Merry Christmas

It's 10:30pm here. Our Christmas Day is almost over. The kids are tucked up in bed after an exhausting day of non stop eating and playing with their cousins. 

 Our tree looks bare without presents under it.

 

Everyone was suitably spoilt and happy with their haul of pressies. Especially me with my new stash of owl goodies!

I got three of those black owl picture frames, a bathroom set, a placemat and table set complete with mug. A cushion to add to my collection, some new magnets to replace the ones that broke and an awesome cookie jar that is coming up to my crafting area. I am undecided if it will hold craft supplies or sweets.

 Now I am off to bed to listen to the rain on my tin roof. Rainy Christmas Days seem like a new tradition these past couple of years. It sure beats those ridiculous 40 degree temps which are the norm. I hope everyone has a fantastic Christmas filled with fun, laughter and family.

Happy Birthday Jesus.

Snowman Bunting

Now that my partner for the Christmas swap has received my package I can share a project that I absolutely loved working on. The Snowman Christmas Bunting pattern by Wendy Poole has been sitting in my Ravelry library for a long time just waiting for the right incentive to get it started. The Christmas Swap was an obvious choice.

 As I still had a few other things to work on, I decided to make the bunting smaller so the project would go faster. 

I had myself a little helper.

Nothing major. Just decreasing at both 

ends of a row instead of just one for the bunting and using the head pattern of the snowman for its body and using a shorter stitch for its head. The proportions turned out great for the modified bunting.

 I also changed up the scarf and only used one of the pieces on each snowman to give him a windswept scarf. 

I was very proud of the way he turned out. The sewing felt like it would never end, but I think that may be because its my least favourite part of crochet.

 Eventually I managed to have a very cute bunting that my kids did not want to part with.

Luckily it's new owners love it as much as we do. Of course the bunting didn't get sent to England on its own. I unfortunately didn't take a photo of everything I sent over, but I remembered to take photos of the crocheted items.

Here is the Chevron Cowl by Melissa Campbell of Totally Stitching. You can find her over on Ravelry. I made it in my favourite Bernat Mosiac yarn. I love the softness of this self striping yarn.

The other thing I made was a couple of six inch squares for Caroline's friendship-ghan. I made them in her favourite colours and with flowers just as was requested.

I hope they fit into her afghan nicely. I had a ball working all the gifts for the package and got a lovely new friend to boot!

 Thank you Caroline for being such an awesome swap partner.

Stormy Days and Crochet...

...makes for a pretty good day to me I think. Well that was before I came down with a bug so I have packed up my swap partners crochet until I feel better.

 Lucky for me, my swap partner over at The Global Square Exchange on Ravelry was on top of things and she sent out my package very quickly. I was amazed at how fast it came over from the UK. Naturally mine will be sent out just before the deadline!

 I am totally in love with my little package. My partner Caroline managed to incorporate everything I love into my package. Crochet, cottages, Jane Austen and my newest love, Dr Who. 

 Part of our list of things to send was two squares of our partners choice. My requested squares were for 6" flower squares, the flowers could be any colours but the background was to be brown. My partner sent me the perfect squares.

As well as the perfect everything else.

I have not put my Christmas tree up yet so my crochet pudding and felt star are hanging up at my attic window.

 Note: Can you believe we now have two discount shops in town and I can not buy felt anywhere! I asked if they were planning to restock and they said they were not sure. Where is a crafty lady meant to get her supplies quickly?

 

A lavender bookmark cross stitch kit!

A Jane Austen fridge magnet with one of her most famous Pride and Prejudice quotes. Plus a little book filled with quotes from her books. I adore the illustrations. They would make the perfect paper cutting designs. 

If you don't know what paper cutting is, you must check it out! I'm asking Santa for a starter kit. http://www.paperpanda.bigcartel.com/

This is my gorgeous embroidery cottage. Caroline chose it for me because it reminds her of a cottage in the woods near her home where she frequently has family picnics. If that didn't make me envious enough she then went on to explain how these woods surround a large manor house that was a filming location for Pride and Prejudice! I jumped on Google and straight away recognised Basildon Park as the exterior shots of Netherfield Park in the 2005 film. Exciting stuff!

Here it is in its final resting place above my crafting table so I can admire it daily.

 Along with all these goodies I received chocolate and tea which did not last long enough for photo time. Caroline also sent all of my little family a Dr Who figurine each. 

 

Before handing out their packets I made them promise that if any of them got the 10th Doctor they had to swap with me. I was lucky enough to find my Doctor in my packet so no swapping necessary. There was a little disappointment when no one had the 11th Doctor and more so when my 9th Doctor loving youngest daughter found out her brother got her Doctor. As my kids have yet to see the older seasons, I had to assure her that the Doctor figurine she received was pretty awesome from what I could remember of my childhood viewing.

The 10th Doctor takes his job of protecting my owl money box seriously!

 Thank you Caroline for being such an awesome swap partner. I hope that you enjoy my package as much as I did yours when I finally get it finished and sent out.

