Crocheted Market Bag

Whoops!  This is a knitting blog but I just had to show you my cool Crocheted Market Bag.  This is yet another great, quick project from my book "Sock Yarn One Skein Wonders."  The project calls for Noro Sock Kureyon Yarn so it got me to thinking about the left over Noro Silk Garden Sock Yarn in my stash.  The Kureyon Yarn is a finer fingering weight yarn and the Silk Garden is more like DK or sport weight yarn.  Also the Kureyon Yarn comes with more yardage per skein as compared to the Silk Garden. Thankfully I had about 1 1/3 skeins of the Silk Garden in my stash and I made it work. The project does call for holding two strands of yarn together while you crochet. I was able to match up the colors for the bottom and body of the bag. For the top and the handles, the yarn appears to have a more "tweedy" effect since the colors are not matchy-matchy. 

Note:  I did alter the patten slightly.  The instructions call for one large handle but I opted for two smaller handles.  I marked the bag at four spots (with safety pins) where I wanted handles to exist.  I single crocheted to the first marker, chained 30 stitches and the slip stitched the chain to the stitch occupied by the second marker.  Then I singled crocheted to the third maker, chained 30 stitches, and then slip stitched the chain to the stitch occupied by the fourth marker.  I continued to single crochet around until I ran out of yarn.  I was tickled that the final row around the entire bag was hot pink.  Such luck!   I was thinking I did not like the way the bag turned out but when I put "stuff" in the bag, it looked great!  To model the bag, I put a gallon sized plastic zip-closed bag full of yarn inside the bag.  That gives you an idea of the storage capacity of the bag.  I am considering using this bag to bring lunch to work.  I am also considering adding a fabric liner (if I am not too lazy).  This would also make a nice knitting bag for small projects (mittens, socks, etc.).