My Story, My Life

Yarns take up space.

Yarns take up space. In my case, it’s worth one whole room.

One messy room full of yarns

I recently made some sinful purchases despite the pledge to lessen them. My excuse? I am now going to sell and I need materials. Pardon me for being this eager beaver, but since I am focusing on bags, I just have to have these wonderful bag handles!

Faux Leather Bag Handle

Bamboo circular handles

Metal Bag Handle and Frame

Bag Metal Frame

Metal Bag Frame

and so I told myself, I have to make sure I can sell something!

But before I can make something, I have to have the yarns to use. And I made a recent discovery. These yarns are awesome for bags. They are strong and durable. Though crocheting them is very painful for my hands, but I love them!!!!

Nature Cotton Yarn

I have two incoming bags made from these yarns and I haven’t used the bag handles I bought from www.aliexpress.com

I have to repeat my bag hack because I ran out of yarn.

Miu miu Bag Hack Round Two

And then this other bag, which I designed myself ( I do love the design, mind you) is almost done! but I cannot move a finger to finish this. I’m sick of doing dc’s!!! hehehe..

Incoming Ginantsilyo Bag

The handles and the base are made from the Nature Cotton Yarn:

Mercerized Cotton – (bought in Saudi Arabia)

But the body is made from wool, which makes the whole thing quite expensive.

Anyway, back to the room. I have to tidy this one more time, which will lead me to another purchase – a decent shelf.

I have a friend named Gina

I have a friend named Gina. We were working in the same company, three years back. I sometimes hang out with her group of friends during lunch and merienda, but we were never really close as we are now. Maybe because the time when I was new in the company, she was on a maternity leave. When she got back, there were never enough time to be really close, but according to her, I was able to influence her into crocheting. Hence, the story of friendship begun.

Me and Gina Three years back

Me and gina now

This is one of the few good stories that crafting really brings people together. Most of the similarities, besides the passion for the craft comes from having “bigger than life” son, and a recently married life, which becomes our everyday topic as we share frustrations over missed stitch and lost hooks and delight over recently finished projects.

Gina loves crocheting. I think, more than crocheting itself, she likes the joy it brings to his son, who she adores so much that almost all her works are attributed to him. My most favorite one, a crocheted vest made from silk-cashmere blend.

Crochet Pullover for Thor

Look at the facce of her kid!

I also love the bag she made. It’s an owl! And yes, it is for this sweet little kiddo again!

Crochet owl bag

She also made a pair of socks, some toys and hats and scarves and so many more for this lucky child. I do wish I could make something for my baby too. But as selfish as I am, almost all my works are for me, and me and me. Besides, my son hates socks, hats, scarves and jackets. He only likes to wear very thin shirts.

Hehe, now back to Gina. I am telling this because we recently shared eagerness to earn something from crochet. As she was really very prudent in pricing her creations, I am encouraging her to take more value in what she can do, hence you might see some of her creations in my facebook page as well. Hopefully, our venture would be profitable Goodluck to us!!!

A promising new year

This year is very promising. I launched my new facebook page, in lieu of a message sent by my friend, Ms. Meikah, who bought earrings from me last year.

Happy Customer! Happy Seller!

A friend of hers saw my earrings and are interested to sell these items abroad. Yipee!!!! Just good enough reason for me to launch my facebook page, which I did plan last year. I just told myself, I have to finish the bags I am crocheting before launching it, but due to this news, I have to! So that I could share the excitement and thrill and yes, so that I can showcase some products.

Hence another good news, a friend of my husband from Saudi Arabia placed an advanced order for this white little blouse,

White Crocheted Blouse

This is very good news as I have a reason to write down the pattern as well.

Another big deal is that I am crocheting a new bag design I created myself:

Bag Handle

The bag handle is my favorite part of the bag. It’s textured and very tightly crocheted that it hurts. My nanay(mother-in-law) liked it too. She likes a lot of expensive bags and she said that it looks “tutyal” or very high-end. I really like being praised (for my works) because it makes me want to finish the items I am doing despite the pain and numbness of my fingers and joints.

