Thursday, May 19, 2016

The Crochet Pant arrives.

Wednesday afternoon? Time for the Wednesday Journal!
 Okay, it's no longer a secret that 1: I'm obsessed with my kids water polo play, and 2: I'm obsessed with crochet.  What you, loyal reader, may not know is that I'm also obsessed with our weekly newspaper, the Wednesday Journal.  Photographic evidence on display right here: proof of local involvement, civic pride, and a thirst for knowledge unparalleled in the Western Suburbs. Eat your heart out, Western Springs, we've got a fierce crosstown rivalry that is worthy of the very best sports writing, a world class High School, and a documentary film maker who's going to put Oak Park on the map (as if we aren't on the map already).  But I digress, this post is actually a shameless plug for my most recent wearable art happening:
It's a pant!
Doris Chan, Crochet Godess, has been at it again.  I can't crochet fast enough to keep up with her designs, and this one has been sitting in my *make it soon* pile for a few years, now.  After finally selecting the Designing Vashti color (mocha), and ordering this sumptuous thread/yarn, I was up and running.  The pattern, plain and simple in it's one piece design down model, worked like a dream and all I needed was enough couch time to finish these pants off.  The yarn comes in about 11 colors, so I'm looking at about eleven shorts and or pants in the near future...totally hooked!  For you pattern hounds, the so-called Gypsy Short/Pant pattern can be found in Interweave Summer 2014.

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Go ahead, try me. I'm totally ready.

And so...you guessed it.  I'm finally sporting some crochet pants and I'm not afraid to show it.  A lot of people have wondered at my face how I was going to pull this off...and, well, I don't know...seems like not a huge issue to me, but sometimes I get hung up on things that other people don't worry about, and the opposite is probably true, as in, things that other people get hung up on, I don't really sweat. 


So on full display on this May afternoon, I'm wearing some hip hugger swim trunks beneath the crochet pants.  Yesterday I wore some light weight tights beneath the pants, and another look will be to wear a smock-type thing over the pants and, well, the options go on and on.  


 Something tells me I'm not going to be taking a lot of orders for these bad boys, and that's okay, since I'm fond of one-of-a-kind projects.  They worked up remarkably fast, but once I got the hang of the pattern it was pretty boring, so....Netflix program required to work my way through another pair of these.


 100 percent cotton, made in USA, crafted here in Oak Park, IL.  Next time you think about finding some crochet pants or shorts, you know where to look.  I'll be sitting out front, enjoying some sunshine, working up some mad yarn arts, or maybe just working a crossword.

Thursday, April 7, 2016

Vertical Stripey Skirt: Crochet Goddess that will not quit.

wrap-around skirt.
Messages from far-away Bloggersville.  Wither, Unencumbered Woman?  Has life up and dished a whole load of weight to bear? Or has the simple maintenance of a hobbyist blog become one more obligation, worthy of being ditched?  Who knows, but if I were to point my gnarly finger in any single direction it would be toward electoral politics, both near and far.  But let's not get into that Right Now, dear friend, because I have yarn work and fun to share!






recycled yarn.
One of the themes of 2016 is about using what I have, getting rid of stuff, and organizing everything left sitting around.  As per yarn projects, I've recently committed myself to finishing more yarn art pieces than I begin. Yes, my friends, I'm talking about a spending freeze on yarn, and to fellow fiberistas we know how punishing this diet can be. I'm stuck in a vicious cycle of completing all of the half-finished projects and repurposing old yarn for newer projects, while the joy of imagining new yarn, new pattern, will have to wait.  And so, at least two skeins of this rainbow fingering weight wool blend were purchased for a not so lovely pattern that fell by the wayside over a year ago.  Meantime I sat with a friend who was noodling around with a knit pattern that involved diagonal variegated stripes and I figured that this yarn would be a hit for an invented crochet skirt, with bold stripes.  I embarked on my own diagonal (okay, now it's vertical) stripe pattern, working three strands throughout: rainbow, grey, black.
double, triple crochet, three strand fun.
I've been carrying this one around for a while, and as I put the finishing touches on it, I felt sort of satisfied.  It's a long triangle, formed with simple double and treble crochet, edged and wrapped-cinch! A light blocking, an extended wrap around belt, and I've got a spunky look.









Funny, a few weeks ago I was talking to a friend and I guess I suggested that I was planning to make another crochet skirt, to which, he replied: "Karen, you don't need another skirt!"  I just about fell off my seat laughing.  It has never, ever, occurred to me that there would be an end to the hand crafted yarn skirt.  What would be more essential to a clothing diet than this? But then, maybe he was hinting that it's time for me to make him a skirt!  Maybe so...but for now, I'm dressed up in my new skirt, just in time for lighter weather.
There's always a new skirt.