Things to Love

Hello my dear friends! I have read your blogs recently and found out that I am not alone in my tiredness and constant want to simply do nothing for a while. I don't really address it to being lazy, and not that there is any health issue as such (touch wood), but rather a mental exhaustion, probably it is the end of year which is usually more hectic. I officially declare that I need a break with change in my surroundings.
Getting in the mood for Christmas and New year in India is a little difficult due to the +25 outside, no snow, no major city decorations. The affect of all the sad recent news leaves me guilty of thinking about happy holidays and all when so many suffer and cannot even dream of sleeping in cozy beds...
However my holiday spirit prevails indoors, a quiet one. I have put up a tree together with little A last weekend, he enjoyed, oh so much, bringing me those little ornaments and is so excited about the lights! I am so glad that we were able to ignite that holiday cheer in him. His school also installed a tall Christmas tree in the lobby and decorated beautifully the premises.
My crochet mood in its turn has been rather high. I confessed to my D that I was bitten by a "crochet bug", he understood what I meant. Whenever I am crocheting in front of him, he then asks me : "Why do you make such a serious (= concentrated?) face ?" :P

The first thing to show is an up-cycled purse. Everything is hand stitched. The handle is crocheted with a t-shirt yarn.

It closes with a help of two buttons and loops made of crocheted cotton threads. (Thank you Preeti for the buttons!:))

I was in need of a new cap for little A he can wear daily on the way to school. My A looks adorable in it! I cannot find the pattern I used for this cap (not in my Pinterest), but it's a basic cap pattern, and semi-circles attached for bear ears effect :)

I have been keeping in my mind that I need to make another, a more beautiful and better fitting sweater for A. So I found this really simple and easy to make Toddler Striped Sweater. As usual it asked for yarn weight I don't have, so I started crocheting with two strands of sport weight yarn, hoping it would help but needed to buy two more colors. Last weekend me and D went to our (note, OUR) favourite yarn market, expecting to buy two skeins and go. When I saw the yarn stalls after a long time .. I got dizzy! The first thing my eyes fell on were various, multicolored skeins of a BULKY weight yarn!!! I have been searching such among Indian brands but never found in the Internet ...and here they are, waiting for me. LOL. D could not help but say ok, buy it if you need... Think if you really need it... I said I needed it very much and can now work so many projects!:)))

 Here is a sweater cum jacket in progress. I want to finish it as soon as possible so Little A has opportunity to wear it THIS winter (not the next one :~)). I plan to make it a little longer like a cardi. The yarn is acrylic, very soft and not prickly at all, works up very smoothly, no knots, and color is just great for this type of garment.

AND... I got this one , a sock weight yarn to try! It seems to be very good too. Overall I was really impressed by the range of yarn  Indian manufacturers offer now. There were many  other ones which I would like to try to work with, but maybe next time.

So that's all for now friends. Wishing you a happy week whenever you are! Happy coming up holidays!

Winter Mood

Hello my dears... The past week was rather tiring for me on the job side - more translation work started coming in which resulted in me being completely drained by the end of the day. As soon as I work half day from home, it might seem like an easy task, but it isn't. In fact, my day is endless. Some days I simply feel like curling up on a bed and doing nothing at all. It doesn't happen, almost never. My sleep timings also depend on little A's preference, however one good thing is that he finally started sleeping through the night. Before that I couldn't get a proper night's rest for more than 2 years :O Hence I am very happy for both of us.
Thank you everyone for your wishes for my mom's recovery. She is already at home and doing well, though would need to be more careful from now on and still requires to support her arm. Life seems to be getting on its' usual track.
That winter mood always visits me as Christmas and New year approach. It's time for cozy evenings and hot chai, for warm socks and crocheting. As our house gets colder, I feel the need to keep warm whenever and however possible.
Yesterday I had a crocheting "onset" and accomplished a sweater for little A. I still need to work on to weaving the ends and probably blocking it. The pattern is "from my head". The yarn I used is like 15 years old! I got it from home last year. First, I had doubts about the colour, but then, why boys should wear only all dark and blue and green?  I am planning on adding some applique to it.