I hope you are having a very good new year too!

YarnSourceManila is giving away bagful of yarns for new year!

Whoa! I heard that our local yarn (online) store – YarnSourceManila, set up a contest on her facebook page.

Here is the details of the contest:

Now, let’s welcome 2013 with a photo contest! I will give a bagful of assorted yarns to the winner. just post your entry on the timeline or wall of this fanpage – facebook.com/onlineyarnstore. Remember – the theme is the NEW YEAR. Just make sure that YARN SOURCE MANILA will be placed somewhere in the photo. The winning photo will be used as a cover photo for this facebook fanpage.

Deadline of entries is January 1st, winner will be announced on January second Happy new year everyone!

Let us all join guys!

I actually joined the contest and I want to share my entry:

YarnSourceManila New Year Cover Photo Contest – Ginantsilyo’s entry

I do hope I will win the contest. Hooray for Filipinos for sharing their love and passion!

Share the love and blessings

Love for yarns!

Few years back, I have known a lot of people through my craft that had graciously encouraged me to continue crocheting by sending me yarns even they are from overseas. Almost all my friends who have been outside the country would come home or would send a parcel for me with yarns of different colors and fiber content. Even though yarn stores were really out of their way, they were willing to be lost just so they could buy me a ball or two. And even some of my friends here in the Philippines, would go to Baguio for my sake.

I also met some few through my blog that unhesitatingly befriended me and sent me yarns as token of friendship though I have never met them in person.

These are the reasons why I, myself, am not hesitant to send a lot of yarns too, so that the feeling of excitement and gratitude would proliferate and would cause a continuous chain reaction, that they too would find in their hearts that it is really heartwarming to reach out and share.

With this, I would like to thank Gina, Cherry and Girlie, for giving me an opportunity to share what I have experienced and extend my gratitude to those people who have shown me kindness in the same way. May the yarns I have sent on your doorsteps have made your Christmas, a little bit happier than it already is.

To all of you, Merry Christmas!!!!

A company that dress up together, stays happier

Last Friday night was a fun experience for me and my colleagues. We found a chance to misbehave and just have fun. People went missing to finish costumes and the people left in the office did almost nothing but anticipate the coming party. Who would not be excited if it was a costume party? Everyone wanted to start the event as soon as possible to finally see everyone else costumes. The theme was United Nations Goes Bizarre. Everyone should represent a country and wear not-so-ordinary clothings.

I, for example, spent a number of nights crocheting. I would represent Ireland and I immediately thought of Irish crochet. I did spent nights learning Irish crochet, in vain, since I was not successful in creating an Irish Crochet clothing, but hey, crochet is still crochet so I am quite happy I was able to finish something in time for the Christmas Party.

Dandararan… Here’s the representative of United Nations:

Our HR generalist comes in with a scottish costume for Ireland:

Mr. Ireland

Our Branch Sys Admin comes with a funky jamaican get-up:

Mr. Jamaica

Ms. J. Gi – as the last viking princess of Scandinavia

Ms. Scandinavia

A very happy arab, he is!

Mr. Saudi Arabia

Queen Amidala pays a visit!

Ms. Mongolia

Whoa! The Irish Pirate Queen

Ms. Ireland

Ms. Palestine!

Ms. Palestine

The very artistic Roch – as Ms. Greece

Ms. Greece

Mr. Malaysia

Ms. Egypt

Three beauties from Ireland, India and Greece!

Ms. Ireland, Ms. India, Ms. Greece

Here comes alluring Ms. Africa!

Ms. Africa

Ms. Africa & Irish Crocheter

(note to self.. still finishing uploading)

Playful & Crafty Sunday

During weekends, I can only breathe and do more crafting if my kiddo is soundly sleeping, otherwise we would spend the whole day running and playing and exhausting me into pulp.

