baggin' it

wowsers! as the very wise Inspector Gadget would say ;). It's been quite a while hasn't it? And not much to show for it either :D, just this bag. But here I am again, probably/hopefully more constant. Have not been around your blogs a lot either, hope you're all doing okay and I will catch up over time.

so for now a miniature bag I made after one I had many years ago, twice even.

the first was one my grandmother had brought home from a vacation in Spain many decades ago. My mom got it from her, who gave it to me in my teens. I loved it a lot and used it everyday, but unfortunately I lost it someday on my bike home from work. Didn't even notice it missing until I got home.. I guess as a teenager I 'traveled' light, haha (had gone back to look along the route I took, but didn't find it..)

 

after losing it, and still loving the kind of bag, at that time I just thought I'd make something similar. So for that purpose I looked for something suitable and in a fairtrade-shop I found 2 African crocheted (?) tableclothes that'd be great for it. Made an inside bag, stitched it all together, braided a shoulder 'belt' and knotted some fringe at the bottom and this was the result. I've enjoyed that bag for quite a number of years as well, I think I still have it somewhere. This is an old photo of it (the folded part at the top was because the tableclothes were longer than I liked for my bag, but didn't want to cut it of and solved it this way):

and now I have miniature version of it, well a different version of it, which I actually like better than it's RL-counterpart :D. I made it with pieces of lace from Art of Mini (they don't sell lace anymore unfortunately) I thought were right for it and have that crocheted look. While my lifesize bag had a creamcoloured inside bag, I decided to give this one a black one for contrast and to better see the pattern.

this is all I had photographed from the process, but you get the idea I think ;)

and since this is the first post I'm writing since receiving it and it also fits the 'theme' of crocheted miniatures, I'd like to show you what the very sweet Susan of Mini Crochet Mad made for me a while ago! As you might recall I had a bit of a disappointing experience with an online webshop where I'd ordered a miniature baby-hat for a future bookbox-babyroomscene, well: Susan has seriously made up for that!

she not only very kindly offered to make me a hat as a gift, as you can see she did much more ;). I was so humbled by all she's made for me. Besides the lovely hat with a tiny flower and leaf (!), she made the cutest tiny babyunderpants with tiny buttons, the smallest babybooties, a babycardigan with a pattern that cannot be easy to do and a spare hat!! That's already great in itself and I felt very spoiled, but I was even more excited by how beautiful & perfect Susan made it. It's so small but só fine and evenly crocheted, it's just amazing! Thank you so much again for your more than generous gift Susan, it means a lot: it will make such a lovely part of that babyscene to come!

next (I will start this soon): the butterfly - or golden - palm using my cat's naturally shed whiskers, with tutorial! Hope you've been able to collect some yourself if you'd like to make one.

example, image found on Google