Updated - sweater pictures! :) Its a little bulky and tacky, but Ok to wear at home. I have a pattern for another crochet sweater, so hopefully the second attempt will be better. My model though refused me taking his pictures in a new attire :)

 Recently I tried making something new - baked samosas. They are a totally healthy vegan version of a popular Indian snack. I am going to make more... when I feel like :P

Have a happy day my friends whenever you are! Blessed be!

Bonjour!

Nothing much has been happening here. All usual mundane stuff, busy home-spent weekend, busy week ahead, plans for coming up weekend again. Days are rolling and rolling. Little A continues his playschool in a same positive mood, thank god. He learned quite much in just 2 weeks of attending it. W,e in our turn, teach him some things at home too, like colors, counting etc. I try to involve him in Russian books' reading everyday and we learned many Russian words too.  I hope that this trend will continue till his speech establishes properly.

D and I joined French language classes... Hence the post title "Bonjour!" :) Phew! The language is awesome but I barely get time to revise and repeat and learn new lessons. It's been also only two weeks (we joined classes the same day as A joined school) but learned quite a few phrases, and we can read and write (slowly).

On a crafty side, I have been rather slow but on purpose. I said myself not to rush into completing the  blankie but to enjoy making it, one square at a time. I am using a 7 mm aluminium crochet hook of a Russian company "Gamma". These have been the best crochet hooks to work with.

I also managed to create few so to say "side projects". One of them is a long-planned crochet owl!!! Little A picked up that owl сraze his mommy has (we have owls everywhere around the house, including my jewelry, and numerous owls in children's books, lol), so he became very happy when I gave him this:

Should I say that having another owl in our rooms brings enormous joy to me as well :) I have to make few more, probably, as X-mas gifts. In plans to create an autumn leaf garland using this awesome (fast and easy) crochet fall leaves pattern. One leaf  takes hardly 10 minutes to complete. Once I am done with the garland I will definitely showcase it. 

This weekend I should as well buy material for A's cape and a few skeins of yarn for my blanket because some ran out already. Going to be occupied with homely deals as usual. :)

Have a great week!

Autumn Feeling

Hello dear friends! I believe that the place we were born in and belonged to once always leaves a life-long impression on our body and mind. Even though it is hot and humid in India, and it seems that the summer will never end, my whole inner world has tuned into Autumn. I just feel it so much everywhere I go. I think of making some Autumn projects so that little A can be involved in them. His preschool is going to celebrate Halloween, and this is such a happy thought for me because in India  many schools don't do this. I am thinking of designing a really easy costume for him, and the main challenge is to make a cape. I thought of dressing little A up as a wizard or a superhero. I am going to use this Tutorial: DIY Superhero Capes.
What concerns my ongoing projects, I do have one. Perhaps it also appeared because of all the autumnal longing for cozy stuff. I have been very inspired till now. Once again, after having a long crochet-block I told myself that if I don't start crocheting again I will never start it. And I felt very sad and lost. Hence I searched for some eye-candy projects on the net, sucked in all the colors and patterns I saw, and thought of making something for myself like this Movie Night Cocoon Cardi. I liked its' cozy name, and considered it would be indeed great if went out for a movie soon, and me flaunting this handmade shrug. Alas! I never made it, and instead...

I have made 9 squares so far, and planning to make total of 25. If the  pace is the same as now the blanket shall be ready by mid October :) I must say that feeling yarn and a hook in my hands again gave me so much energy and positiveness! This time I haven't bought any special stash but combined and used the skeins left from the previous blankets. Somehow I am very pleased with the color combinations this time. I also did a BIG step in crocheting - I started crocheting in front of little A :) I had some kind of fear before he would start asking for the hooks and yarn, he does of course, so I give him another ones (which I am not using) and he plays with yarn as with a ball :) Hence I can spare a few minutes of crochet this way, without waiting when the night falls.

