Roly Poly and African Flower Bag

Hello!  I just realised that I still owe you a picture of the Roly Poly Pillow Seat I hooked for the Teen.  Here we go:

The yarn is Vinnis Nikkim Colours in 100% cotton, hooked in size 3,75 with hdc's.  They now have their own webpage, take a look at the various yarns on the Vinnis Colours website.

 Oh, I have to confess that on the photography and creativity front I am inspired by sensory rich surrounds and societies that function on chaos, where the energy is palpable 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. It is the multi-sensory ambiances of every day urban life that keeps me going; these sensuous experiences that bare complex accounts of social formation. In short, I miss vibrant Asian living whether it be in the Middle East or South East Asia. 

In my current setting, I see people experiencing a daily sociological numbness, deafness and general anesthesia in the absence of any street culture; in the presence of horrific crime. The spectacle of real life is a threatened one here, the society aggressive on one hand and completely desensitized on the other.  

Bare with me until I find a new source of inspiration that will nudge me towards picking up my camera again so that I can once again produce interesting pics. Meanwhile I snap my photos with my mobile phone on the Vignette for Android app.  

I am hooking up a storm to complete the Babette-like throw so that I can move on with a new project.  I bought shades of grey to aqua to green but am still awaiting inspiration for what exactly I will be making! 

This is what African Flower handbag nr 2 looks like, hooked from the left over Roly Poly Yarn:

Below is the layout of the two sides before they are first joined at the bottom, then folded and joined at the sides.  

There is a teeny little corner that looks like a "step" at the bottom of the bag once all sides is joined too, that I simply push in with my pinky to create a smooth, rounded bottom corner.  The image to the left also shows the reverse side of the African Flower after I worked away all the yarn.  Neat huh?

Have a great week!  Cheers!

xxxxx 

Roly Poly Pillow Seat and Pentagon Pattern

While some parts of the world are currently covered in snowy white, we are living in a country covered in colour during the long Southern Hemisphere summers! The Roly Poly Pillow Seat fits right into this image but I can only show you the deflated version at the moment. Stuffing of the ball will take place later this month and I cannot wait to see the ball in it's full splendour - only then will it be possible to truely appreciate the beautiful yarn, colours and design. If you haven't hooked anything in Vinnis Nikkim Colours yet, this is an amazing 100% cotton yarn that I cannot recommend enough!

 The 12 pentagons hooked in different colours

I hooked the pentagons with a 3,75mm hook rather than the recommended 4mm as I wanted to achieve a slightly denser look. The ball was hooked in half double stitches [hdc].

Round 1. Chain 4, close to form ring.  Chain 2 to form first stitch. Hook another 19 hdc and close round with slip stitch. Total stitches = 20.

Round 2. This round will increase by 5 stitches. Chain 3 to form first stitch and single chain. Then in same space hook 1hdc. This will form the first corner. Hook 1 hdc in each of the following 3 spaces. Then in fourth space to create second of five corners: hdc, ch, hdc. Repeat to create 5 corners. This round = 25 hdc in total.

Round 3. Chain 3 to form stitch and single chain. Then in same space hook 2hdc.Hook 1 hdc in each of the following spaces until you reach the corner. In corner space: 2hdc, ch, 2hdc. Repeat until you reach the first stitch. THEN hook another hdc in the corner and slipstitch before going into second round. This round = 40 hdc in total.

Round 4. This round = 45 hdc in total.

Round 5. This round = 60 hdc in total.

NOTE: You will see that the corners of every odd round [starting round three] = 2hdc, ch, 2hdc. Every even round [starting round two] = 1hdc, ch, 1hdc. This resulted in a flat Pentagon. I always join the next round in a corner in order to hide the joins between rounds as demonstrated here. For these pentagons it meant that during the odd rounds you need to hook one last hdc in the corner before slipping into the first one in order to ensure 2hdc, ch, 2hdc for that round.

Thanks for stopping by - Cheers!

Aha!