Luckily for me, after indulging my baby in a whole morning water playing (with me crocheting an arm’s length away to avoid the splashing of water from his mini pool), he spent the whole afternoon napping, giving me 100% craft time. So that I have time to do more crocheting and yes, a little work on embroidery too. Here are some photos:

Pool fun : since it’s still the time of the month for his mom, baby just played in his mini pool

Create two front pieces and the back

This is the making of my dress#2. I took a photo of the creation of basic parts so that I will remember the pattern and how -to’s. Writing down the pattern while crocheting takes too much time and I just want to crochet.

Dress#2 Third piece: back part

A closer look at the back part will reveal the lace design. I used pattern#2001 of mypicot.com:

Crochet Pattern 2001 – Open Lace Work

The three pieces are meant to be sewed together. I do not like doing this much but I think the design calls for it. so here we go, let’s stitch them together, shall we?

Sewing of the three pieces to make one piece

Oh, and before I forget, we went to a fabric store and I was able to find a fabric that only costs me P60 per yard. It’s quite cheap so I was happy to find something of the same shade.

Khaki fabric for P60 per yard

Then the whole day went on with my baby still fast asleep, I had a go at my forgotten cross stitch project Though I do not want to bore you with the whole thing so I thought to somehow take a creative shot(?) I guess I try to be good at photography but trying is all I can do about it.

yei! cross stitch

And then a few more hours and before you know, addiction really kicks in.**Disclaimer the whole back part is done til tuesday morning.

the design at the back. I inserted that small hole to accomodate buttons and i just think it would look and feel sexy specially that the whole back is covered

And of course I just want to show off the bust part where I painstakingly tried to manipulate the lace to form the desired shape 😀

side view of the lace around bust area

If you are wondering about the space between two front parts, I am planning this to be tied by a drawstring

Uh oh! baby woke up, time to tuck away my stuffs!

On shaping the lace

What I love most about crocheting is that I can create shapes that I want: Conventional shapes to unusual ones. This is the logic I apply in creating clothes. I imagine the shape I want. I look for inspirations on how clothes are formed. I look for laces of different kinds until I can stumble on the one lace I would use for my project, then I study how each part of the lace would contribute to the creation of the shape. Then I crochet. Or with careless attitude, I just hook up and crochet.

I love clothes. Well, to put it bluntly, I love making clothes, but I am not skilled at sewing that crocheting has been my ultimate armament in dressmaking. Hence, I put forward my passion in couture towards crochet and how I can improve my skill to become a good tailor.

An example of this effort is studying how crocheted lace will hold the bust or shape it in such a way that it will hug the bust line. This was initiated on my first attempt at creating a dress (remember the gold one?) Now I want to make another but I have to create a different design, so the shaping of the bust is different.

shaping the lace

But again, since I am petite, the dress would again hug the upper body and will be flowing from the bust line until mid length of my thighs. This, of course will be decided as I create each part of the garment.

On the crocheted lace, the whole thing was crocheted in rows and I formed the shape by gathering the stitches in such that it will form a slanting angle from the rounded corner. It took me three attempts to attain the desired shape, and thanks to this that I keep regaining my cool on attempting to understand how the whole OOP thing would work on javascript, next to PHP, I think JS is the most hard-headed bunch of all languages. Now, I am ranting.

Give yarns for christmas

I have two friends who I want to give some yarns this christmas season, they are very good followers of my blog plus they are mostly used to using the cotton yarn, staple to the Philippines. I want them to try something different.

The first lot is a mixture of off-white wool knitting yarns in bulk weight. The label even says ‘extra thickness’.

Bulky Wool Japanese Yarn

I do not know how to make full use of these yarns since I mostly do wearable crochet. I think if they will include it in their wearable items, it would be useful as accent or border. But the thickness of the yarns turns me off, sometimes I wonder why I even bought this lot. I was just excited to acquire yarns. Now, it’s time for them to be used by people who might be able to appreciate them more. The color is nice, that I can tell. I used some of the lot to make flowers for accents but that did not really used all of them. I know I had more of these than in the pictures but some of those are not in a good ball shape anymore, they might need some rewinding.