To bring on more Autumn feel, here are the photos sent by my parents. Autumn flowers blooming at dacha.

 Canna flower started blooming quite late because the summer was rainy and cold.

 Typical dacha style snack -  fried zuccini circles with tomato and garlic. It is so delicious! I wish oh so much to be there again! One month of trip home was not enough.

Have a wonderful week ahead, keep on crafting!

Summer Things

Hello friends! That's right - we have no spring in here, but Summer right away... it has got really really hot already, up to +28! It's not a joke because now it will start getting only hotter. Nevertheless we cannot skip doing our daily deals, right?
Last weekend we as usually took a walk in the garden - a Terrace garden this time for our little A to enjoy new surroundings. He is FOND of the stairs and steps! As soon as he sees them anywhere he wants to climb up and down... We are very careful to choose places where he can do it safely. Under our supervision of course.

The garden had many most bright and cute flowers! As usual I don't know their names...

 This is the longest flower bed there... loved how it stretches further...

We stopped to take photos of this tree somewhere on the way; it has no leaves but huge red flowers! I am wondering what fruits it might give? These trees are everywhere in the city now.

Besides wandering around, I try to be productive on a crafty front. Here is what I put in my To accomplish list - a Waffle stitch dining set for little A. I am using tutorial by Kathleen of Miss Abigail's Hope Chest. Loved this stitch, and wanted to learn it after seeing on Sangeetha's post.

Also as we had bought a 3 in 1 microwave oven, I now can bake! Yey! Here are my latest oatmeal, flour, atta, ginger and turmeric muffins. I am glad that baking products and equipment became available in India in recent years. One can afford them easily as well.

This is pretty much it for today... I aim to finish pending projects in nearest future and start new ones as soon as possible. Thank you for all the comments and sharing of your experience on raising a child in many languages. Next post will try to make on what toddler activities I could incorporate in A's routine, and what didn't work for us. Still working on creating a quiet book for him and busy bags for a future trip home.

Have a wonderful day!

Crocheting Useful and Beautiful

Hello dear friends! I guess that our Indian winter has come to an end... Sun is shining bright, temperature is around +24, birds are chirping. Hot Indian Summer is round the corner!
We celebrated my father-in-laws birthday last Monday, the cake my D brought was awesome - fruity delicious!

However last week had also stored unexpected health issues. First my little boy had fever for 4 days, then when he started recovering, another boy, D, fell ill... Both are fine now, but I was taken a little aback and stayed home for almost a week. Hopefully no one else in the house will experience this nasty viral.
Thank you all for encouraging comments on my last post, I must say they moved me, literally! I did start crocheting after little A goes to bed. And the feeling of being able to create again is awesome, even if I get a little less sleep. I am not yet ready for any big crochet adventures, hence I am warming up by going for the small ones.
I have been wanting to have a storage basket (-s), which I finally own, and this is not the last one. I have not used any particular pattern, but got inspired by many on Pinterest, especially by the one with handles. It looks awesome, works up in no time, and organizes little things in the house so well - what more would you wish for? I put two strands of yarn together and liked the marble like effect it created.

Another rather beautiful, but maybe not so useful project is a Mega mandala doily, consisting of 23 rows. I loved crocheting this one a lot because it uses various stitches, and each row is in a different color. It can be called a stash buster project.  I used Indian yarn brand Vardhman, Brilon as usual. The doily was emerging throughout few creative nights, here it is how:

It measures about 35 cm in diameter. I am going to place it on a crockery table in our drawing room.. and make one more for the sake of enjoying making it once again, lol :) Crocheter's madness.

In plans to crochet a set of coasters, maybe something like a set of mats for my little A's meal time, 2 pillow covers for my parents and start another blanket (shall start soon, because this project will stretch till next year for sure, lol). I particularly liked Linda's Greg blanket - the square patterns and colors, aww...! So perhaps I will steal the idea :P
That's all for now, enjoy your week, enjoy your days!

