Rasta-ret!

One of my all time favorite type of hats is the beret. At this point, I've made more than my share. The one pictured below was thrown together with scrap yarn, while watching a 2012 documentary on Bob Marley.

I totally free-formed the entire thing in a few hours.

It was an enjoyable crochet AND a stash-buster to boot!

Now I have something to pull about my ears when sitting around the campfire next week in Yosemite! Okay, I have lots of hats to choose from for this purpose, but I am definitely bringing this one with me anyway.

I think I may need to crochet a few dreads to pin to my head...

Many thanks to Heather for modeling and Steve for snapping the pics!

Happy Wednesday, everyone!

Woven Star Shawl

I love small loom weaving. Weaving on a small frame loom is portable, allows me to use up small amounts of leftover yarn and it gives my wrists and fingers a much needed break from crocheting and knitting. As such, here's my latest small loom FO...the Star Shawl!

I love my Hazel Rose Diamond Looms. You've seen my diamond loom shawls before and I've got a diamond shawl schematic that seems to work for me, but this time I decided to vary it up a bit. I am a big fan of this shawl on the "Knitting in Tuscany" book cover by one of my fave designers, Nicki Epstein. So, I figured why not try a star shape with woven components! Using my 3.5" loom, I wove 8 diamonds and arranged them into an 8 pointed star. Beautiful. Now repeat (and repeat again)! I used lots of my own homespun as well as some commercial yarn scraps on the individual diamonds.

I also wove a few squares and triangles to fill in the open spaces between the stars. All in all, I am pretty happy with the results.

Oh, and even more exciting that this FO is the fact that my loving boyfriend and very talented photographer, Steve, has been elected the Head of Photography at Monster Crochet. And thank god for this! His photos are heads and tails above my own. In addition, the lovely lady in the photos above? Yes, that is Heather. Hi, Heather! She will be modeling a lot of my wearables now. Another thanks be to god for this development. Yay! Thank you both for helping me!!

In other news...

In addition to my one-off designs, I've had a few patterns published recently in books as well. Firstly, this lovely little motif bag...

The pattern for this cool crochet can be found in this publication:

Secondly and thirdly are these homey items: flowering trivets and color block ottoman...

These two patterns can be found in this pub:

I have made a lot of major life changes recently (new job after nearly 13 years at the old job AND new large loft/studio living space after a handful of years of residing in a space the size of most people's closets) that pretty much put my ability to design stuff for publication on the back burner. However, having settled a bit, I am now back in the game, but with a different focus. Sure, I will still be doing a bit of work for books and magazines, but mainly I am trying to concentrate on creating designs that really make me happy and keep me interested in designing in general. Over the years, I've felt less enthusiastic about designing and I think that this due to the fact that I accepted commissions that I really should have passed on. I really love crocheting, knitting, spinning and weaving. I mean LOVE. As such, I want the things that I design to reflect this depth of feeling first and foremost. In addition, I have the added complexity of being a single mom and the sole breadwinner for my twosome. So, because of these two factors, primarily, I've decided to just focus on having fun when designing and not worry about making a living from it. The moral of this long-winded treatise is that you all should expect to see some wackier creations coming from this blog again. Okay, my stuff may not appeal to the masses, but it definitely has it's place in the pantheon of crochetdom/yarndom and that's the way I like it!

Thanks for hanging in there with me, peeps. You all have made this whole crochet blog journey worth the effort! xoxo ~ LL

Crocheted Raffia Fedora - Free Pattern!

Everyone likes to sport a bit of fun atop their heads during the summer months, whether at the beach or just running errands about town. So, I figured I'd get my fingers working on a quick crochet that looks great under the summer sun...

Yes, that would be a lovely green fedora, crocheted from raffia ribbon, with a stylish white daisy adhered to its side. Literally peeps, I made this hat in one evening. That being said, I need to make another one in navy, one in natural and oh, maybe one in a lovely shade of coral. Ooooh, and one in turquoise! The raffia color selection is vast...Must. Take. Advantage.

You too can take advantage and make your own pile o'fedoras. Just download ye olde pattern link here. Happy summer crocheting kids!

Love,
LadyLinoleum