The second batch only has one skein each kind (though I am not sure as of this moment, I know I had two balls each but maybe I have used them for something else and wasn’t able to properly keep the leftovers)

merino wool blend acrylic japanese yarns

The violet yarn has a lovely shade. It would be nice for a purse or any small pouch. I could say the same thing for the navy blue one. Though I am unsure if the yardage would be enough for bigger projects. They are both wool blend. I am unsure of the exact fiber content because everything is written in japanese. The yellow monochromatic yarn is 100% acrylic, but the texture is same with the wool blend.

The next lot is one of my beloved yarns three years ago. I wasn’t able to use these because I was an idiot for even buying them. I just loved the texture, but did not know for what purpose they will serve me. The yarn brand is Linie Taiga and cost me around 200 (or 250 pesos per ball).

linie taiga wool yarn

They would be very nice as lining for a hat, that I can tell. I love them that I know it’s already time for someone to be able to actually use them.

The next lot are leftovers from a purse-making project I got three years ago for Christmas. When I offered to sell small purse for giveaways. I hated that time that I got to finish a lot of coin purses. But these yarns have velvety texture that is soft to touch.

velvet textured yarns

crocheted coin purse using velvet yarns

These are the purses I made before from these velvet yarns. I do not know where I put the lighter shade of purple of these lot so it’s not included in my giveaways.

This is my last skein of this yarn. I used two yarns for making slippers for my sister. It is nice and warm and soft to touch. These would be nice shoes for a toddler and would certainly be enough for that! I am not so sure about them making slippers for themselves though..

fancy yarn

I have loads of these yarns. They are thick and sturdy. And I use them for bag handles, or for shorts.These yarns came without labels, so I am not so sure about the fiber content, but they feel like cotton.

cotton yarn

The next ones are ‘baby yarns’ according to the labels. But I am not recommending to be used for babies because they have not been kept properly.

Baby yarns

The next ones are my feltable wool yarns in moss green shade. These yarns would be lovely for any project. One spool is enough for a beret.I bought a lot of these yarns from china. I still have lots of leftovers but i have so many greens so I can spare to give two spools away.

Feltable Lambs wool

And this small ball of feltable wool yarn too I personally wounded this yarn into a ball using my small manual ball winder. The color is very very nice and would be great for accent.

Feltable wool yellow

And oh, I also said that I will give bamboo hooks but I cannot find them! I do not know if i have much left too because through the years I love giving them to friends who find them fascinating. I am not comfy using big hooks so if someone can appreciate them more than I do, then I give them away.

Hopefully they will like these yarns.

Going Gaga over Hairpin Lace

A month ago, I never knew the name of the stitch I so love to make but do not know how. If you notice from my previous works that I have so many treble stitches in between horizontal lace mesh:

Mint Green Striped Front Tied Crocheted Blouse

This is me, attempting to actually do the so-called hairpin lace effect I’ve been eyeing over the years through windows of shops and magazines, until now.

Through a fellow crocheter, fats of http://crochetology.net, who introduced me to the term: hairpin lace, and lori of http://lorisart.blogspot.com/, who showed me that I could create a makeshift hairpin loom, my world literally turned upside down. I am gaga over hairpin lace now. I love incorporating it in anything I can create and everytime I see fences, or grills or anything that has two parallel bars, I imagine me crocheting lace in between.

So far, i have made a makeshift hairpin lace loom using rubber soles of old slippers and two double pointed bamboo knitting needles:

Makeshift Hairpin Lace Loom

I was able to make this hairpin lace collar:

Hairpin lace collar

And then I bought this small crochet fork from a fellow raveler at http://handmadebybheng.blogspot.com which is very small I do not know if I can make further use of this:

Sunday lace work

And i started a dress that is also showcasing a hairpin lace collar

Dress showcasing a hairpin lace collar

Now, (since I get bored so easily) I am starting another project with hairpin lace collar again 😀 hahaha.. I have yet to test my patience on a full hairpin lace garment because, working with the loom is really very crazy and tiring! Aja! Aja!

Let’s work hard! Hook up!

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