (looooong) run it will help me pay for my yarn acquisition disorder without feeling guilty when I stock up. Since Adsense, for reasons unknown to me, does not want to be my friend I had to hunt for other options. Also fear of html is a big handicap.

Another activity is that I have now joined Twitter. I have not really got the hang of it yet but it is an easy way to "follow" your favorite bloggers, crochet designers and experts. Hoping to be active and tweeting soon. PS- Any tips are most welcome.  :)

This has been a hurried post as I am leaving for Mumbai to celebrate the Ganesh festival with my friends and relatives there. Last year I wrote a small post about this festival and you can read it HERE. I hope I have some good pics to share with you from Mumbai. 

I am also planning to buy some yarn in Mumbai, so wish me luck. No, not for buying but for camouflaging and stuffing it into my suitcase so that nobody is wiser!!  LOL The things one has to do just to keep your hobby alive.

So that is all for now. Can't resist one more pic of my orangey matching set!  :)

Happy crafting and Happy Ganeshotsav

Scarfed for life

Hello friends.

Thanks for popping in. I know I am not blogging consistently but I have been crocheting like it is going out of fashion. Now that my hook has become hot let me keep it down and pick up my camera.

But first I want to thank everybody for their good wishes on our Independence Day and also for your lovely comments about my crocheted hearts. And a warm welcome to all new friends who have joined us.

You may have read one of my previous post about our trip to Ladakh. Before this trip, I used to think that scarfs are fashion accessories and I always wondered how a thin strip of fabric could protect you from the cold. Well, that trip put all my doubts to rest as I wore my scarf 24/7.

Once home I decided to make a few more, now that I had realised  that they were useful and handy and definitely helped to keep you warm. 

I decided to use a pattern I had already used here but with a twist. This time I decided to use two colours. 

Soooo...... tad dah.....

And this is my first scarf

The two colours make it look like a whole new pattern, doesn't it? But I love both of them.

When my scarf was done, I thought it looked like fragrant "parijat" flowers strewn down a pathway. A sight that greeted us every morning when we would go to our native place, Mangalore during school vacations.

Pic source axsoris.com

Don't you think so?

Do you think it needs a fringe?

Well, scarf done, now what?  I am going to make a matching hat. 

But before that, let me tell you something funny. Since Ladakh is an extremely cold place I was happy that for the first time I could actually take all my hand crocheted goodies along with me and of course flaunt them. But after reaching Ladakh.....flaunt was the last thing I wanted to do. WHY?... Because I had my ivory colored scarf (shown above), my canary yellow fingerless gloves and a deep blue beanie (this pattern) I had made.

Now you can well imagine what a sight that must have been - blue beanie, cream scarf, yellow mitts coupled with my outfits in various colours. A real clownish ensemble!!!  :)

Well, at that time I was more worried about keeping myself warm rather than being fashionable...!!!

So that is how I was struck with the idea of making matching sets. [Confession - I am a big fan of matching sets]. I will be back soon with my matching hat.

Till then, happy crafting and have a great week ahead.