Crimson Fiesta Shawl

When I spotted the yarn in a booth at the CGOA conference in 2012, I knew what I was going to make with it.  I had played with an idea for some time, and when this yarn jumped out at me, I grabbed it and got going!  In retrospect, a lighter weight yarn might have been better for the job, but, I would still be crocheting the shawl if I had used a lace weight yarn instead of the fingering weight I purchased.

I love leaves, and flowers, and enjoy being able to work them into all kinds of art.  The Russian crocheters do this kind of art so much better than I, but since this was one of my first attempts at a design like this, I think it came out alright.  I learned a number of things along the way, and I know what I would do differently next time.

My goal was to enter this design into the CGOA design competition in Manchester New Hampshire in 2014.  This would be my first entry into any kind of crochet design competition.

Since I crochet so slowly, this work was in progress for some time.  The largest leaves took at least a day each, and the smaller leaves took between one hour and several hours each.  From the time I started making swatches, until the time I finished the design, was about a year.

I am so pleased the judges liked the work enough to award it second place in the category (accessories). I am very inspired to do more work like this, with botanical themes.  I want to thank WEBS for their generous award, and for sponsoring the 2014 CGOA design competition.  Check them out at: www.yarn.com

All the design competition entries can be viewed on the following blogs or photo pools:

http://dorischancrochet.com/2014/07/25/cgoa-2014-design-competition-showing-you-the-crochet/
http://hooked-on-crafting.com/2014/07/25/cgoa-2014-design-competition-showing-you-the-crochet/
https://www.flickr.com/groups/cgoa/pool/