Completed: Malay Wedding Dolls

Recently, one of my friends, who is also my ex-colleague got married! When she invited me to her wedding (which I could not attend unfortunately), I knew that I would be crocheting a pair of wedding dolls in Malay traditional attire as a wedding gift. The topic of wedding gifts had come up in our conversations before and it felt surreal that I am finally going to crochet the wedding dolls for her.

As there were not many amigurumi dolls in traditional Malay attire for me to base the design on, I decided to just make up the design based on my friend’s engagement ceremony photos. She had wanted the dolls to be unique so I followed the pink theme of her engagement ceremony, rather than the traditional white theme of her wedding ceremony. Plus, pink is actually her favourite colour.

The most challenging part of creating the dolls was actually the groom’s sarung. A sarung is basically a length of cloth that is wrapped around the waist and tied and it forms part of the traditional Malay attire for men. Sarungs are usually of plaid design, something which is tricky to replicate in crochet. Thankfully, a search on the web brought me to this beautiful tartan plaid wash cloth pattern by Laura of Happy Berry Crochet. With some modifications and loads of trial-and-error, I managed to crochet a sarung that is similar to the real thing.

Albeit it not being part of the traditional Malay attire, I decided to go with a wedding veil for the bride since a veil would give off a wedding vibe and not result in the bride being mistaken as just an ordinary doll in traditional Malay attire. I added some crocheted flowers on the veil as well even though this is not visible from the front. Don’t they look dainty?

That wraps up my short post on crocheting a pair of wedding dolls in traditional Malay attire.

Have you crocheted anything that has a cultural significance in your culture/country? What has your process been like? Do share in the comments section below!

Till the next project. xoxo

Completed: Crochet Mesh Bag

Hello. I am back to post about my latest FO, the crochet mesh bag. You didn’t think that I had disappeared, I hope?

I got inspired to crochet a mesh bag when I saw the beautiful one crocheted by the talented Stephanie from All About Ami. She had taken the pattern from Haley Waxberg, made some modifications to it and had come up with a beautiful crochet mesh bag.

The crochet mesh bag is really a departure from my usual amigurumi projects so I was quite nervous on how the end product would turn out. I guess I had been worrying for nothing because the final product looked amazing (at least, in my eyes).

I love the fact that I could make my own bag and I have been using the crochet mesh bag as much as I can. The bag is such a stylish way to reduce plastic usage.

Now.. you’re curious as to how it looks like, right? Here it is.

 

Isn’t it gorgeous? In case you’re wondering, the person in the photos is not me, but my sister. I like to think that I’m the type who is better behind the lens rather than in front of it. Now sis, don’t say I didn’t give you your one minute of fame on my blog.

On a separate hand, here are some updates on what has been going on that you might be interested in.

– As I have quite a heavy study load this semester (it ends in June), crochet has been placed on the back burner for the time being. Therefore, it would take me longer to finish up amigurumi projects and I’m guessing that because of this, my blog and Instagram would be less active than I want them to be.

– I have not forgotten about the pattern for Lady The Party Planner Llama. Rest assured that I’m working on it (despite the progress being quite slow) and you all will definitely be the first to know when I release the pattern.

That’s all from me for now.

Till the next project. xoxo

Completed: Rudolph The Red Nose Reindeer

Phew. What an eventful way to end the end of 2013. I know I had promised on Instagram to update my blog soon (that was back in December 2013) but there were just too many things that got in the way and to put it simply, it was hard for me to cope.

Before I proceed with my post, I would like to thank everyone for voting for my entry, Lady The Party Planner Llama in the Design Contest hosted by Amigurumipatterns.net. Although I didn’t win, I still felt like a winner because I have learnt so much in the designing process. I am currently working on the pattern for Lady The Party Planner Llama and I shall post updates about my progress whenever I can.

And to continue. So it took a New Year to pass before I could write about how the Rudolph I crocheted was different from my other amigurumi projects. If you’re reading this, I hope you’re not mad that I’m only fulfilling my promise now, Dendennis.

I bought a bunch from yarn from Cotton House Store when I visited their physical shop in the middle of last year. Cotton House Store specialises in (well, you guessed it) cotton yarn so naturally I bought their signature milk cotton yarn and also other yarn from their other collections such as polyester and merino.

I’m embarrassed to say that these bunch of fabulous yarn were sitting in a corner in my house until I decided to make a Rudolph from Dendennis’ pattern.

I chose the brown cotton yarn for the body and the red polyester yarn for the scarf. As for the reindeer’s horns, I used something from my stash of Minlon 4ply acrylic yarn. Since the weight for both the cotton yarn and polyester yarn were almost similar, I followed the directions in the pattern exactly and they turned out amazing. As for the horns, I had to make some tweaks so that it doesn’t look too small for the reindeer.

This is the first time I’m using yarn of different weights and fibre to make an amigurumi and it was really fun because I was really anticipating how the final project would look like. Crocheters are often advised to take care when getting yarn for a project and to make sure that the yarn is from the same dye lot, weight and fibre so that the project turns out as per the dimensions. I usually follow this advice to boot or at least, with aspect to the yarn weight and fibre so this time, it’s really refreshing to just use whatever I have in my stash without having to bother too much about uniformity of the yarn used.

Plus, the cotton yarn was such a joy to work with. I am definitely going to purchase more of the cotton yarn when I get the opportunity to visit the Cotton House Store again.

So.. have you ever used different yarns for a project? And how did your project turned out?

Tell me your experiences by leaving a comment here or e-mailing me at theamiproject@yahoo.com.

Note: Currently, I am still not able to update my blog on a regular basis BUT.. I will do my best to update it as much as I can. If you’re looking for constant updates from me, you can follow my Instagram account (my username is “theamiproject”). I update my Instagram account more regularly.

Till the next project. xoxo

Completed: Whale

Photo taken using Hazel’s Canon 60D EF 18mm f/1.8 II

Since discovering the world of amigurumi, I have somehow entertained the idea of making a whale someday. So upon stumbling upon Freshstitches’ whale pattern, I decided to make it.

I chose pink because pink whales do exist in the fairytale realm. There are pink dolphins, why not pink whales then?

This is one of the many things I love about crocheting amigurumi. I enjoy the flexibility of creation and really, the sky is the limit. Nothing is too wacky or crazy to be made into an amigurumi.

Completed: Peyton Bear

Say hi to Peyton Bear, my first attempt with variegated yarn. I was really inspired to try the variegated yarn on the bear after I saw the beautiful colours of the pattern designer’s (Cheryl) bear. Mine does not look as good as her colour combination but all the same, I love the effects of the variegated yarn.

As mentioned, this is my first time using variegated yarn and it was a pretty exciting thing since you literally, do not have control over the colour of your final project. This would make every project of the same design somewhat different. If I were to make another Peyton Bear with the same variegated yarn colour, perhaps its legs would have more shades of blue instead of grey and white. Get my point?