Nearing Two Month... Already

Up at 8 in the morning, feeding, making him sleep, then rushing to the shower, preparing breakfast and eating... fast (that's why it's called "breakfast"?). Sometimes I am on time, sometimes have to take my little one along to the drawing room and place near myself. Then again: feeding, making him sleep (if he wishes), changing nappies, cuddling, kissing his soft cheeks, then bathing him in the evening, waiting for papa to come from office... I feel a little relaxed when he is around, and my baby boy feels happy to see his daddy after so long! Here is pretty much the same schedule I have been following since my son's birth. I love it... but I long to go out of the house too. Like far out... not just in the park near by. So we did when finally made a short trip to Kasauli hills with our friends, one of whom also has a baby, June born girl. The trip was awesome, I had loads of interaction with Russian girls, and we had a great time together with D and our Indian Prince.

view from the balcony

My Indian Prince had his first 1 month birthday on the 5th of August... The month was a flash because of its business, because of a new life we have begun which evolves around our dear son. He gained more than a kg (from 2900 g to 4190 g!)  and grew 4 cm more (from 51 to 55!) - all in one month! I am proud of it as I can say that I nurtured him well :)
I used to feel overwhelmed, exhausted, happy, helpless, grateful - all possible feelings you can have when you realize you are a parent. I am sure that after a while things will become more steady, more interesting, more challenging too. I will be ready! Right now I enjoy so much kissing tiny fingers and touching his cute little nose, watching him sleep peacefully with his mouth open and a tongue slightly out sometimes (hehe), and there are many many more such things me and D adore witnessing.
On the Indian Prince's first birthday a friend of mine, who is residing in Russia now with her Indian husband, came by with her two boys. She brought lovely children books from Moscow. One of them is short poems for children by Agnia Barto. I myself still remember many of them as my mom used to read them to me too :) Now I have something to start incorporating Russian language as my child grows.
He is nearing 2 months already, and a special ceremony was performed when he was 40 days old, and the told by the priest, my son was kind of "baptised" into a Hindu... Anyway he indeed has changed so much, became more chubby and healthy looking, smiles and makes happy sounds a lot, tries to convey us something in his baby language. I noticed he started sleeping for longer periods in the night...but he is still so small and depends on us so much in all the aspects!

In spite of a busy new schedule I found time to make this cocoon for our son from that eye lash yarn I intended for a shrug first.  It was meant to be used during our trip to the hills, but I completely forgot to take it out... let us try it some other time.

Some more baby stuff I'd like to share. My baby received many many gifts, among them is this lovely book I'm a boy, sent by Preeti of Createwittyunleashed. Thank you Preeti! I have started to fill  it up, and hope to use those huge buttons for some projects ) Also I got many other things by post, and will tell about them later.

My mother-in-law sewed two pretty cotton sheets for her grandson. Thank you mom!!

 More teddy bears! A friend of mine visited three days ago with a bag full of things for my baby boy.

And this special cross stitch I made around a month before my son's birth - a Slavic amulet Fireeye (Ogneglaz) with a symbol of the young babies Radinec in the middle. 

That's all for now, I hope to be back soon with a more organized post :) Or may be less...lol. As you see now I am a totally baby oriented blogger ))

Have a lovely week ahead, my dears!

Crochet Handles for a Purse

Nearly 2 years ago I made this ripple purse from Attic24's neat ripple pattern. Since then I got many searches of "how to make crochet handles" which led to my old blog post... but there I didn't tell "how" properly. I don't know whether it is really required to make a separate tutorial or instructions for the same however I thought it could be useful for some folks just in case. I will be uploading the same on Ravelry, it's been loooong I logged in there. As I understood  I am not in favor of illustrating each and every step with photos, so I hope the written text is sufficient.

✫CROCHET HANDLES FOR A PURSE✫ 

Materials: DK yarn, 100% acrylic

               Tapestry needle

Hook: 3.5 mm (not bigger than 4 mm)

Difficulty: easy

sc- single crochet

ch – chain

sts – stitches

st - stitch
A tip: You need to make two long rectangles.
Begin with ch 9

Foundation Row:  turn, sc in the second ch from hook and sc till the end – 8 sts. Turn work.

