Misty Clouds Scarf and 2013 Hooky Pleasures

Hello!  This is another scarf (yeah, I am fixated) hanging from my hooks. I wanted to share a few photos with you before the clock strikes 12 in three more days, even though the item is only half finished! I am still finding my way around this gorgeous yarn but think I will be able to push the boundaries and hook really interesting items once the creative juices are in full swing again. 

Misty Clouds Scarf

Pattern: hooked in hdc, 28 stitches per row

Hook size: 8mm

Yarn: African Expressions Love, brushed mohair, 100 gram  

 

Psst - Long post alert!

I decided to take a quick look at what I created during 2013 and am quite pleased with the results. Below is a collection of my projects with hyperlinks to all the postings. The postings include links to patterns, my own patterns or tutorials.
I have also thoroughly enjoyed all the blog hopping, commenting, link parties and blog week (See my posting Bamboo is Best for a chuckle). Thank you for stopping by here at the Pigtails Blog so often, have a fantastic New Year. Cheers!

  

1&3 African Flower Handbags 2. Roly Poly Pillow Seat & Roly Poly Pentagon pattern 4. African Flower Tutorial

1. Elize Shawl  2. Placemat 3. Shell Crochet Scarf  4. Mandala 

1. Necklace 2. Spotty Dotty Scarf & Spotty Dotty Planning 3. Circles Scarf 4. Dentelle Scarf 

1. New Yarn 2. Raw Rustic Throw & Raw Rustic Progress & Blocking Raw Rustic Squares & Rustic Squares Pattern 3. Blocking Cotton 4. Tutorial: Joining squares with DC2Tog 

1. Crochet Frames 2. Drops Design Top 3. Doilies 4. Ziggy Lace Scarf 

1. Delphine Cowl  2. Throw Main Bedroom 3. Crochet Frame 4. Bamboo is Best

1. Ivory Handbag 2. Crochet Pot 3. Mohair Scarf & Planning Mohair Scarf 4. Crochet Vessel 

1. Pattern: Squaring the Treble Circle 2. Vintage Fan Ripple 3. Doilies 4. Skinny Scarf & Skinny Scarf Inspiration 

1. Circles Scarf  2. Triangles & Kaleidoscopic triangles & Planning Triangles 3. Babette Style Throw finished & Babette Progress & Babette Inspiration 4. Erica Cowl  

1. Checkerboard Blanket  2. Spotty Dotty Cushion 3. Baby Ryder Blanket 

Mohair Scarf

 

Hello!  We are enjoying a great holiday at the moment and I decided to post a picture story for you today in order to showcase The Mohair Scarf.  For more details about the pattern and yarn, see my posting Something a little different.  Below are typically the items I would choose from my own wardrobe in order to create an interesting outfit.Cheers!

Travelling. It leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller - Ibn Battuta

Holiday Bliss

Vintage Fan Ripple

Vinnis Nikkim Cotton Yarn hand dyed in Peach

Two more Christmas tree decorations in 

Strawberries and Cream, Kismet Yarns colours 08 and 0050

I am crawling back into my corner now to enjoy the Bill Bryson book A Short History of Nearly Everything as well as Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation by Michael Pollan.

Cheers!

xxxxx

Christmas Tree Decorations

Crochet Frames / hanging ornaments

Hello! Aren't we lucky?! We've spent the past 5 Christmases in 5 different places namely Dubai, Kathmandu, Penang, Bangkok and South Africa. Perhaps this year we should drive over to Swaziland, Lesotho, Mozambique or Botswana to keep up with this trend! (We've actually spend a further 5 Christmases also in the Middle East when we were living in the UAE). We have learned so much from other expats and societies about the way they celebrate this time of the year, but the biggest surprise to me remains the interest, involvement and respect we experienced from people belonging to other major religions - here I do not refer to the commercial sense, but the blessings and celebrations.

Teen showcasing a minimalist paper garland for the tree. Just cut cardboard in strips and fold - glue or staple together.

These are drawings the Teen made with a silver pen on wooden discs she spray painted in black. This is the family of course! Wooden discs available from Ruby's haberdashery in Brooklyn, Pretoria. 

Christmas in South Africa is vastly different to Christmas in the Northern parts of the world due to the differing seasons, school years and the fact that this time of the year is spent on the beach and behind the barbecue. Few of those who can afford it, stay at home. 

It is sun, sea and surf time!

Meantime, I grabbed the blackboard and jotted down a few patterns for you. I used oval cardboard frames and wooden curtain rings available from Ruby's Haberdashery in Brooklyn. 

To hook the first round take a look at the tutorial by LolaNova. I used wooden curtain rings as well as oval cardboard discs to create my frames. The patterns below do not include that first round as demonstrated by LolaNova:

This is the bobble border by Vicki

Uhm, pardon the wet blackboard in the above photo.