Hello from a windy, wintry South Africa!  It is summer and the season of sunshine, beach, picnics and endless barbeques, but somehow the weather continues to play up and it is far too cold for the time of the year.  It makes for great hooky time though, something no hooker should be complaining about. I have been hooking up a storm to finish my impromptu, unplanned project so that I can focus on what I really wanted to hook - a charcoal tablecloth for a dining table seating eight people. I will be sad once the roly poly is finished, it is a fun project and a real pleasure to hook!

 Nine out of twelve pentagons that will form the roly poly pillow seat - I will be adding one last round in colour "natural" before I block the lot. Each pentagon will also be getting a  hand stitched  cotton lining to ensure the ball holds it shape well.  

 

 

Aha! Caught red-handed! Isn't she adorable, not quite three yet and already hooking up a storm. She has been watching me quietly for weeks now and then last week as soon as I got up to make her a hot chocolate, she grabbed hold of the hook! 

Cheers, have a great weekend! 

Frogging and a fab find

Bonjour, Good Morning, Asalaama Alaikum, Hej! 

After completing a quarter of the pentagons for the stripey roly poly pillow seat [giant crochet ball], I decided that the random stripes in random stitches wasn't doing it for me. The subtle colour changes in the handspun, hand dyed yarn sadly disappeared in the pattern.  It looked 'meh'.

One of the new Pentagons - there will be 12 colour combinations in total

I decided to frog the lot and start again with a simpler pentagon.  The new ones are hooked using 4 colours, 4 rows per colour for a cleaner colour blocking look and feel.  I fell in love with the new effect straight away and will be visiting the yarn shop in another hour to pick up two more colours to add to a more vibrant look. Take a look at the above photo to see the variation in the yarn, I am HOOKED on hand dyed cotton - it is scrummy!

Another pentagon was taking up space in my handbag during a trip to town recently and woopeee, the below bowl jumped out of the shelves, sporting the exact same colours of that specific pentagon.  Of course the bowl belongs to The Teen now. On my way to the yarn shop, I am once again popping into the same shop to see whether there are any new stock . . . ;-)

 See how the crochet pentagon matches the colours of the bowl!

Cheers, have a great Friday and weekend!

Ball and sort of a Holdall

My fingers did the walking and before I knew it, I was hooking away on a Pentagon. I am hooking a big ball, a rolypoly pillow seat, yip another one! My fourth and I still think this is the one item I want to be associated with in the land of hooky - huge roly poly pillow seats.

 The ball will again consist of 12 Pentagons, each measuring 15cm from any of it's corners to the center or alternatively 30cm across and the final ball will hold nearly 2 normal pillows [the kind we sleep on] worth of stuffing.

This is a teaser of some of the Vinnis Colours Nikkim 100% hand dyed cotton I am using. I am following instinct, combining sc, hdc and dc stitches and simply enjoy the motion of going round and round and round.

Don't you just love my fabulous leather bag in which I can stuff a whole project, my I-pad, a camera and still have space left over for shopping?!  Thanks to the Husband I am now the proud owner of this great holdall. I love Tsonga, the shop where this bag comes from.  The Tsonga stores and project is all about a "A thread of hope" - it is yet another upliftment project involving a community of women who will eventually pass on their skills to ensure a real future for their children. Check it out.

Have a great weekend. Cheers!

Tutorial: Cabbage Rabbit/The Easter Bunny

The Tween managed to finish her Easter Bunny in record time!  Wow I am impressed, her Cabbage Rabbit (the colour of the yarn reminds her of purple cabbage) is absolutely stunning.  She is all of 12 years old and I am a super duper proud mama!

Her love affair with bunnies started when she was 2 and a half years old. I was 5 months preggers with the Dude Tween and trying on bikinis for a fab holiday in a very busy shop in a very busy mall.  The Tween wasn't going to be patient at that challenging age and came close to throwing a full fledged tantrum . . .  Suddenly she spotted a white bunny and decided to manipulate me into buying her something in return to allowing me a few moments to find THE BIKINI. Uhm I don't easily fall for these moments but that day I did and Easter Bunny was born, has her own passport and has since traveled the world with us. A staunch, fiercely looking "I am going to give you a hard time" type of immigration official at Charles de Gaulle once cracked a massive smile when Easter Bunny's passport was handed over to receive a French stamp, a very memorable moment for us since we travel with not so globally friendly and warmly accepted South African issued passports and are used to getting The Look.  

