My First Crochet Handbag

So I found a great pattern on the Lion Brand website for a Crochet Handbag, by Drew Emborsky. It's such a gorgeous shape -- I love the pleats! I decided since I had a bunch of off-white yarn hanging around that I would give it a go and see if I was a.] capable of following the pattern, and b.] I liked the end result. In the end, I love the look when it's lying flat, but prefer it was a bit taller/deeper than the finished result, and maybe not quite as wide at the base... at least for my personal usability preferences. In my opinion the dimensions looked great flat but made for some strange interior space when the purse was in use. Full it looked a little funny but flat it looks fab! But maybe that's just me. Check out a "full" pic below and compare it to this flat one, maybe you'll see what I mean.

The pattern itself was super easy -- all single crochet with ONE pesky row (row 15) where I had to follow the written instructions to form a pleat. And not just one pleat, but six total in that row! And then you had to do row 15 twice, because you had to make two side pieces to form the bag body. I got some help from fellow ravelers to interpret the instructions and I finally managed to get the hang of the pleat :) Yay! Beyond row 15, the rest of the pattern was super simple. My seaming isn't all that great, but I'm learning. I've made some modifications that I plan to use on my next try and I hope it turns out the way I invision the perfect version of this handbag to be. Once I pick out some delicious brown yarn (after all, you can't wear white after Labour Day, and with that coming up tomorrow, I only have one day to use this purse, LOL) for a more season-appropriate look, I'll give the modified version a go. If that works out I'd love to post the mods for anyone else who might be interested :) As you can see, I didn't make the little flaps (mostly because I had different handles than what the pattern called for) and I decided to add little crochet flowers as an accent. All part of the modifications, I tell ya. In the end it was a great project. I can't wait to make another! :)

This little crochet handbag will be off to the bowling alley with us this evening for some dinner and fun with friends. Enjoy your holiday weekend!

Recent Craftings

I don't know if "craftings" is a real word (And based on Firefox's built-in spell checker, it isn't.) but for today and for my blog post title, it is a word. This week I've finished two projects: a purple bouclé scarf for my mom for Christmas (Yes, I am ahead of the game) and a little tiny turtle for Somer. The scarf was knitted from a beautiful skein of Bernat Soft Bouclé that I picked up while in Penticton a few weeks back, in a colour called The Big Purple. What a fun name, huh? It's 65 inches long and really soft and pretty, at least I think so. I hope my mom does, too! There's no real pattern involved with this bad boy -- I co'd 15 sts on big size US 15 / 10.0 mm needles and knit until the scarf reached my desired length of around 65 inches. I love the big loopy look to it.

The tiny turtle is from a pattern called Tiny Striped Turtle by KristieMN. It was surprisingly easy and quick to make up, and I think it turned out so cute! Somer likes turtles and she's had a rough month or two so I thought I'd surprise her and send a tiny turtle her way to say hello. Don't tell her yet, though... he's so cute I haven't mailed him off just yet hehe. I think my favourite part is his wee little tail poking out. And you probably noticed mine doesn't have a striped shell. Well, crochet is fairly new for me and the idea of switching yarn so often on such a small item kinda intimidated me since I'm not really all that familiar with how changing yarn colour works. Instead I crocheted the entire shell one colour. I'm still on the hunt for safety eyes (Who seem to be hiding from me at Michaels.) so I cut small round eyes out of black felt and hand stitched them on with thread afterwards. He's a cutie!

I've been rather busy this week and doing a little crochet in my spare time (I started on a crochet blanket last night... BIG endeavor for a newbie!) but I'll have a digital scrapping freebie, Part 2 of 2 of the "Healthy Balance" mini kit, for you on Friday. I've also got a few other digi scrap items in the works, they're just not finished and ready yet. Soon! Hope you have a great week :)

Sunday Share

Hi :)

Hope everyone is having a great weekend. We've spent the day cleaning the house -- it was really overdue! I got a wonderful email from MAKNJ, who shared how she used my "A Day at the Beach" digital scrapping overlay -- aren't the special touches that she added fab? I think the photo of her son is just wonderful, it turned out perfectly! Be sure to check out the rest of MAKNJ's photos on Flickr HERE! Thanks so much for sharing, MAKNJ! :D

If you missed my "A Day at the Beach" overlay freebie, you can snag it here on 4shared.

And speaking of sharing... I finished up a crochet project this weekend that I thought I'd share, too! It's a "Bitty Baby" from the pattern here (and on Ravelry here) by Hannah Kaminsky. It turned out... ok. It doesn't look too bad, but I know where each and every imperfection is and it makes the finished project not feel quite as nice as I was hoping it'd turn out. The pattern itself was fairly easy for a newbie crocheter like myself (just taught myself last week or so) and the hardest part (in my opinion) was stitching it all together at the end -- the head was such a pain to stitch to the body, and I wasn't sure I was really stitching the arms and legs on properly. I'm not very confident that my stitching-things-together skill (yes, that's a real skill) is very good. BUT, here it is anyway. I'll chalk this one up to practice and perhaps try making a few more for some of our friends that have recently had a baby in the past few months or are due in a few months. I think everyone we know has had a baby in the past year or will be having one soon. No, we're not ready yet ;)

Enjoy the rest of your weekend and have a great week <3