If You Go Down To The Woods Today...

Look who appeared in our garden this week!  I thought I had spotted Pooh Bear a couple of days ago & now Piglet arrived too.  They were hiding in the camellia which is the same colour as Piglet so it was a bit hard to find him.

My First Hat

I had never sewn a hat before today!  But I got all inspired somewhere on the very world wide web the other day so I proceeded to down load & print out & cut out a pattern for one.  That is despite the fact that I have a pattern in the cupboard that I bought about 2 years ago & still hadn't made.  

The pattern was from Oliver + S.  Quite a good one to follow.  I did have to unpick a little when I got bits in the wrong way but it all worked out in the end & didn't take long at all!  I was quite impressed.  It's reversible too!  

But it's too small for DJ.  I had even measured his head!  Oh well, now I know I can do it I might even open the pattern of the other one.  This hat is pretty cute though with some fabric I have had for ages called "Beep! Beep!". It didn't take much either.   I am going to a baby market next week to try to move out all of the old baby clothes, so I will take this hat & put it out for sale too.  Can only try hey!  Might have to try to make a couple more before then but bigger!  lol

Vintage Fabric

In 2010 I participated in this sheet swap.  It was good fun.  I have some pretty vintage pieces as a result & some other purchases I made since then.  

BUT... I'm not using it!  

Sooooooooo.... I know plenty of you out there in blogland will put it to better use.  

I will offer some up to some of you.  What I will do is if YOU can send me a self addressed 500g Aussie Post mail satchel thingy, I will fill it with fabric for you.  I really want to move some of this stuff out of the cupboard & this stuff won't be used in any great hurry in my house at the moment.  

The first 5 to leave a comment here with an email address & being happy to send the 500g satchel to me first, I will be only too happy to share my vintage fabric loot!  I will email you my mailing address so you can send it to me!  

At the moment I will leave it at 5.  If after that I find I have more to share around I will put up a new offer.  If I remember correctly,. I think I got 13 different fat quarters in my swap in a 500g mail bag.  Not bad variety to be had.  Also if you would prefer larger than a fat quarter for other uses, let me know that so I don't chop what I have too much!  

Any takers?

Block Puzzles Are Back in Production

I thought I should get a few sets of blocks back in my madeit shop since Christmas is not really all that far away!  90 days & counting!  I know you don't want to know any of that though...  

I did laugh the other day when I heard BJ telling Stuart "Mummy is getting a wiggle on with her blocks!".  Oh I laughed!  He really does take notice of things & comes out with suitably cute statements!  

If you aren't familiar with my puzzles, I make them of Golden Books.  Everyone has a favourite from their childhood!  If you are like me, you have shared them with your own kids too!  Can't beat a good Golden book!  

What was your favourite?

The Color Kittens

The Saggy Baggy Elephant

Blogtober in October

This is the first time I have tried this!  I am up for the challenge!  Well this week I am anyway!  We'll see how I actually go when October comes around - next week!!!

Are you interested in playing along for the month?  Check out Katy for all the info you need.  Don't stress if you don't end up managing it!  Real Life happens, we all know that.  But we can try can't we!

Finger Puppet Family

Here are the whole gang!  I finished Beaver & Skunk.  BJ asked me if the skunk was smelly.  :-)   They are pretty cute little critters!  No BJ in the picture this time!  Much easier without!

Finger Puppets

Yes, it's true!  I've now been making finger puppets!  As you do!  But you know what, I have a little knitted snowman finger puppet that I bought at a school fair when I was a little kid.  I still have the snowman finger puppet somewhere here in this load of kids toys around the house!  

I saw the cute finger puppets on Pinterest & had to get the patterns for some Woodland friends through the link on Etsy.   They are cute.  Easy too!  Quite fast too as there is glue involved as well as sewing!  So we have a family of  a Hedgehog, Fox & Owl!  Yes the owl is pink because that is BJ's favourite colour at the moment.  But that's ok, I made a blue one & green on & some brown ones too.  They are cute & great for little fingers.  They were good fun.   So much so, we still have some others in the process of making!  

Once again it was hard to get a decent picture!  Arrrghh... So the first pic you can see the animals quite well. Then we have a bunch of outtakes cos they are just fun pictures of BJ & not so nice of the animals!  lol  But best of all he still really loves all the stuff I make him & adds his enthusiasm which just makes me want to keep making him stuff.  I wonder if DJ will be like that too!  Hmmm... interesting...  

More Squares

I have enjoyed this new colour way of squares.  I have had lots of fun lately doing a few squares while the mood took me.  

This one was fun!  It's Lucky Charms.  Fun square to do & not as hard as it looked.  

This was the latest installment in our CAL.  It's called Impossible Hexagon, but wasn't at all which was a relief!  In fact it was really easy!  

I enjoyed this one.  This was part of another group on Ravelry.  I had joined the group a while back but hadn't done anything from it yet.  I like this!  But it looks crooked.  I am hoping it pulls straight when it is joined.  Oh & it's called Firenze.  

So there you have it!  Happy Weekend!