How to hook a bunny ;-) according to The Tween.

Eyes:

Chain a 4 stitch circle

Row 1: 7sc in ring but do not join, work in a spiral
Row 2: 2sc in each stitch around (14sc)
Row 3: 1sc in first stitch, 2sc in next stitch. Repeat this all around (21sc)

Change colour, keep on working in spiral. See  "How to change colour" below.

Row 4: 1sc in first 2 stitches, 2sc in next stitch.  Repeat this all around (28sc)

Row 5: 1sc in first 3 stitches, 2sc in next stitch.  Repeat this all around (35sc) 

Change colour, keep on working in spiral.

Row  6:  1sc in first 4 stitches, 2sc in next stitch.  Repeat this all around (42sc)  

Fasten off and weave in ends. 

How to change colour:

Join original colour with a slip in the back loop only. Finish it off. Change colour: Join with a sc in the front loop (not a slip/ch1 as it will leave a bump) and then sc around. Joining this way only works for patterns where the front is shown, back disguised such as eyes. 

PS: off topic but for future reference - Check out the tutorial on NeedleNoodles on how to hook jogless stripes for stripey amigurumi projects.

Head:

Follow the tutorial as per Youtube for an amigurumi crochet ball but once you reached the 4th decrease stitch near the end, start to increase again in order to form the body. The head consists of 15 rows and the body consists of 12 rows - she wanted the head bigger.  The Tween says you will need to follow your own head and improvise. Gotto love Tweens! 

Arms and Legs:

The Tween: "Now that you have learned how to do the head and body, improvise and make the arms and legs in a similar way through increases and decreases and stuff".

Ears: 

Crochet first 4 rows as per head tutorial.

Row 5: Decrease in every second stitch and then keep on spiraling without increasing or decreasing to form a tube. do not stuff in order to keep ears sturdy and floppy, strong and soft all at the same time.  "Improvise as per arms and legs"

Face: 

Sew eyes on face. Then sew on nose and mouth. Give your bunny a hug and enjoy her.

Ideas

Recently I gave my roly polys one look and started toying with the idea of hooking a whole lot of crochet objects for an art installation/exhibition, errr to sell and make some $'s. Of course it will mean re-looking patterns and colours and stripes and time and . . . and so forth. Here in Penang there are tonnes of little mini-markets and stalls selling a selection of inflatable objects to enjoy in the ocean and swimming pool.  I had already tried out the idea with the naff roly poly and found it to be a great idea except that I didn't plan on stuffing it with a plastic ball so the inflatable ball was just a tad too small for the crochet ball. I would need to plan better, but can you image the hooky possibilities by giving the below a stripey or knobbly or granny jacket of some hooky sort?  Meanwhile the roly poly pillow seats hooked for the kids are stuffed with the cheapest available pillows from Tesco's.

The Tween's Roly Poly

Oh noooooo I hooked 5 pentagons following the exact stripes as generated by the Tween and I for a Liquorice All-Sorts Roly Poly as posted here, and fell out of love with each and every pentagon almost straight away. The yarn was an identical match to the stripes, the outcome not-so. Smooth stripes don't always translate well into hooky crochet stitches, the pentagons were downright ugly. butt ugly.

Neither did the Tween enjoy the results and I then gave her a free hand in choosing new colour combinations for her Roly Poly Pillow Seat. She loves a sense of the absurd and also collects pictures painted on scrap wood and second hand tables. The below cat is painted on a side table, the other pictures on a wooden cube.

I will once again set out in my quest to refine the Roly Poly Pillow Seat idea. I have tonnes of ideas for many projects and also need to learn a great number of new stitches and patterns, but since I mostly hook in the car whilst waiting for the traffic lights to turn green, I am bound to the simple and mindless in the land of hooky.          

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