Crochet News

If you're like me you will be very excited by this article that ran today on ABC news in Chicago, IL. The title "Crochet's Comeback" caught my eye immediately. How exciting! I love crochet and have always thought that it is such a beautiful art, although I must admit, I cringed every time my grandma, bless her heart, would send me one of those ugly crocheted vests. I got them for birthdays, Christmas, and for no reason at all. I loved my grandma and my conscious, even as a child, wouldn't let me throw them in a drawer and not wear them. So I would wear them to school. I seemed to be the only girl in school lucky enough to have these "vests of many colors" and I got more than my fair share of teasing. Let's face it, crochet's 'bad rap' is well deserved based on the crochet of the 60's and 70's.

But crochet has become more modern and fashionable, trendy even. I've always thought if today's crochet got more exposure it would change people's minds and it would overcome it's fuddy duddy reputation.

The article I read this morning caught my attention and I must say I was excited!! The article started out by saying that when you think of crochet, you probably picture your grandmother's baby blankets, or those (ah-hemm) multi colored vests worn by college girls in the 70's. It went on say, "but crochet has been updated and it's making a comeback". Hurray!! It's about time, I thought.

According to the article, some of the crochet accessories that will be popular this fall are Nordstrom crochet tights, sweaters and tunics in purple, grey and turquoise, and looped scarves. Also popular this fall, handmade crocheted hand bags made with recycled pop tops such as these from CasaBrasilonline.com.




The recent crochet jewelry trend is expected to continue as well. You can get more details and read the full article here.

In addition to making some of these items for my Christmas Craft Boutique, I'll be adding some of these popular fall fashion accessories to my Christmas crochet gift list!

On a side note, my trip was fantastic, but I'm so glad to be home. I'll be posting pics soon!

Success! I've Completed My First Original Design!

This is "Ciji". She is the first doll I made from an original design. She's the doll that almost wasn't. I really wanted to try my hand at designing and crocheting my own doll and if you've been reading my blog you know that I first talked about designing a human ballerina doll. In a later post you probably noticed that I was beginning to worry that I bit off more than I could chew! I got the body, arms and legs done, complete with pipe cleaners inserted in her arms and legs to make her posable. And that was it. That's where my creative mind stopped. She laid headless on top of my computer hard drive for days. I would glance over at her often and wait for the 'lightbulb' of an idea to come on. But it didn't. So I decided to do nothing. I believe that creativity should just flow, and while it can be developed and encouraged, it can't be forced. I pretty much lost confidence in my ability to design anything of my own, so I crocheted something from a pattern to make myself feel better. I received encouragement from an awesome designer, one who does amazing work and whose works and tutorials have always provided me with so much inspiration. She explained what she does when this happens to her and it really got me thinking. This probably happens to everyone, not only when they first begin designing, but once they are experienced as well. I relaxed and stopped worrying so much about it and one day it happened. I looked over at my headless doll and the ideas started to flow again! So I picked her up and continued on.


As her personality started to emerge she really didn't seem like a ballerina at all so I decided to turn her into a fairy. I made the wings and everything but it still just didn't feel right. To me she seemed more like a stylish model type so that's what I went with. I'm really happy with how she turned out, and I love that I can pose her arms and legs and even make her hold my thread bear.



I feel so much better about all of it now. I really should have started smaller I know, I could have saved myself some frustration. But nothing ventured, nothing gained and I'm glad I did it the way I did. I learned a lot, that's for sure.



I made her hair with fun fur. That was a completely new experience, and one that I almost gave up on until I went to planetjune.com and read her tips for working with fun fur. That made all the difference and I love the way her hair turned out. If you're even considering working with fuzzy yarns I highly recommend you start by reading the information at this link: http://www.planetjune.com/blog/fuzzy-yarn-tips/



Here's Ciji with "Daisy" the fawn and holding the little thread bear I made a while back.




More pictures from Ciji's photo shoot.



I told myself that if I ever finished her it would be a long time before I attempted another original design, but that's not the case at all. I'm actually excited to try another, and I have lots of ideas rolling around in my head so stay tuned.




If you're thinking of trying your hand at designing, my advice to you would be to GO FOR IT! And secondly, DON"T GIVE UP!

I'm going out of town for a week and my blog will be on "auto pilot" for several days. I'm hoping to get some crafty inspiration on my trip and have lots of nifty photos to post when I return.

As always...thanks for visiting!