Last Post

I am sad to see this semester coming to an end. As I am a freshmen, it is hard to say that I am excited my first year is over. Yes I am extremely happy that I have survived the year but it has been such an exciting year that I can't bear to see it over. However, everything must eventually come to an end and with the end of the year comes the end of this class. I can honestly say that I learned so much from this class. The reading was extensive and the early class time was a bit of a burden but I would do it again. Taking this class gave me the opportunity to learn a craft that I never would have taken the time to do otherwise. I was able to learn how to crochet which taught me a lot about patience, hard work, and a little bit of frustration. It allowed me to connect with my family members and create items that I can use in everyday life. I can't believe that from the beginning of this project to now, that I have improved so much. If you look back at my first post you can see how awful those first few flowers were. Now I can make those flowers in no time with my eyes closed. I am really excited to present my project and actually show everyone my hard work. I hope the class really likes seeing everything I have worked so hard on this semester. I know that I will continue to crochet and hopefully continue improving. One day I may be able to teach my own kids about this special little craft and hope that it holds a place in their heart like it has in mine.

Crochet for kids

I have finished my ipod sock! My mom is coming up to visit today and we are going to see the Straight No Chaser concert, I'm excited that I will be able to show her my finished product. I won't be giving it to her yet though, I am going to keep it and show it to the class during my presentation. I'm pretty proud of my little craft. After finishing the sock I did some research on crocheting for children. Because my research project is about children's crafts I was curious to see if crocheting was widely used by children. One of the books that I have been learning from is aimed at children. The directions are simple and all the pictures are of little girls wearing the items they made. When doing research I found lots of simple children's crochet patterns and simple directions that were easily understandable for kids. There were also lots of books about how parents can/could teach their kids to crochet during vacations, weekends, and other free time. It seemed that most of the books that talked about crocheting for kids assumed that a parent or other adult would be helping them learn. It is interesting to see how the research I have been doing for my project translates to this craft. Adults pass what they know onto their kids and sometimes learn a little something themselves along the way. The crocheting that parents are teaching their kids is a useful skill that will keep them busy during free time and out of trouble. It's also cool to think that now that I have learned how to crochet, I will be able to teach my kids when I grow up.

I am not going to post pictures this week because I want my ipod sock to be a surprise when I show it to the class. I know not everyone is as excited as I am about it, but this is my favorite item I have made yet, and I think it may be done the best as well. Can't wait to show everyone!

Easter Weekend

This weekend I went home for easter and was able to work on my second ipod sock for my mom. She watched me as I showed her what stitches I was using and explained how I was going to finish the ends together. She was very impressed with me and how far I had come. She also told me a story about how when I was really little I used to sit and watch her do her needle work and crocheting in the evenings and ask her all kinds of questions about how she was doing it. She said she had to constantly promise me that one day she would teach me how to do what she was doing if I really wanted to learn. It's really exciting to hear that and then realize that I finally can do it. It's also interesting to me that as a child I was very interested in my moms crafts. For my research project I am researching children's crafts and how children learn from their parents and the crafts that children do teach them skills they will need in their adult life. I think that as a child you learn what you are good at and where you fit into society through craft. I am excited to see that this is kind of true, as a child I learned by watching my mother the art of patience and calm work on a long project to get a desired result and because of that I am able to work on my own crocheting today.

Reflecting

This week I will not be posting any new projects. Instead I will be reflecting on what I have done thus far. Over spring break I took home a few of the projects I have done to show my mom. She was so proud to see how far I have come over the past months. It is pretty exciting to see that I have been able to make so much. After the first week of this project I was so frustrated with my craft. I had made little flowers and worked for hours just trying to figure out how to hold the yarn and stitch at the same time and now I don't even need to look at my hands to do simple stitches. My mom was very impressed by my ipod cover and asked me to make her one as well, so I have been working on one for her recently. They are so easy to make, if I had enough time I could make on in just a few hours.

I think it would be really cool if crocheting were more prevalent in today's society. It seems to have died out with a lot of women's fancy work like quilting and knitting. While craft does seem to be coming back, I feel that it's coming back in a different way. I feel like crafts are used now to go against the norm, but I wish that crafts were the norm. It is such a better way to spend your time than playing on facebook or watching tv. Fancywork in the past was used to keep a woman's hands busy when there was nothing else to do because being idle was looked down upon. Today's society is so idle with all the technology and time-saving devices. We use all of these time-saving items but do nothing productive with our time. It seems that women as well as men need to re-learn the art of keeping busy with craft.

ipod sock

This week has been dedicated to making a sock for my ipod. Sounds silly I know but I really am enjoying how it's turned out so far. Last week I found a pattern for an ipod sock online and it seemed pretty easy. The pattern only consists of three stitches, it starts with a chain and then about 25 rows of single stitches and is finished off with a slip stitch. I haven't finished it all just yet, I'm pretty close though. I accidentally made it a little bit too short so I may make another after I finish this first one. It was easy to make and I was able to do it pretty quickly so if I decide to make another it should only take a day or so. I didn't really run into too many problems making the sock except that I miscalculated and made it too short for the ipod. I think for next week I will just make another and then maybe move onto some real socks.

this is the ipod sock almost finished. I just need to stitch off the bottom.

I sent the scrunchie that I made a few weeks ago off to Maryland to my little cousin. She called me this week to tell me how excited she was. I am really glad that something I made is actually going to be put to use. She told me that she was going to wear it to school the next day, which made me pretty excited. She's in the third grade so hopefully all the other little girls will think it's pretty awesome.

Scrunchies and Belts

I know my last post was a bit rushed and didn't give any real update on how my crochet is going, so hopefully this will fill in the gaps. Like I said last week, my scarf has been frustrating me. The yarn is so thick that I can't see the hole to put the next stitch in and therefore have been missing stitches. So last week I made a couple of scrunchies for my little cousin and I have pictures now because I finally got my camera batteries! I will post a picture of my scrunchie, I actually think it's pretty cute.

This week because I decided to move on from the scarf...(maybe I will come back to that later) I used a rainbow colored ribbon to make a thin belt. It's a bit odd looking because of the colors but I actually like the stitch I used. Instead of using a regular single or double crochet, I used a half double crochet. The belt is kind of stretchy because of the ribbon I used which makes it kind of nice when you put it through belt loops.

After making my belt I started thinking about next weeks project. I found a pattern online for an ipod sock so I printed it out and I started in on that. It's a simple pattern, it consists of slip stitches and single crochets so it's one that I can do without really thinking about. It will be nice to do in front of the television inbetween studying for midterms this week.

All of the crafts I have been doing so far have been fancywork. They are not necessary objects and really serve no immediate need. I would like to find something to make that is more necessary. I was considering making socks and baby booties but the patterns seem a bit difficult. After my fail with the scarf I am worried about taking on a task too complex. After this ipod sock maybe I will have a little more confidence to move onto socks for humans.

It's been a busy week

I know it's Monday and I was suppose to post last night. It's been a busy week and I got a little distracted. But have no fear I have been able to continue crocheting throughout the week, although I did get a bit frustrated with my scarf. As I was continuing on my scarf I began noticing that the lengths of the rows were getting shorter, I must have been missing stitches throughout each row. So the scarf is starting to go more into a pyramid shape. I think I'm going to scratch it and start over because there really is no saving it now. I decided not to start in on a new scarf right away, I know that I would just get to angry with it so I thought I might make a couple of hair scrunchies and send them out to Maryland for my little cousins. They are always playing hair dresser so I thought they might enjoy them. So far I've made one purple one and have started a white one. I hope they like them!