A project for the bedroom

I'm taking a little break from stitching this week to work on a project for the bedroom:  two matching large doilies to put on the bedside tables.   I have stacks of doilies that I've crocheted over the years, but just not quite what I wanted.

I finished the first one over the weekend while on a road trip, and I'm currently working on the second one to match.  I thought it would be fun to show how second piece grows as compared to the finished piece.

Here's the first piece, finished:

It's made with size 10 crochet cotton (slightly thicker) and is currently 19 inches across.  Once I wash it, it will shrink down to 18 inches.   This is a pineapple design, which is the symbol of hospitality.  It's a very popular motif in doilies, and shows up regularly in patterns.  It's also one of my favorite motifs, and it ends up on a lot of my projects.

This is the first row of the second doily, which is obviously quite small.

The first three rows.  You can see how the pattern starts to take shape.

The first six rows, side by side with the finished doily.

As you can see, they're worked in rounds out from the center, so it grows fairly rapidly at first.  Obviously as the rounds get larger, the progress slows down.

Here's the center just about finished, and within the next 2 rounds, the bottom of the pineapple edging will start to form.

The bases of the pineapples are completed here. The interior of the design will be mostly covered by things like the lamps, a cup tray, etc, so for a bedside table, a simpler interior design like this works really well because the edging is highlighted.

The pineapples are about 2/3 of the way done here and you can see how it's all pulling together.

And they are both finished (on the dining room table here).   I still need to darn in the ends (you can see them hanging out still), then wash and iron with a little bit of starch, and they'll be ready to use.   The thread is 100% cotton so that makes them very practical for actual use, not just decorative.