Setting up the Crafting Area

My youngest three children have called the attic home ever since we moved here at the beginning of last year. A few weeks ago they started talking about swapping rooms around. My eldest son has the biggest room in the house, which I didn't mind because I fell in love with my quaint little room off the kitchen. It is made of brick and light paneling. Has huge shelves to store my yarn and an old ornamental fireplace.

 That was until around this time last year when I brought myself a sewing machine and dreamt of setting up a crafting area that was big enough to keep the sewing machine set up permanently. My son, who is also attached to his room (he has the big tv unit and his own lounge) adamantly refused to swap. Short of changing rooms while he was at school ( that furniture is heavy and I wasn't that desperate) I figured I'd have to wait until some kids left home to have the privilege of my own crafting oasis.

 That was until my eldest daughter who has a great imagination, found out we have a cellar under our house and the hatch to get there was somewhere under the carpet in my room. She convinced my youngest daughter to move into the room with her and my eldest son was happy to have his little brother share his bunk bed. Which left them to convince me. Not that I needed convincing. A whole attic to myself! I just like hearing their arguments for the move.

 My only concern was how I was going to get my queen size mattress up my steep steps and where I was going to put my faithful old recliner. It is way too heavy to attempt putting it upstairs unfortunately.

But where there's a will, there's a way. I am not exaggerating when I say that mattress was dragged up those stairs almost folded in half when we reached the corner section. I thought for sure someone would tumble down the stairs or that i would never be able to stand up straight again. My poor back felt the strain. But eventually we managed to get it up the stairs. 

 That night, with only the beds having been swapped over, I dreamed if how I was going to set up my attic. It runs the length of the house and even though it is all open, it gives three distinctive spaces. One side of the attic gets more light then the other so it has become my crafting area. Or at least the beginning of one. The furtherest space is my sleeping area and in the middle is a small sitting area where I have my old small tv.

My old recliner went into the lounge room and I have one of the seats from my corner lounge upstairs. It is nowhere near finished being set up, but I'm enjoying my little hide away.

 Of course if I didn't keep getting distracted by all the pretty I would be able to get it finished. 

Next up on my list is carting all my bags of yarn upstairs and getting them set up in my book cases. 

 Here's a little peak at what's been done so far.

I can't wait to get it finished!

Little Lovelies for Little Ladies

At the beginning of the year I made a cute lovebug for my friends daughter. Of course it then sat on my mantle for many a month waiting to be sent to its new little owner over in the UK. Then it sat a little longer still. 

 Fast forward to several weeks ago and my friend had sent out a request to her Aussie friends for someone to send her cute toddler daughter a stuffed koala. Said toddler had received a koala chocolate in the mail and fell in love with our native furry mammal. I jumped at the chance. A couple of weeks previously I had seen talking koalas for sale in my local post office and had thought of my friends two little girls. I figured it would also get me to finally send the lovebug that was still sitting on my mantle piece. 

 Well today the little ladies package finally went out. The lovebug will now get its hugs from the littlest sister while I know the bigger sister will love her koala. 

 Of course I sent a few extra things for the girls. I remembered that when I was growing up we all had little koalas that could grab on to things using a little mechanism in the back to make him open his claws. We had ours holding on to the curtain so it looked like it was climbing it, or attached to our dressing table mirror. I managed to find them quite easily on Ebay. I sent over one each for the girls so their mum could find something for them to cling on to until the girls are old enough to play with them.

 I hope the girls get as much fun out of their package as I did putting it together!

Scary Cute Graphghan

Back in September I agreed to make a Monster High graphghan for the daughter of a great friend for Christmas. I started off well but other projects and life in general slowed me down considerably.

 Fast forward to today and I am only 30 rows in with another 117 to go. 

The pattern is quite a nightmare. When I ran the photo through knit pro 2.0

 http://www.microrevolt.org/knitPro/  

 it didn't come out as clear as I would have liked because the photo was too detailed. So now I am spending quite a big chunk of time modifying as I go or pulling out the graph paper and fully reworking sections that are necessary but blurry. 

I figure that to get this finished before Christmas I need to find at least two hours a day to just concentrate on this. All other crochet projects are completed until after Christmas so it should be fine. Right? Hopefully there will not be too many stuff ups along the way. I love how bright and gorgeous it is looking. Fingers crossed I'm up to the challenge. Wish me luck!

I'm Back!

Being without a computer really sucks when you want to blog. Trying to write a blog on the iphone is stressful. Especially if the iphone is like mine and likes to protest the abuse it unintentionally recieves. I'm sure it limits my use by frequently freezing on purpose. So this week I managed to get myself a tablet on the cheap. I am enjoying it so far except for its short battery life. Today a message popped up on screen saying to plug in my charger because I only had 14% battery life left. About 90 seconds later the tablet shut off! What is with that?

