Free Form Crochet

So, my crochet hero, besides the woman who taught me how to crochet, is Antonina Kuznetsova. I've faved a few of her designs on ravelry, and linked to her photostream. Take a few minutes to look at her creations, it will blow your mind away. This one has to be my favorite:

What? Like it's such a shock that I like pink. Her mastery of freeform crochet blows my mind away. I was lucky enough that the woman who taught me how to crochet taught me how to sight crochet. Essentially, she started with teaching me how to make basic stitches and a general shape. Then she would hand me motifs and tell me to figure out how to make them. The motifs got progressively more complicated, and she taught me an incredibly valuable skill. Not only did she teach me stitches and abbreviations so that I could make things from a pattern, she enabled me to create my own designs. That said, even Irish crochet seems somewhat daunting to me, and I've been crocheting for almost 15 years now.

That said, I found a wonderful tutorial about free form/irish crochet at smart-knit-crochet.com showing you how to construct your own free form skirt. While it's absolutely gorgeous, I don't think I'll be doing another lace garment just yet. (I heard that derisive snort! Give me until next year at least, to start something insanely intricate again.) However, I think jewelry will be a perfect launching point to learn this technique. As you can see, Dainty Crochet by Aly, uses free form crochet to make really beautiful pieces.

Someone, anyone (not me) please buy that necklace before I cave and buy it myself. If I had to guess at its construction, she started with the circular and center motif. Then she used crochet to create the structure of the necklace and beaded chain at the back of the neck. It's an absolutely gorgeous piece of work.

I've got a pretty good idea of what I want to crochet, though, variations on lace trims adapted to necklaces and chokers. I've been browsing through Crochet Lace by Pauline Turner, which I highly recommend. It's got a ton of great patterns and motifs for your imagination to run away with. I actually picked it up at half price books for a great price. I can't wait to get started on a little choker just to bust some stash.

Brainstorming

So, I'm in the middle of several projects all of which take about half an hour or more to do a row. I'm working on the secret project/aspiring design with the haiku yarn. Then there's the wings of a dream shawl that I heavily modified. There's also the celtic tote bag which requires me to finish embroidering the outline. As you might guess, it can get a little tedious.

Well, there's also the sock, but it's just not captivating me right now. And there's the intolerable cruelty skirt, but that's mindless knitting. Except for the short rows I'm attempting to add. My waist is 6 inches smaller than the widest part of my butt/hips. That means I need to add length back there or I will have a really funny looking hemline. (Anyone else ever make a garment where it's shorter in the back than the front?) Remember that the next time you knit a skirt. In sewing, you make the hem long to compensate for any uneveness and then trim the fabric to get an even hemline. It doesn't work quite the same way in knitting. You gotta add short rows in the back, or as a friend charmingly misspoke: short ass rows.

Anyways, I've decided I'm in need of some instant gratification projects so I thought I would design some silk & beaded crochet lace jewelry. I found this wonderful blog, where she has an embedded video on how to crochet with beads. Good quality, it's not perfect, but it's enough to get you started on the basic idea of how to crochet with beads. I've done it with knitting before, but not crochet yet. There's a wee stash of beads waiting for me to use it, and this just seems like the perfect opportunity to try.

And there's the death shawl.

Its's holding up some gorgeous yarn that probably won't get made into a shawl. Why? Well, let's start with the name. On ravelry, one woman commented that she'd probably get buried in the shawl, because it would either kill her or she wouldn't finish it until she died. The charts for it are just that long. I'm not kidding. It's a beautiful shawl... and not something you should try for your 3rd knitting project ever. Ask me how I know. Anyways, the yarn is a beautiful dusty gold color, which would make for great jewelry, don't you think? Time to dust off my crochet books and figure out what would look really great with some beads.

"Gather ye rosebuds while ye may"

Old time is still a flyin'.
For that same flower which blooms today,
Tomorrow may be dying.
-Herrick, Robert "To the Virgins, to make much of Time."

Yay! Today, I woke up and there was no pain in my left hand. Curling it was a little stiff, but no shooting pains. Much love to yoel for her cat sweater project which cheered me up. I crafted maybe a whole hour yesterday, and took it very easy on my left hand. By crafting, I mean I bound off on the front waistband of the vogue dress, and started on a crochet rose. It's loosely based off of A Rose By Any Other Yarn. By loosely, I mean inspired to think with yarn in 3D. I constantly forget that I am way better at crochet than knitting. The woman who taught me how to crochet taught me how to look at an object and determine how it was made - aka patternless crafting. I forget that I have that skill alot.

So, the "gather ye rosebuds" flower was born - or the Georgia O'Keefe rose. Once you see it assembled, you'll understand the reference. I didn't intend for the center of the bud to look so... well, similar to certain parts of female anatomy. Humor aside, it's a lovely reminder to take things easy. Aging sucks, my joints hate me, and I haven't hit thirty yet. It's to remind me that beautiful things bloom over time, and if I want to keep these skills, I have to work within my limitations. And probably pick up a regular exercise regime, that includes more than walking a mile around campus.

I haven't decided whether or not I will write the pattern for the rose. It's interesting to see it shape up to resemble our more modern rose, the hybrid tea rose. It's why I'm making up the pattern as I go along - the old Irish crocheted roses don't look like roses to me. When I thought about it, though, I realized that it wasn't modeled after the tea rose at all. The pointed bud shape of the tea rose is the product of much more modern breeding that only came about within the last century or so. The Irish rose was most likely modeled after the older varieties, like the floribunda. Actually, now that I've looked at one, I definitely see the resemblance. It makes sense, since the floribunda is a much hardier rose than the tea rose, and would have been much more common two centuries ago.

As for the rest of my projects, I think I bit off far more than I could chew with the f'ing deer socks. Colorwork and patternless socks? Ooops. The nail in the coffin was having him try on the first finished sock. Well, he tried to get it on, to no success. There simply wasn't enough stretch in the colorwork to fit his heel. I was sort of dreading making the color on the second sock anyways. Now that I know it doesn't fit, I think I might make a pair of normal socks first, before going back to these socks. The deer will have to be saved for another special occasion.

That, and I want to do reinforced heels on his socks. I don't learn, do I? Hmm, let's see - let's try a technique I've never done before in a pattern I've never done before. To make it more interesting, let's try it in fingering weight yarn! On magic loop! Brilliant! Sounds like fun to me. I needed to stop by a craft store today anyways.