A Jumper/Sweater

I did knit one!  I actually did!  Wow!  Plus I finally took a (very bad) picture of it!  It's hard to get a good picture of a moving subject!  The easiest way to keep him still in the end was to get him to be a starfish!  At least he isn't blurry this time but the lighting sucks!  Can't have everything...  

Anyway, I did this round neck jumper in the round which was the first time I had done that.   So I am feeling quite clever.  I was hoping this would fit him next year.  I am not sure if it will.  It's the biggest size on the pattern leaflet - size 6-7 years.  He's only just turned 4 & it fits him well now.  Fingers crossed he still can wear it next winter.  Bummer about the sizes in this though.  Very frustrating to have that happen after all that.  At least I know when I sell the patterns at work that I can tell them they need to upsize!  It's wool called Magic Garden Buttons & it's lovely to use too.  Very impressed.  I hope the rumour isn't true about it being discontinued though!  I will have to grab a couple of packs of a couple of colours if that is right as they are nice.  

Here's a pic just because it's cute!  My little Man!  

How Lucky Am I?

How Lucky am I to have something like this in my backyard?  We have had Mr & Mrs Swan sitting in a large nest on the edge of our dam at the back & here on the weekend we had 6 wee ones to watch!  

Do You Pin?

Hi there!  Are you on Pinterest?  It's the latest web craze I think!  It is so inspirational though!  Full of so many ideas for so many things!  Amazing!  Some things are just so simple it is crazy how simple & how stupid I feel for not having thought of such a simple things myself!  Really it is amazing what you will find there!  

Some of my favourite ideas are following:

1.  Cupcake papers in a spaghetti jar!  Find more info here!  Quite a simple way to store them & you can see easily what you have!  

2.  Do you have pavers with weeds like this?  I did!  But I sprayed - well actually BJ sprayed them with the vinegar mix that is found here.  

3.  I love this!  Stu got a 6 pack of beer given the other week & I kept the box.  I won't put drinks in it, but I like the ideas of using it for packaging!  A bit of cute scrapping or gift wrap paper over the box & it has huge potential!  I was thinking maybe even a ball of wool in each 6 pack space!  Cute!  Something will come to me before Christmas, but in the meantime the reindeers are cute!  

The lolly bottles are cute too but not for Father's Day!  lol  

4.  This is one of my favourite ideas!  So much so that I actually bought the file boxes just yesterday.  Yes I am ready!  Bring it on!  I got one for each of the boys already.  BJ starts school next year.  OK so DJ doesn't for a few years yet but I can use the box for a few other things in the meantime.  It really is a great idea!  Save all their stuff for them & when they move out or you clean out, hand them a box!  lol  

5.  Do you like these little packages?  Aren't they clever!  & you know what?  They are made from a loo roll!  There are more ideas here!  

6.  How simple is this?  I am going to do this with the bits of ribbon I have strewn through a ribbon box!  Very simple!  It will stay fixed in place!  

So after all that inspiration have you joined Pinterest yet?   

New Colours

It didn't take me long to start on a new colour way for my next square sampler.  Well actually I did start these before I had finished my rainbows.  The first square here just didn't lend itself to my rainbow sequence of colours.  I had these 5 colours waiting in the wings for the right moment to play with them & so Crown Jewels was the first in the colours.  I really like these colours.  Quite un-bright compared to my last 2.  Quite orderly even.  I picked the colour pattern from a swatch I liked at design seeds & one that actually had the colours in the yarn range I like to use for these.  This was a square from our CAL recently.  It's a good one.  I really enjoyed doing it & will no doubt make more of them in the future!  

This was the next one in our CAL & is Tumbling Diamonds & designed by one of the ladies that runs the group on Ravelry.  It's a nice on & came up well with these colours too. 

I actually am in a couple of other groups that do squares too & hadn't participated in any of them yet.  I came across this one in the Melinda Miller group.  It's called Kiss the Bride & was nice to do.  Quite enjoying the colours & not having to do them in an order like the rainbows!  It's quite liberating & leaves me so much choice that it isn't exactly easy to pick what goes where but it's fun all the same!  I could always do multiples if I wanted.  So that's me once again!  

Happy Weekend to You!  

Ta-Dah

There it is.  My rainbow sampler square blanket.  Some squares were from the crochet-along.  Others I did because I liked them or because I needed to find some that suited the colour changes!  That isn't so easy!  Anyway it's done!  I need to not look at it for a while & I might like it.  Not sure where this is going to live yet though.

Last Of The Rainbows

Well I have been hooking along still.  I got a bit side tracked with some other colours & projects.  But I have finished 20 rainbow squares now.  Yay!  

This one is Brighter Daze.  I really like this square.  Was fun to make too.  

 Cluster Dome from the book 50 Fabulous Crochet Squares.  I did this one before & liked it.  I had a hard time trying to find a few more squares that were going to suit my rainbow colour sequence.  

 I hadn't done this one before  - Ruffle-Go-Round, also from that book above...  

I am currently doing the border on the blanket.  So stay tuned!