It has been a whole six months since my last post. Even though I have been crocheting in that time, I have only managed to complete one project. I joined a scarf/cowl swap on the 'Our crochet and furbabies' facebook page. I picked out a gorgeous cowl on Ravelry called the Chevron Infinity Cowl by Pam Daley Designs. I used Bernat Mosaic in Fantasy and fell in love with both the yarn and the pattern. As a bonus my swap partner also loved it!
In return my partner sent me a wonderfully soft scarf. I have no idea what the yarn is called but it is a verigated thicker yarn with eyelash yarn incorporated into it. I have a very hard time keeping my daughter from walking off with it!

Puppy Cuddles

No crochet updates today. Just cuteness!

Projects and Puppies

One of the things I love about working in a nursing home is that when one of your family members are sick you are not allowed back to work for 48 hours after the last episode. Most single mums stress over what they are going to do with their sick kids during work hours while we have the comfort of knowing I will always be able to stay with them.
Last week my DD came down with a bug. It didn't last very long but with the 48 hour rule I got in a few days of much needed crochet time without the constant interruptions of, "Muummm" coming from upstairs. It was a very productive time.
Some of the projects are going oversea's so I can not post photo's yet. This is what I can show you.
My temperature scarf with February completed. I really must get onto those ends. As you can see we have not had much difference in our temps for February compared to January.

This gorgeous love bug ami. It will soon be sent overseas to a very cute two year old. It is meant to have a heart on it's belly but it would not go on straight no matter how many times I tried. In the end I decided to leave it off instead of somehow destroying my very first completed ami project.

An American friend had a little baby boy last month and I am making a car seat blanket for him. I received the yarn for it yesterday morning but had promised myself that I would finish a granny square for my swap partner before I started. Luckily the square was finished in no time. This was how far I got on the blanket yesterday. I am loving the bright colors and I'm hoping bubba will love the visual stimulation.

The other exciting news is that my gorgeous maltese x shihtzu girl had her puppies on the 1st of March. A date I will not forget as my eldest DD keeps reminding me they share a birthday with Ron Weasley from Harry Potter.
My Missy had three gorgeous girls. We have decided to keep the brown and tan one. Her name is Coco and Molly the white and black one will be going to join my mums family. The cute white and brown one might be going home with one of my work mates as a surprise for her newly widowed mum.
They are quite the handful. Climbing out of their bed and I was surprised to find them already wrestling. Not being able to see or hear hasn't stopped them. Perhaps the cutest thing is the way they sleep together though. We are very excited to watch them grow over the next couple of months.

EDITED TO ADD: The car seat blanket pattern can be found at http://www.anniescatalog.com/detail.html?prod_id=88170

Bernat CAL: Temperature Scarf-January

I was excited to see this years Bernat CAL/KAL. Last years mystery blanket still sits unfinished until I can find some time in my busy schedule. So to find this year that we get to work on it all year is great.

As per usual I was late to the game but the official starting date was February 1st. I sat down to figure out the lowest and highest temps in my town over a year. Broke it down into 5.c increments and then used a colour wheel that has warm to cool colours and picked my colours accordingly. I ordered my Caron Simply Soft yarn in ten colours and it was delivered a few days later.
My colours are:
Raspberry
Strawberry
Persimmon
Melon
Lemonade
Sage
Lt Country Blue
Berry Blue
Dk Country Blue and
Vanilla for a border colour.
If I followed the directions to the letter I would have a ridiculously long scarf at the end of 365 days. I have decided to only work one row each day not two to make a more manageable scarf. I am loving the progress I have made on it. As well as the fact that I am up to date. Let's hope I can stay that way!

Polish Delights

Earlier in the week I received a gorgeous package in the mail all the way from Poland as part of the Holiday RAOK on Crochetville.

In the few years I have been a member at the 'Ville I have received packages from several different countries, but this was the first time I have received anything from Poland. To say I was excited was an understatement!
In the package was some gorgeous handmade gifts. A miniature felt stocking with the cutest snowman applique and pom poms. Three gorgeous snowflakes and a card with a beautiful angel attached to the front. They go so well together that it will be a shame to separate them this Christmas for the few weeks the angel will be adorning my tree.
Thank you so much my new friend. You do beautiful work!

Yesterday we spent a couple of hours pulling down our tree and the other decorations. I always feel a little flat at this time of year after the excited anticipation dies away. My children were feeling the same, albeit for a different reason. My youngest son commented that he wished it was Christmas every week; that way he will get new toys every week. I mentally patted myself on the back when my eldest son lectured him on how Christmas isn't about material things, then ruined it by finishing with, "but that would be awesome." I told them that if they wanted Christmas to last longer this year we could do it. My two eldest children, who know Santa doesn't exist, were thrilled with the idea. At least until I told them that this year they could open one present a week and see how many weeks it lasted. That idea didn't go down too well. Instead we decided that once a month we will do a Christmas decoration craft while listening to carols and snacking on fruit cake.

I hope everyone had a fantastic Christmas and New Year!