Cellphone case

One of my finished projects is a cellphone case which uses shell stitches.
The image on top is a closeup of the stitches made. I have done this in old rose Monaco mercerized cotton thread no. 8. I also finished one in olive green but I haven't taken a photograph of the other one. I got the inspiration from Little Crocheted Bag at www.michaels/com/art/online/project sheet.
I alternately use Cannon and Monaco threads because these are the ones available in the Philippines. I seldom use yarn in my crochet nowadays because I think they are too bulky for my needs. (Ignore the date. The date setting of the camera is erroneous!)

Crocheting is also an art

This is my rumination on May 28 when I was contemplating on starting out this blog:
I am a writer. Actually I am an editor by profession. I graduated as psychologist. So where does crocheting come in? Perhaps it's a hobby, an interest. Just like my interest in strumming the guitar, my interest in making sketches when I was young, and my interest in cross-stitching (which has waned years ago when I was unable to finish that dancing ballerina thing!). But the interest in crochet has not left me. It may lie dormant for some time but a crocheted piece or two fan the interest anew and here I go with my hook and thread, trying to create something now and again.
A creative artist can produce so many things with her hands. Perhaps, basically, I am an artist. (I have several written pieces to prove it.)
But I still have to prove my worth as a crocheter. Crocheting has led me to so many websites in the Internet trying to compare techniques and designs. Ultimately, I learned one basic thing despite claims of originality in design and copyright: creativity cannot be bridled nor restrained although originality and copyrights are just conventions that try to safeguard property rights.
The thousands of designs I have seen in the Internet gave me an idea that the only original aspect of crocheting is the product that is created by the unlimited imagination of the crocheter. Perhaps only the one who started the basic stitches could claim originality.With a basic stitch, one can go a long way. Just like the way writers can inspire other writers when any of their works become the seed for another creative endeavor, one design can inspire another crocheter to produce another design and the cycle goes on. There are three primary colors but when these are combined in so many ways, one can produce a rainbow.
In crocheting, the basic stitches of one crocheter can be "borrowed" by another creative crocheter to produce, not necessarily a replica of the former crocheter's product but perhaps another piece of art.
The bottom line is, teach a novice the different stitches and she can produce her own masterpiece. Share a picture of a finished product and a creatie crocheter can make it an inspiration for a totally different product.
In my case, I discovered that out of patterns for edgings, I can crochet a headband, a scarf, a belt, or even a bookmark!
Sometimes creating one's own design is an arduous task and I admire people who have the patience and fortitude to rack their brains until they can produce a beautiful design!
It is to their credit that the crochet tradition is very much alive! Keep on untiring guys!

The Joy of Crocheting

My interest in crochet as a hobby is turning into an obsession. This was triggered when I tried to search the Internet for some crochet patterns. I was just curious then. But when I found out a lot of free patterns and a lot of bloggers, with so many pix of what they had done, I figured out blogging could be this interesting!
So, here I go. Perhaps I may not be able to share my own patterns or designs (I also found out that the basic stitches are not copyrighted, and one can just use these basic stitches to create a thousand designs just like a musician who can use any combination of the eight notes to make a hundred melodies!) but I sure could post some of my works here.
I had done a lot of projects eversince I was in college when I would ransack the dorm lib for books on crochet. Indeed I found at least ten of them and I pored over these books in between study periods.
Most of my earlier works (done when I was in college and when I was teaching) are already wornout. Perhaps what I would be posting are designs I have made a couple of years back and some ongoing projects.
Crocheting is a great way of unwinding especially after a busy day!