Roly Poly Pillow-Seat done!

Woo hooo my first Roly Poly Pillow-Seat is finished! The original idea was blogged by The Thrifty Fox and re-blogged here and I re-blogged about the same here. I think I found my "thing" - that is some"thing" that I enjoy making, seeing and displaying so much that I just have to make a few more, in all sorts of colour combos including a liquorice all-sorts black and white one spruced up with vibrant pink, orange and green stripes. Wherever I put the Roly Poly down, it just seems to fit right in. This one is destined for my boy's room but I just had to try it out in the kitchen and upstairs lounge area too. Our bedrooms are private space, hence me not posting photos of the Roly Poly in it's rightful place.

Looking back at the original article now, I think that I should have added more stuffing to it. I deliberately added less so that my boy would be able to sink in and read a book or play with his Lego, but it seems just a tad on the floppy side now. Tomorrow I will open one side and add some more stuffing; just now I want to keep on looking at it.

I used 100% acrylic yarn Made in Japan of dubious thickness.  Not all the colours were of the same weight either but I am just thankful that any yarn at all is available for purchasing in Penang.  I used a 5.00mm  Made in China hook (so cannot confirm whether the size aligns with hooks internationally . . . ) hooking the 12 pentagons needed to make the Roly Poly. Each pentagon measures 15cm from the center to any of it's 5 corners. 

I alternated US double crochet (dc), half double (hdc) and single crochet (sc) stitches at random and added texture by inserting the hook only in the back loop of the chain instead of into both loops on a few rows. I roughly used a row of dc only once per pentagon and hooked the pentagons with the majority of the rows in hdc's. The texture where I hooked via the back loop only was created mainly on the sc rows. The Roly Polys are not supposed to be looking too neat and perfect but more organic and handmade.

Basic Idea/Pattern:

To begin: Chain 4 and join to form a ring.

Round 1: Chain 3 and 14 dc into ring = 15 sts

Round 2: *3dc into 1 st, 1 dc in each of next 2 sts * repeat 5 times = 25 sts

Round 3 and all other uneven rounds: 2 dc each in the 2 chains that forms the middle stitches of the 3 dc of the previous round, 1 dc in all other sts

Round 4 and all other even rounds: 3dc in the middle chain of the 4 dc that forms the corner of the previous round, 1 dc in all other sts

Round 3 onward illustrated - It is only after hooking a few pentagons that I realised the below is the best solution in order to keep the corners neat and the shape flat. How you treat the corners also pretty much depends on whether you use US sc, half or double sc stitches. With US dc or UK treble stitches there is a very distinct middle, not so with half double.

||| \|/ |||  - middle 3 dc all in one chain to form corner of row 3

||| \\// ||| - middle 4 dc split between middle 2 chains to form corner of row 4

||| \|/ ||| -  middle 3 dc all in one chain to form corner of row 5

||| \\// ||| - middle 4 dc split between middle 2 chains to form corner of row 6 etc

Aleksandr, the very last knitter

Oh you just have to watch this short award-winning animation about the very last knitter.  I am by no means a knitter, oh no I am not a good girl, I am a bad girl, a hooker ;-) indeed! However I really enjoyed this short story about knitting. More about this animation project can be viewed here



Aleksandr (english subtitle) from Aleksandr Team on Vimeo.

Roly Poly Pillow-Seats

Can you feel the vibrations?  That is my energy and enthusiasm for The New Project. Wow I fell in love with these Roly Poly Pillow-Seats the moment I saw it on here. I still need to figure out the pattern but I think I will be hooking these with a combination of single, double and triple crochets to keep the pattern interesting and somewhat rustic.  As for the colours - it will most definitely have a retro feel about it - wait and see!

What a Hooker!

Waa haaa I just knew when I stumbled upon Obey Crochet that I found the ultimate in hooky sites! There is no need to say anymore about the site, go on, take a look and you will be in hooker heaven too. Be sure to check out the shop as well.

The Yarn Shop

Here in Penang there are quirky shops and dirty shops, funky shops and monkey shops, shops in modern malls and shops in old Chinese shophouses. Then there is the yarn shop. I will leave the description of this shop up to you, but what I can tell you is that I co-incidentally stumbled upon this shop one day after searching for a haberdashery on the island.  I actually gave up any hope of finding either yarn or a crochet hook anywhere in Penang and decided to order via Amazon. Only to have Amazon declining delivery of crochet hooks to the island . . .

I still think it utterly unbelievable and co-incidental that I walked past this shop and discovered the yarn tucked away on shelves at the back of the shop, exactly one day after trying to order via Amazon.  The choice lies only with the colours, not the yarn.  It is 100% acrylic, manufactured in Japan and is sold in bundles of 5x40gram. The quality is OK, at least the yarn is soft. I have since read about another shop selling yarn and will investigate and report soon. Oh the fun of living this life, one simply has to have an outstanding sense of humour.

The front of the shop and the backstreet where I park - note the storm ahead, it is wet season.

The "Shop"

Hexagon & Granny's Soccer Ball Cushion and Handbag

The Tween's room is mostly a blank canvas of white which is spruced up with a few interesting objects among others "paintings" on raw wood that she purchases every alternate month or so from the quint Amelie Cafe in Armenian street, a favourite space of ours. Various bloggers have documented Amelie and to get an idea of this cafe where everything is recycled by the artist owners take a look here and here. 

As soon as I came across the beautiful African Flower pattern designed by two South Africans, I decided to give it a go and fell in love with the satisfaction of hooking these Grannies. The Tween and I selected the colours at random from our stash of yarn (yes, she is hooked on hooking too!) and it was great fun to see the flowers evolve. I hooked the borders of the hexagons in green and the pentagons in blue, a combination that popped all the colours beautifully and created harmony between other objects hooked in the same tropical colours. After 8 years of desert living in the Middle East we love the vibrancy that comes with living on a Tropical Island.

The "soccer ball" cushion is assembled with 12 pentagons and 20 hexagons and unfolded looks like this [you might also want to head over to Crochetbug for a tutorial on how to assemble the ball]: 

You might also want to head over to Imaging Maths to see it unfolded in a different way:

Or use this one:

The pattern for the beautiful Summer Garden Granny Squares can be found on the lovely Attic24 blog.  44 Squares were used to create the bag.

The pattern for the African Flower is illustrated and described step for step on the fabulous blog Heidibearscreative