My First Crochet Project

This is the first crochet project I ever tried. It's a hacky sack. It's done in the continuous spiral style. I really liked that. It also sort of taught me to crochet very tightly. You can see by the ridge lines, I used back loops only throughout. It wasn't part of the pattern, but it gave it a bit of a different look. It was hard to make the stitches as tight as I would have liked towards the end, but, I quite enjoyed this project! Plus, this project also gave my daughter the idea to start a garden. I had filled the sack with beans to give it a heavy, but still light feel my husband likes. My daughter ended up planting the leftover beans!

Some things I realized I would need in the middle of this project: Stitch Markers and a Row Counter! They are invaluable when you're working in the round and need to know where each row begins.

I used this pattern as a guide: Hacky Sack

Crochet: Not Just your Grandma's Hobby

The family and I have recently arrived back in the States after a year living in Okinawa, Japan. If you've never been, I highly recommend some time there. It truly is paradise. While there, I was big into sewing. My favorite thing to create is bags of all sorts. Even the kind I refuse to use myself. I am a picky purse person. Now we're back home and our things are still crossing the pacific and nearly the entirety of the United States, this leaves me without any creative output and a lot of time on my hands... Well, as much time as you can have with an eight year old and a three month old.

My mother used to crochet afghans. Not a lot, but every once in a while. These days she's into hats more than anything. Since I was bored she bought me a crochet how-to kit. You can find them at any craft store, or the chain store to beat all chain stores: Wal-Mart. I decided to give it a go with nothing better to do in my down time.

To make this story short: I fell in love. So now I'm crocheting every neat pattern, and some patterns of my very own, that I can get my hands on. I guess this blog will serve to show my progress in both actual crochet and the projects I'm working on. I've started what I call 'the crochet bible'. It contains every pattern off the yarn I buy and patterns I find on the internet, either bought or free.

I will probably link to free patterns and paid ones alike. Since I'm new to the crochet game, I probably won't be of much help should anyone ever read this and need assistance. I can only say... I love Youtube. Here's a shoutout to Teresa who does the Art of Crochet videos. With all that said... let's hook!