A Special Bear for Thomas

We have been given some gifts from several close friends and family, including this bear from Megan! Here are a couple of images of what he has been up to lately.

He is a special bear, his tag says his name is "Ellerslie". I think he is around the same size Thomas is at the moment, maybe even a little bigger. We're not allowed to put anything with Tom inside the humidicrib just yet. I did put the blue boy doll inside for a moment just to take a photo, but it wasn't in there for long. Because Tom was born so early, he has to stay in a special crib where it is easy for him to breathe, and keep cosy and warm. We are allowed to take him out to feed him like you can see David doing here, but after that he goes back in his crib.

So Ellerslie has been hanging out with me to keep me company while I was in hospital, and he was excellent company too! <<< Here he is looking after my eye mask when I wasn't wearing it. >>> Here is another photo of teddy with my comfy green neck pillow. I think he was "looking after it", too! Ellerslie is wearing the special yellow beanie that Tom was wearing in his first photo, as it is just the right fit!

Thankyou to Megan for this special gift, Ellerslie the teddy bear is sure to be part of the action!

To catch a dream (three small things)

The last two weeks have been surreal to say the least, like a walking dream or day-mare. Some thoughtful soul gave this special beanie to David to give to me, it's what Thomas was wearing in the photo that was taken on his first day. Someone even printed up the photo so I could have it in my room. I didn't see Tom until the second day as I left the ICU to go to the maternity ward. I clung to this special little yellow beanie during my stay while I was away from my baby, I even imagined it smelled like him! I give thanks to the person who made and donated the beanie, and to the person who took the photos of Thomas wearing it, and also to the person who thought I might like to keep it when our baby went into the humidicrib and no longer needed to wear a beanie.

While we were in the maternity ward, on the meal tray was a paddle pop stick. We guessed they were meant to be for stirring tea and coffee, which we thought was a waste of wood. Imagine throwing all those not needed paddle pops away? What a waste of trees! So I collected a few and made some into dream catchers to pass the time. When we left the maternity ward and David went home to sleep, I told him to take the brown dream catcher to place above his bed. It is meant to be for good luck in catching your dreams so they can come true. I learnt how to make these from school, you just weave wool in and out, around the sticks.

Three Small Things - dishcloth, heart, face washer

green edged blue face cloth

 

>>> Here is a face cloth that I edged last night, I simply did one round of double crochet (US sc). This cloth came in a gift pack from the hospital where Tom is staying and it was perfect for a quick edge treatment! I nearly did the edge in blue but decided that would be too boring so did it in a contrasting green instead! The single row looks less frilly I think, so will go well in our growing stash of baby boy goodies. I vowed years ago never to edge face washers with crochet but I succumb to the urge this year while teaching myself crochet. So far I've edged a pair of white with purple, and a pair of pink with pink!EDIT - this is the cloth my toddling son through down the toilet - winter 2012

tiny two round heart, free pattern at Suzie's Stuff

<<< I whipped up this variation of Suzetta's small heart earlier this month. This one has a second round so you can have two colours like I have here. For this one I used my 1.75mm hook. I think this is my favourite heart pattern, thankyou Suzie! I first had a go at this pattern back in January when I was teaching myself how to read crochet patterns, and I've come back to this pattern several times so far.

small ridged dish cloth in cotton

>>> Here is a small ridged green cotton dishcloth that I did up earlier this month using a 4mm hook and the last of the cotton in this colour. I now have two dish cloths this colour, the other green dishcloth I made up last month.  The ridged stitch is at crochetspot.

Handmade Christmas Card 2010

In case anyone is wondering where I have been, I have been recovering from an emergency caesarean to deliver our baby boy, whom we have named Thomas!

All I can say right now is that this has been an incredibly humbling experience, and both David and I are still shell shocked. We are still coming to terms with the fact our baby is born. On Monday the 13th I went to my G.P. to get some abdominal pain checked out, which turned out to be pre-eclampsia. By midday the next day I was being wheeled into theatre for an urgent c-section. Thomas was born on Tuesday the 14th December at one minute to one weighing 1.250kg. I like the neatness of the numbers of his date - 14.12.10

The steroid injections they gave me to help his lungs develop worked very well, as he didn't need any assistance breathing, despite being born at 31 weeks gestation. He is being fed formula, and just in case anyone is out there thinking I should have breast fed, believe me please I wanted to and tried very hard, but it wasn't to be. He has started putting on weight every day and the nurses in the special care unit are very happy with him, telling us he is a sprightly little one with lots of spirit.

Here are two pictures of the lovely card they made for us, it's so very special. An imprint of his feet in the card makes this a very thoughtful gift for us. The hospital also gave us a stocking of cute little toys and baby clothes, they are so kind.

I can't help but wonder, when I think of the staff at the hospital that saved us (if they didn't perform the operation we both would have died), that I was amongst angels. These people had what I like to call 'Hudson River Pilot' coolness and professionalism. Being part of it has been very humbling indeed.

Racey Rocket!

