Crochet Everywhere

Today I thought I'd share with you a few of the crochet works I came across. Below you see the crochet converted van of a yarn shop, something of a small chain here. They use it as their market stand.

I think it is safe to say that crafty Thailand is very crochet orientated, more so than knitting. (Contrary to what the sign on the picture above suggests.) When you go to a market, you'll often see - female - vendors crocheting behind their stand. A lot of shops sells crochet items. Sometimes really nice, but other times I feel like abandoning this beautiful craft.

One shop I have to share with you is Bantaktor. It is from a crochet cooperative of which about 60 women are part of. They had some cute knitted items but it was mainly about crochet. The lady working in the shop was very friendly and informative. She told me most of the participants work without patterns. Also they only use cotton of a good quality. Find them online here.

I really like these bags that are partly plastic netting and partly cotton.

Another favourite of mine is this traditional woven basket (you find them a lot around here). Here however with a crochet jacket. Love the brown-blue combination.

In a corner of the shop there was this little workspace. See how the kitchen whisks are used? Nice!

In another (small) shop I found these boho bags. The mother of the shop owner made them.

Thanks for travelling a while with me!
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Yarn!

Did I succeed in my quest for local cotton yarn amidst the abundance of acrylics?
But of course!

It wasn't easy, but - through sheer dedication for the cause. Ha! - I found a few places where gorgeous cotton was sold. Recently I'm quite smitten by greyish hues - especially after hooking my very pastel travel blanket I feel it's time for a change. So I bought mostly greys and earthy colours. Nevertheless, when I stumbled upon that gorgeous pink, I had to get it. I love the combination grey and pink.

Twentyfour Twentysix huge cakes of cotton yarn so far - and counting... So much for travelling light. :( The look and feel of this yarn reminds me a bit of Drops Paris, but it is slightly bulkier. I like that, because at home I find it hard to find cotton that is suitable for a plus 5mm hook. I'm guessing I could go as far as to use a 6,5 mm hook for this yarn. I hope so, because I feel a nice drapey blanket is coming up! Granny squares maybe? Starburst hectagons? Rectangulars?

Still, it's a pity that in country where bamboo is everywhere, there is no bamboo yarn - or hardly anyway, I didn't find any. The production of bamboo is more sustainable than that of cotton (the latter requires a lot of land and water), and the end product is very suitable for a tropical climate.

Having said that, I did stumble upon this really handspun nice hemp yarn. Not in a yarn store however, and they only had these varieties. It's nice to be able to buy something handspun for a change (because I don't use wool, that limits my options regarding handspun).

By the way, in addition to what I wrote about the local yarn stores in an earlier post, I have to add that I did come across a few that resemble the ones that are found in eg. Europe and the States. They mainly sell imported yarn. Pricewise: I could buy five of these fairly big cotton yarn cakes for less than the price of one ball of imported Katia cotton.

Apart from yarn I stocked up on my crochet hooks. Lots of small sizes that are not easy to get back home. Like 0.75 mm, 1.25 mm and 1,3 mm. The smallest one I bought is a 0,6 mm hook. It's tiny! How does one use it? With a lens? Since I took this picture, I've purchased quite a few more. (I've lost count, but I think it counts up to at least sixteen.) The hooks look very short on this picture but that because the needles are so huge...

Not only did I stock up on crochet hooks, but also on crochet books. But that's a different post altogether. ;-) Thanks for dropping by. I really appreciate your visit!
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Colours, Culture and Whatnot ~ Snapshots for Inspiration #2

Shortly after I wrote in my last post that I sometimes wonder if I can translate something I see into a crochet pattern, I came across this wall painting. Wow! I can easily see how I could translate this into a work of crochet... Actually, I might do just that sometime. This pattern has been on my to do list for quite a while and I really like these colours. It would be a perfect selfmade souvenir.

In Lampang these birds and flowers brighten up a temple wall. Simply love it.

Despite - our should I say due to? - its colourful attire this rabbit looks unhappy, don't you think?

I can see these tiles turning into an amazing crochet throw - colours, pattern, edging & all. What do you think?

The temples are so colourful...

 Love the colours of these noodles. Turmeric, I suppose.

Colourful lanterns are everywhere...

Gorgeous light in the early (well, not that early...) morning.



Thanks for your visit. Hopefully till soon!

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Colours, Culture and Whatnot ~ Snapshots for Inspiration #1

Thanks for the kind comments on my travel blanket! I haven't had the opportunity to give a reaction to the comment, but I will soon.

I use my phone and camera often to make a snapshot of what strikes or inspires me. Whether at home or while travelling. It can be anything really: a colour - or a combination of colours, forms, texture, an (often not intended) styling, light - or shadows, a book or even the pavement. The pictures in itself don't have any artistic pretention. ;-) Sometimes I wonder if can 'translate' something I like into a crochet pattern. Ha!

Today, and later this week, I will share just a few of these shots here.

Colours...

Shadows...

The print of my dress corresponded with the shadows in the gorgeous CM University Art Center. I tried to blend in. ;-)

Thanks for dropping by ~ see you soon!

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PS. Does anybody know what the name of that pink flowered tree is in the first collage? I'm quite smitten with it...)

Travel Blanket

Imagine... A sleepy provincial Thai town... An old wooden house, traditionally build with an elevated ground floor... The sun is about to set... Inside is breezy... But still it's hot... You hear the crickets chirping... Muffled voices from outside... The clattering of pans from the neighbouring house... In your simple teak room - lovingly decorated with local antiques - the swooshing of the fan ceiling...

