Playing with Thread

I'm back! I've gotta admit, I'm beginning to like this blogging thing. I find myself thinking during the week about what I'm gonna post next and then get a little annoyed when I don't have the time post it, which has definitely been the case this week! Life is crazy, but it's fun. :) Anyhow, I wanted to share my latest project with you all. I believe I mentioned in a previous post about starting on some earrings. Throughout my pattern scrounging on Ravelry and other places, I realized that there aren't really a whole lot of earring patterns out there that aren't totally granny-ish. Some of you might be thinking, "This is crochet...it is by definition granny-ish Kaity!" I would have to say I disagree. Part of what I love about crochet is the challenge of making it modern and taking it out of the "my 80 year-old grammy made this for me" box. And if you look around, there are several designers out there that have made an effort to do just that. Short story, it would be cool if crocheted items (and handmade items in general) were able to be both functional AND stylish, and those are the kind of projects I try to do (unless I'm geeking out on amigurumi, which happens quite often).

Back to the point: earrings. I really love flowers, and I have recently come to love this particular flower pattern by Carlinda Lewis, which you can find on her blog here: http://hookhound.blogspot.com/p/rosa-crochet-flower.html. And I thought it would be really fun if I could make one of those flowers super small and put it on an earring. This was the result:

It took a little bit of trial and error, but I finally got a look I liked with a little modification of the original pattern. All I did was use size 10 crochet thread with a 1.5mm hook and skip Round 4 of the pattern (so you have 18 stitches in the round instead of 24 when starting your petal bases). This takes the outer row of petals off the flower altogether, making it smaller. In any case, I like them. :) Now that I have a little bit of experience with crochet thread, I'm working on some more (non-grannyish) earring patterns to put up for sale in my Ravelry shop. I'll let ya know when things start happening! Adios.