Knitty gritty

Hi friends, How are you? Once again,I am posting after a long break. Feeling a bit under the weather, listless and also a little uneasy. But that did not stop me from visiting all of you.....even if sometimes I did not leave any comments.

Finally decided to go for a check up. The diagnosis is a complex cyst on my left ovary. Surgery is the only option and I may be getting admitted to hospital next week. This is not the first surgery I am having but that does not stop me from being a little scared. So wish me luck.

On the crafty side I did actually manage to finish the knitted  scarf for my husband. 

I added a fringe just for fun. You can see the different colors in the yarn, in the fringe.

I really like the texture produced by the pattern.

Now that my knitted project is complete I am thinking maybe I should knit a little more. But I am slow knitter and that is not very encouraging.

The best part about this project is that my son and my hubby are now debating about who actually "deserves" this scarf and I am glad that both of them have liked it.

My head is buzzing with lot of new project ideas. But I think they will have to wait till I am back home from the hospital.

I had planned to make different rangolis to share with you. But I finally ended up making only one! The rest of the time I was busy with eating out and watching newly released movies.   :)

So anyway here is the only rangoli I made this Diwali.

This is a very small rangoli I made on the first day hoping to make a bigger one later. But of course that did not happen!

Here is my rangoli at night with the earthen lamps I showed you in my last post.

Isn't that a pretty sight!

Rangoli powder in lovely colours.

Well, that is all for now. Next time I will show you the small item I crocheted for my MIL before she left for Mumbai.

Take care,

Love xxx

Two Timing

Hello dear friends, How are you? Are you looking forward to this weekend? We are eagerly awaiting the weekend as Sunday will set off the celebrations for Diwali - the festivals of lights. Not being a great fan of noisy firecrackers, I look forward to doing some beautiful rangoli. And of course gorging on some lovely sweet and savoury goodies which are made specially during Diwali.

I am posting after a long gap. Blogging did seem to drop off the radar for a couple of reasons.

A) I was busy with the Diwali house cleaning, which is an intense spring cleaning of the whole house. A lot of cleaning, scrubbing, polishing and of course de-cluttering. The purpose of this marathon session is to welcome the Goddess of Wealth, Laxmi, who is said to visit houses which are sparkling clean. (I have a hunch, this tale was invented to ensure that houses get a thorough cleaning atleast once a year...  wink, wink) And who does not want the blessings of the Goddess of Prosperity!

B) After giving it a lot of thought and debating over it, with a heavy heart, I made up my mind to go ahead and cheat on my Love. Yes, I am now a two-timing b****......

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ahem... I am talking about my love for crochet. I hope you were not thinking something else, silly.

Ha ha, the reason for all this cheating is this ball of gorgeous yarn I found in my stash. It is a beautiful variegated yarn with shades like the sky just before sunset. Here, have a look:

 

 

Seeing the lovely colors in the yarn, I now realised why spinners go ga-ga over their yarns in their blogs and put up umpteen photos of the yarn from all different angles possible.  With the colors changing every second with every stitch, I was falling in love with the yarn.

And now, the reason I cheated is that I had only one ball of 150 gms of the yarn. Compared to knitting, crochet IS a bit of a yarn eater. So to get the maximum out of the yarn I decided to knit rather than crochet with it.

Winter is slowly and steadily creeping in on us. I decided to make a scarf for hubby. Then followed a lot of pattern searching on the internet. After getting inspired by a lot of patterns, I finally decided to "design" my own pattern.

The yarn is self striping. Tell me, does it not remind you of a twilight sky,

 I wonder if a plain stockinette stitch would have been better. But I wanted a textured fabric so I decided to go ahead and proceed with my pattern.

 

The best part about the pattern is that the fabric does not curl at the edges (which means no blocking... yay!). This pattern is very simple and would also look good with a solid colored yarn.

This is the pattern in case you are interested  :)

Using 3.25mm knitting needles, Cast on 34 stitches.

Then knit all stitches for 3 rows.

Pattern:

Row 1:  K3, *K2, P2 * till last 3 stitches, K3

Row 2:  K3, *K2, P2 * till last 3 stitches, K3

Row 3:  K3, *P2, K2 * till last 3 stitches, K3

Row 4:  K3, *P2, K2 * till last 3 stitches, K3

Repeat these 4 rows for the desired length and then knit all stitches for 3 rows again. Cast off.

If you try the pattern, do let me know if there is a mistake. I can't wait to finish the scarf as the mere thought of so many "live" stitches and handling two needles is a bit daunting.

And while on the topic of Diwali, let me show you the beautiful oil lamps, called deeyas, I bought.

Lovely...no? BTW, Rangoli is an art form of making decorative designs outside the main door of your home, using colored powders, flowers, chalk or even rice flour paste. The designs are an auspicious and  welcoming gesture for the Hindu gods. I hope I can turn out some beautiful designs this year so that I can share them with you. (Just google Rangoli and enjoy the fantastic pictures.)

Before I sign off, a warm welcome to Irina from Handmade. 

A very Happy Diwali to all of you. Take care and have lots of fun.

Love xxx

A Fruitful Trip

I am feeling very happy because I had a fantastic weekend. By now, I am sure you know how excited I was to meet one of my blogger friends for the very first time.

On Saturday night we left Ahmedabad and reached my aunt's place at around 9.00 pm. We had a great time with lots of good food and long chats, with joking, singing and lots of laughter.

Sunday morning after a bit of sightseeing. I called up Aishwarya to ask whether it was a good time to visit. Dear Aishwarya had been waiting for us since morning! So I landed at her place with hubby and MIL in tow. The most unbelievable part is that it did not feel as if we were meeting for the very first time. Since neither of us put up personal photos on our respective blogs, we were actually seeing each other for the first time!! Would you believe it, that our friendship started in  Germany? It was my comment on According to Matt that led Aishwarya to my blog and well the rest is history.

I loved Aishwarya's family, especially her two lovely, beautiful daughters. The most incredible thing is that the two MILs and the two hubbies hit it off instantly and very soon everybody was talking nineteen to the dozen. Also, the fact that both families happened to originally belong to the same part of Karnataka(in South India) brought us closer. Since the visit was en famille the only thing we did not talk about was CROCHET!! Can you believe that... well, hopefully there will be a next time.

After a lot of chit chat and snacks we decided it was time to be homeward bound. BUT surprise, surprise, Aishwarya had a very cute, sweet gift for me. Would you like to see it? Yeah.... as if I need to ask! So, here it is:

Aren't they incredibly cute! Ever since I saw them on Attic24 I was in love with them and had decided that one day I would try my hand at making them. And now I have my very own two cute little babushkas. Thank you, dear Aishwarya.  

I have placed Sana and Vandi ( of course I had to name them) right next to my computer as a constant reminder of my lovely friend and her beautiful daughters.I hope she likes the knitting cotton I took for her.

So, all said and done I had a great weekend. How was your weekend? Do write in and share. 

I seem to have collected a lot of UFOs in the past few weeks and I hope I have something to share with you soon. Until then, have a lovely week, take care and happy hooking.

Love xxx