Poncho Princess

I wrote in one of my previous blog posts about the Ponchos  that I crocheted a couple of years ago.  This one had the name of my niece Shal.. written over it.  I gave it to her when cousin Shail.. was visiting us with his family a couple of summers ago.  I was told later that she wanted to wear it to school everyday after they returned from here.  Loved how she coordinated her outfit for this picture.

Cousin Shail.., who was in college at that time, had accompanied me from Belgaum on my bus journey to the far away city of Pune from Shimoga, just before my first flight to US in 1994. I remember it took 18 hours on the road from Shimoga to Pune.  That is about the total air time to fly from Mumbai to Boston!  This bus ride gave us a chance to bond a bit more, sharing our hopes and dreams, admiring the rainbow out the window.  Who knew then that years later he would settle down in the neighboring NJ and actually come visit us with his wife Le.. and two kids Shal.. and Sheel! Yes it is a beautiful family of sh's and l's :)

Bag Pattern Invention

It was December break last year and I found myself in between projects!  Yes, sometimes that happens.  Although most of the times I have two or three things going on in parallel and eying four more that I cannot wait to get started with.  Anyways, I picked up the Readers Digest book I mentioned here, and found a stitch I wanted to try and experiment with.  The result was this invention of a bag design using leftover Sugar N' Cream yarn of different colors from another project.

M was appreciative of my effort, and loved taking these pictures, but she did not want it for herself.  Somehow by the time you enter high school, everything has to be either black or gray or beige.  On the other hand this was the best thing in the world for S who had just begun middle school.  It was an instant hit among her friends.  I am seeing it being used a lot and hope that continues for a couple of years.