hand-made – Sunrays Creations and Yarns

Posted on May 24, 2014 by mindovermanasa — 2 Comments

Sock Me! ;)

When one of my Ravelry groups suggested a sock-along, I jumped at the opportunity. I already had made 3 pairs and I was sure its just a matter of sitting for a few hours n getting it done! Delusional, anyone?

Which essentially was stupid. I already had 3 sweaters (out of which 2 were for me… Small. Not), and a shawl. Not to mention I knew I would be busy with the in-laws here and stuff on the personal front. And did I choose a free pattern?! No, I went ahead and signed up for something that said “complete within 2 months or pay up”. So, ya, sock me!!

Anyway, today happens to be the deadline for the socks, and I’ve just managed to finish it.

The yarn is an entire different matter to crib about. It looked good on skein, and that’s the only reason I can come up with for buying it!! The color changes are normally small i.e 12″ in most Indian acrylic yarns. However, this took short to a whole new level: approximately 6″. The design is mostly invisible. 🙁

Anyway, here’s my pic!

PS: I don’t think I’ve ever written a “rant” blog ever before! sigh

Posted on May 20, 2014 by mindovermanasa — 2 Comments

Hooking Away

As a couple of friends pointed out here, I’m just too used to “needles”. And I finally found the need to change my terminology to “hooks”! 🙂 Crocheting has recently become my go-to option when I’m tired of knitting. While knitting usually involves wearables of some sort, they take a lot of time to complete. On the other hand, I crochet only to take a break from garments. So these are small projects, doilies to be precise.

Here are a couple that I’ve completed recently:

Floor Show: Every bit of this rug/mat is a gift. The yarn was a gift from Rinku, and the pattern came from a crochet magazine gifted by Swapna… And I just couldn’t resist putting it all together!

Mallika: My very first test pattern. Designed by Srividhya, and tested on the Crafty Dozen forum on Ravelry.. and helped through the process by Jaishree and Swapna on WatsApp! 😉

Dove Doily: I wanted to challenge myself… and challenge I did! It definiltly challenged my patience to stick to it till it got done. As it is i skipped the last few rows. 😛

Clematis: this was pretty motif that I found in a book… and decided to make a couple. Not sure what I’ll do with them though….

Posted on May 16, 2014 by mindovermanasa — 4 Comments

Pine for Me! :)

This one is freshly completed, though it actually slid off my needles a couple of weeks back. Unfortunately, I’ve just not had the time to wash and block the garment, not to mentioned finish off the weaving in of threads n sewing on of buttons. But here is the finally product, and am really really thrilled with my lovely Pine Cardigan!

The design itself is a test knit run on Ravelry from the very talented designer/s Tincanknits. Its been fun, though the sleeves were boring… I mean how fun can 20 inches of stockinette be?! But the end result more than made up for it! 😀 <3

Here’s my lovely Pine!

Posted on February 3, 2014February 3, 2014 by mindovermanasa — 1 Comment

Intriguing Shawl

This was supposed to be a quick project which I signed up for it. Unfortunately I got so side-tracked with other projects on needles, that I got late for my deadline! 🙁

The nice part is that the designer was cool about it, and had no problems extending the deadline. So here’s my Intriguing shawl, with its lovely design! It was made with a silk-wool blend that I got from IndianSilkShop on 4mm needles and it was also the first time I knit with anything silk! 🙂

I did make a couple of changes to the design namely I cut out on the repeats for the end garter ridge and I didn’t do the picots. Did that make a difference? No, it didn’t, because the focus is now entirely on the design! And a very pretty one it is. 🙂

immediately after blocking :) — immediately after blocking 🙂

Posted on January 31, 2014 by mindovermanasa — Leave a comment

Gilbert

Gilbert was a sweater that I made for my nephew. The pattern was designed by Melanie Coogan, and she was very generous when she gave me the pattern for free! And for no reason but that I asked for it on Ravelry! 😀 Thanks, Melanie!

The sweater is knit seamlessly and knit bottom-up. This is the first time I made anything with such extensive cables, and it was great experience!

Posted on October 9, 2013January 21, 2014 by mindovermanasa — Leave a comment

New Design – Raised Diamonds

At the starting of this year I decided that I would dedicate this year to making stuff for family. Made a sweater for Mom, and a shawl for Sis-in-law. And proceeded to start a scarf/muffler for Dad and Father-in-law. While the earlier projects got done soon enough, the Dad part of the scarf just got done.

This has been an interesting experience though. When I first designed the scarf, it was also a reversible design. The problem was that the final product was looking as good as the swatch. So it was back to the drawing board for me. And Oh! It was miserable ripping up 2 scarves (I was making them simultaneously).

This design was the one I finally went with. This time I cast on with only 1 yarn, in the thought that I would at least feel half the pain if I needed to rip again! 🙂

But this looked good, and here is the final product! However, the design writing is an exercise I shall contemplate in about a month or so! 😉

Posted on July 16, 2013 by mindovermanasa — 2 Comments

Autumn Woodland : Kobo Touch Cover

Having finally received my e-Reader, i’m all gung-ho about creating stuff for it! 🙂

My latest attempt is a test knit (how timely!) which featured covers for e-readers. Since the dimensions of mine are the exact same as the Kindle, I got to work!

The design, Effie, was created based on a character from The Hunger Games ™. The design is simple, and yet, the ruffles create a funky look. I called mine Autumn Woodland because of the colors. For some reason, the colors remind me of just that…

So here are the pics:

Couldn't resist this one too! — Couldn’t resist this one too!

Case for Kobo Touch (sunraysartyarns.wordpress.com)

Posted on March 11, 2012 by mindovermanasa — 6 Comments

Crochet Purse – Jute Thread

Now this one has been lingering around, just waiting for me to get around to finishing it. It is made of jute thread, which makes the finishing a little difficult.

Since I was already finishing the other bags, I decided to complete this one too.