In fact, pardon the bad photo editing, it is dinner time and the jerk chicken is calling. These are just some basic pics and ideas.

Something a little different!

Hello! I won a few skeins of this soft, misty, almost magical brushed mohair in the October Monthly Challenge hosted by the gregarious Maryanne from Woolhogs fame and WOW! At first I was speechless - what is a cotton lover to do with mohair yarns?!  It is so delicate and raw simultaneously that I was completely in awe. 

Inspiration struck after I touched the strands, played with the yarn between my fingers and put mood boards together. I started dreaming up endless ideas, possibilities and patterns so utterly suitable to the raw look of the yarn, but finally settled on a mesh pattern.   

Mood-boards put together from my Raw Rustic Pinterest

 

Yarn: African Expressions Love Brushed Mohair

Hook Size: 7mm

Pattern: liveinternet.ru nr 10 as found on Pinterest

Hint:

In order to prevent total chaos, I imported the pattern into the Doceri app on the Ipad and colour coded the rows as seen in the below image. 

A profound sense of loss

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Mielie!

Goeiemore, Good morning, Bonjour, Assalamu Alaikum, Hej, Hei, Dumela, Selamat Pagi, Namaste! 

The Afrikaans word for mealie/corn/maize is mielie. "Mielie" is the brainchild of Adri Schutz who established the design project in 2002 and involve underprivileged township women to create the designs. Mielie handbags are made employing the time consuming but sturdy hooked rug technique using cotton off cut strips, a by product from local cotton mills. These strips are woven in such a way that the surface looks like a "mielie"!

My latest bag - a Mielie bag designed by:

                                                                                         Photo courtesy of Mielie.com

You definitely want to browse the web for "Mielie Crochet" to take a look at the other handcrafted items the women produce too.  The Mielie website itself is not mobile or tablet friendly, but fire up your laptop if you want to read more about the Mielie Family and confirm whether the products are available from stockists in your country. 

Drooling over my bag, I immediately decided to hook a scarf to go with my bag during the winter months! 

I created my own mealie like edging by once again using the fabulous Bobble Border by Dover and Madden. Thank you again Vicki!

Don't you just love my bag and scarf?  I used various Vinnis Nikkim scraps for the circles and Vinnis Bambi (150 gr in colourway Cloud) to square the circles.  The pattern is by Little Woollie and one that I used for a scarf before. I used a hook size 4 although Bambi is better suited to at least a 5mm hook.  Have a nice week, I am busy hooking a few ornaments for the Baobab Christmas Tree. The cat can also not leave the tree alone and steals an ornament whenever I am not looking at him!

A busy week!

Hello!  I recently found two treasures on Pinterest, the first one was the Elize Shawl made by Liz from Crochet in Colour and the second was a drawing of a scarf by Sukha Amsterdam. I am a member of a Dutch Crochet Group on Facebook and always enjoy the shawls (omslagdoeke) hooked by the Dutch. Since we love travelling and seeing the world, I decided to hook my own shawl to take along on trips, inspired by the pictures I found on Pinterest!  The original design is by Evan Plevinski and can be find on Ravelry.

Elize Shawl hooked over three days in hand dyed, 100% cotton.  I used another day to block the scarf and take my hat off for Liz who said that she hooked her shawl in one day! 

 The Teen meanwhile got hold of her hook and covered a garish neon bangle in linen stitch, one of her favourite stitches to work with. She favours single crochet stitches (I do too, it is just a tad time consuming).

 

Last weekend I asked the husband to pick up a Christmas Tree for us, he came home with a baobab made out of wire by a group of Zimbabwean dudes who set up "shop" on a nearby street corner! We promptly decided to decorate the tree in a fusion of Scandinavian and African designs in black and white and I immediately stocked up on spray paint, polystyrene balls, paper, felt, sequins and more and hope to show you a version of the decorated tree soon. Interesting trees made out of wire, wood and other materials have been quite the rage in South Africa for close to 2 decades now.  It is fun given that this is the Southern Hemisphere and winter does not factor into our Festive Season! 

Lastly, our Tuna cat belonging to the Dude Tween went into labour when I was out shopping and safely delivered no less than 7!!!! kittens with the help and encouragement of the Teen and Tween. I am hoping that our Main Coon is daddy of at least the black ones, but of course the ginger ones belong to Garfield who lives across the road from us. This is the litter, no more than 48 hours old!

 Enjoy your week!

Oh yes, and before I forget, I informed New Stitch a Day of the Acrobatic Stitch dilemma as per previous posting and they immediately rectified the mistake. Thank you for excellent customer service!

 xxxxx