The Bella Shrug

Well, I guess there is no more hiding in the craft room quietly crocheting. Since I have started sharing my patterns I have been astonished, a little overwhelmed and awestruck at the generosity, kindness and creativity of everyone I have communicated with in the fiber arts community.  All of that means more to me than I could ever express in a few words on this blog. So, since I am getting page hits in large numbers I thought it was about time that I actually start posting and sharing here.

The Sophia Infinity Scarf

I posted a few new patterns this week on Craftsy & Ravelry. Cascade Yarns was kind enough to post one of my patterns, the Sophia Infinity Scarf,  on their Facebook page. Thank you to all of the nice people at Cascade Yarns for posting the pic and link, and also for making reasonably priced yarn I love. No they are not paying me or bribing me with free yarn. :)

The Sophia Infinity Scarf has been a hit, but the Bella Shrug  has been far and away the shining star of the new patterns. I have been floored at the number of downloads it has gotten in just 3 days. I am also so excited that it has been hovering in the top 5 on Ravelry for crochet patterns too! Thank you to everyone who has downloaded or favorited the pattern. I adore each and every one of you marvelous people. That's one of the things I love most about designing and sharing my patterns with everyone. The ones I think are going to be big hits rarely are. The dark horses are the ones that always come out of no where and take on a life of their own. I almost didn't publish the Bella Shrug.

I have been crocheting since I was 7. My aunt & grandmother taught me. Most likely to keep me quiet so they could have 5 minutes peace, but whatever the reason I am grateful they did. I have always created things on whimsy but never wrote them down. I made it and off it went into the cosmos. The Bella Shrug was my very first attempt at sitting down and creating a written pattern based on one of my designs. I thought it would be a simple process. It wasn't, at least for me. It's been a few years, a lot of frogging and a lot of rookie mistakes. I have always been proud of that design and have made quite a few of them as gifts. Over the years it's been revised and rewritten in my design notebooks, but never quite there as a completed pattern. When I finally found the courage to venture out and start publishing & sharing some of my designs the Bella Shrug was one of the ones I had hoped to publish. I just never thought it was ready. Part of me is a little nervous that it's not ready now too, but it was time and I have been touched and thrilled by the response to my first design child!

The Bella Shrug

Next time more about the projects I am working on this week!