Row 1: Ch 1, sc in each st across – 8 sts. Turn work.

Repeat Row 1 till the desired length of a handle is achieved. Fasten off last stitch.

Fold first stripe into half, and start sewing  from the short side, and then - from the long side with a single crochet or slip stitch, or tapestry needle stitch. When you have finished approximately quarter of its length, stuff with polyfill. *DON’T stuff the ends of the stripe too tight, you’d need to attach them to the purse later*. I used a thick crochet hook to stuff the handle and move along the handle tube. Continue sewing up on the side and then stuffing as you

go. Finish by sewing another short end of your handle.

Work the second handle the same way. You will get two soft tube-like pieces in the end, now find where you would like your handles to be. Mark the point with a stitch marker or a piece of yarn. Start sewing one end of the handle to the purse, then another one on the same side of a purse (like in the photo above, I placed mine 10 cm apart). Secure the handle properly. Do the same with the second one. You can embellish the handles with crochet flowers or hearts, or other items like beads, sequins, may be ribbons, whatever you can think of.
I found that crochet handles come out sturdy and durable this way. I am yet to try to crochet a proper bag with lining, perhaps a diaper bag will be most useful now. We are going to be very busy this weekend - many pending deals are there plus meetings with friends are planned.❥❥❥

Have an enjoyable weekend, my dears❣ Be happy and have peace of mind.

Crocheting for Home and a Baby

➳It is time for a crochet tour. Crochet made its way into my life and established itself as a much needed, joyful activity at least on weekends or very much inspired after office evenings. Ever since I saw Sangeetha's rainbow mandala doily, and many other round doilies of the same type in the Internet I wanted to make one or two or.. for myself. Bearing that in mind I found this pattern on the net and went on crocheting tranquilly this one, in one of my favorite color combinations.

Nearly the next day I felt an urge and itch to make one more mandala doily, this time in different color pallete. My D even had a question (again) why I make the same things again and again... Well, dear, because it gives me pleasure and peace of mind. One doily found its place on our room's  table, but this one is waiting for an owner perhaps. This doily would turn into a  lovely cushion cover if ... I have time.

Besides home decor crochet I of course tried my hands a hook in crocheting some baby clothing items. I made a sweater for the first time, and I liked it. The free pattern is called Baby Cardigan, click on the Baby Hat with Earflaps for a free pattern. I am so grateful to those who invent and post the patterns for us to use! I suppose that the white row of stitches I let in a sweater and a hat kind of makes it a set. I made both for a bigger baby, 3+ months old, for Indian "colder" months. I used my favorite Vardhman Brilon - purple is a left over of the summer blanket.

On the list of the clothes I planned to crochet for a baby was a vest. I noted many of the patterns, including Linda's wonderful Kids Sleevless Tops, but hesitated to adapt the pattern to a smaller size, and finally designed a vest myself, involving much loved granny square stitch and granny squares - it works up in no time, really. Once again I used Brilon yarn.

A finished vest on the clothespins. My husband said it looks like a bag... Thank you so much! I am okay with the result myself, the main thing it fits a child and will be comfortable to wear. I hope the neck line is not narrow... Otherwise I will HAVE to turn into a bag.

A close up of the  little granny squares before I wrap up a post.  They turned out to be 2"1' each, sewed together with a slip stitch and then edged with a single crochet stitch. I would like to try this way of clothing making for some accessories too, like booties and caps.I might try it out tonight itself! Yey! But first need to complete a blankie I have never even shown in blog.

I am oh so relieved this working week is getting over and the weekend is just round the corner! Can't wait to have my usual brewed cup of coffee tomorrow morning and watch favorite series (while D is still seeing dreams) - a rare Me-time. I hope the weather will not hit us with sunshine and high degrees. This Sunday is coinciding Orthodox and Catholic Easter. We might go to meet few friends.

♡♡♡Bye for now! Have a nice weekend!♡♡♡