Okay, got the picture? 'Cause this is the setting in which I present to you... My travel blanket!

Details
Yarn ~ Rio cotton from Lammy Yarns (which I usually use for my doilies, this was my first bigger project with it). The Rio includes one ball of blue/grey variegated cotton. I also used one colour from Hema (a Dutch shop) and one from Catania. Unfortunately I don't have the colour numbers available here...
Hooksize ~ 3.5 mm
Pattern ~ solid granny squares (if you google it you'll find many patterns for it), 64 in total (8x8 squares). I sewed them together front sides held together, then sewed the inner thread of the stitches together.
Edging ~ a simple picot edging in a shell-esque pattern. I like the result because it softens the austere character of the solid squares - without compromising on the overall squareness. ;-)
Blocking ~ I didn't, because I'm on the road!

I'm glad I was foreseeing to take quite some natural white yarn with me... I really needed it to complete the blanket! As you can see I still have some yarn left, which I didn't use because I wanted this blanket to be square. Also I wanted to use the bright pink to spice the blanket up, but I had too little of it to make it work. Travel doilies coming up, I guess...

As the sun was about to set the pictures are a bit dark. In the morning the colours are a bit brighter. Anyways... I hope you like it and I'll try to be back soon, because there are quite some yarny travel tales to share. Many thanks for visiting & take care!
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Yarning in Thailand

Hello!

My solid granny squares are beginning to pile up. Too many for a bag. I'm thinking a small blanket instead? (I'm rather partial to blankets as you might know...) As that pile of squares is growing - like my other work in progress (the shawl) - my travel yarn stash begins to decrease rapidly. Too rapidly.

Anyway, time to explore the yarn shops of Chiang Mai. It took me a while to find them, but I did. In China Town.

These colours are not edited. Can you imagine: the shop was quite dark, but still there was this unexptected colour explosion. Don't you just love it? I did... I didn't buy anything, since they were all acrylics, and I really would like some nice, preferably local, cotton. BTW, it was the first time I saw acrylics in skeins, I'm used to acrylics in balls. (And the skeins were rather huge too.)

However, the vast majority of the yarn sold here is acrylic. Which I often use myself, but I didn't really like most of what I came across. By the way, the way the shop above displayed it stocks in a quite unusual way. Far more usual around here is this... (This was actually the first yarn shop I came across, by accident. I got hopelessly lost while cycling through town and suddenly saw these huge bags filled to the brim with yarn. I almost squealed. Ha!)

And this. (Yarn in the back of the shop, behind the counter and wrapped in plastics.)



Oh dear, I wanted to show you some not yarny stuff as well, but it's getting late already. Next time! I'll end  this post with some crochet - which seems much more popular here then knitting. (Apologies for the bad quality of the picture.)



Hopefully till soon. Many thanks for dropping by!
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Crocheting out of a suitcase

Sawadee Ka from Thailand!
How are you?

I'm quite well, as I have the luxury of travelling for quite a while through South East Asia. Having arrived two days ago in Thailand, via Laos (beautiful!), I still have many, many weeks ahead of me. Hooray hooray! Being away from home for a relative long time, left me with a big (and when I say big, I mean Big) decision to make. Made even more difficult by the fact that I like to travel light (and when I say light, I mean Light: one small suitcase, plus one carry on bag). Which (and how much!) yarn to bring with me?

So what is in that (really small) suitcase? Well ehm... See for yourself...



Oh dear, this is rather embarassing, isn't it? And this is even without the balls of yarn pictured below... Beforehand I couldn't decide which project to make. It had to be practical, but satisfying at the same time, if you know what I mean. So in the end I quite randomly took quite some cotton pastels with me (the ones I usually use for doilies) and silver grey and natural white acrylic (because the acrylic is light weight).

I still can't decide what to make of the pastels... I have been trying different things. Like the lacy circles from the first picture. I thought they would make a nice blanket. But the pattern (inspired by a Japanese pattern) is too fiddly and fuzzy when travelling. A lot of short rounds means a lot of ends to sew in, and that is just not the thing to do when travelling in a bumpy bus for hours. ('Where's my needle? Sir, excuse me, my needle is under your seat. It's my favourite needle you see. Oh dear, I think I might have fallen between those bags of rice. Would you mind removing them?') Also I think this pattern would work better with a softer cotton, like Drops or Vinnis. So this sample will end up as a doily or hotpad. (I haven't blocked it yet, so it is a bit wonky still.)

So after the blanket-ending-up-as-doily, I tried these solid squares. I think this might work out. The idea now is to make a big bag of them. What do you think? And should I throw the bright pink in too? (Pictured on the right.) Probably.

Because it needs to be a travel friendly project I'll have to compromise on my principle that even within one-colour-squares I cut the thread after each round in order to start the new round on another side of the square. Is that a weird thing to do...? It's just that in that way the first stitches are less visible as such.

Meanwhile I'm working with the grey yarn. It's going to be a huge scarf. I'm using the same shell stitch as for the pink scarf that is still waiting for me at home. Couldn't finish it in time.  Anyway, I like the stitch, and it's a perfectly travel friendly project. Especially in this very light acrylic meant for a 3 mm hook - but I'm using a 4,5 mm hook, which makes it very soft).

Anyways, quite enough of my ramblings for today, I think... I'll try to post some travel posts soon - with a yarny angle. Thanks for visiting. Have a lovely day!
(And of course I would love to hear your yarny - or other - travel adventures...)
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