David and I are so very keen on our rocket this year! Last year we had just 6 plants from a nursery which seeded at the end of summer. We planted those seeds and are now starting to harvest our first crop! <<< Here is a photo of those very first 6 plants we bought from the shop. We didn't get much harvest from these 6 little plants, but we did enjoy immensely what we did manage to get.

When they seeded I carefully harvested all the seeds and put them in a brown paper bag to wait for the next spring. We ended up planting them on Sunday 24th October. They astounded us by shooting up within three days of planting, the weather was very warm and humid at the time. Here are our rocket babies at 5 days old. >>>

<<< But alas! Grubs were eating our rocket by 3 weeks! We decided the safest, healthiest way to remove them was by hand. The rocket should be ready to eat in just a few short weeks and we really didn't want to put poison on it! The grubs were a pretty green colour the same as the leaves so they were hard to spot. In the end we found them all but it took a few days, we guess we found about a dozen grubs.

>>> Here is our rocket at 4 weeks, you can lightly run your hand across the leaves and the smell of fresh rocket wafts up to you straight away. Its very fragrant and fresh. We made a chicken wire cage at week 4 in case any bigger predators like birds or lizards decided they wanted to eat our rocket. It's sitting on our outdoor table at the moment, so we can keep an eye out for any more grubs!

<<< At 5 weeks our rocket looks good enough to eat, so we did! It's best you don't leave it too long, or the leaves get too bitter. But we like the peppery taste to the crisp leaves. It's just so much nicer to pick a few leaves of greenery from the garden as you want them, better than buying a lettuce from the shop and having it wilt on you the very next day. I hate buying lettuce, it just seems like such a waste. Over the last 5 weeks, I think David fertilised a couple of times using an organic seaweed mixture.

>>> Here is our very first lunch with our first rocket of 2010! My sandwich is the one with the cucumber, David hates cucumber! What's up with that? Who knows, but at least we both love rocket!
/nomnomnom

Pink and Purple Dolly Blankie

It's my niece's 4th birthday today, and on her wishlist was a 'Barbie Doll Blanket', so I hope this is what she had in mind!

The rug should be pink and purple, apparently. Luckily I had just enough of these colours in my scrap bag to make it. I used up the tiny bit of variated white wool left over from my flowers baby rug, and the bit left over purple dimples yarn which I also used for the purple baby jacket. For the pink flowers,
I had a small bit of yarn left over from my childhood when my mum had taught me how to crochet, so that wool is very special, as I've been carrying it around with me for a very long time! For the jazzy edge I used a bit of fluffy yarn my mum gave me last year some time. All of these yarns are probably acrylic. If this rug needs a wash, it would need to be gentle or it might fall apart.  It would be best to spot clean it, or a gentle hand wash in cool water and gentle detergent, drying flat in shade should be ok.


It took me a couple of hours to do up the 24 tiny granny squares, then a couple of hours to stitch them all together. I find stitching granny squares together the most tedious, there doesn't seem to be a quick enough way to do it. I used some cotton and a big needle and tried to get it done in an efficient time. Putting the cute fluffy edge on it only took a few minutes in comparison. I used a 3.5mm hook and the end result measures 18cm x 28cm, just big enough for a Barbie to be able to use as a blankie!

I hope my niece enjoys the things I've made for her this year, which includes everything I made for yesterday's post, as well as the child's cotton sun hat and the pretty pink and purple bag!
<3 <3 <3

How to make shoes for a flat-footed Barbie

My niece is turning 4 soon, and an order for new shoes for her flat footed Barbie has arrived so I set to work!

a pair of orange sandals for a flat footed Barbie doll

two pairs of shoes for a flat-footed Barbie

These are now the 3rd and 4th pair I've made for flat footed Barbie dolls. The shoes for these flat feet are very hard to find, and when you do find them, they are overpriced. So I make my own, and it's very easy. The first pair of flat-footed shoes I made were these slip on pink shoes which went to Darwin with my niece. The second pair I made were these orange sandals with ankle strap, which were for a flat footed doll I picked up at an op shop for $1. I'm most happy with those ones, they worked out quite well.

To make these doll shoes, I use some recycled black vinyl, I can't even remember where I picked it up from. You sometimes can find this on packaging or old things you might throw away, so keep an eye out for it, you don't need much. Any kind of flexible plastic you can pierce with a needle will do. I trace around the soles of the doll's feet to make a paper template, then trace that with white crayon onto the vinyl, and cut out the soles with sharp scissors. Then I pierce the plastic with the largest needle I have, pushing it all the way through, 3 times each side where the shoes strap will go.

I then use my 1.25mm crochet hook, and push that through the needle holes to make sure they are big enough. Then using fine crochet cotton, the first row is three single stitches (UK dc), then 4 rows of 2 ch 3 dc (UK trbl). The last row is some slip stitches and singles again to attach to the other side. Sometimes I'll add an ankle strap of chain stitches like I did with these red ones. I always put the shoes on before finishing the final stitch to make sure they'll fit. They don't take long to do, especially as I chose not to spend too much time fiddling on these ones.

In the package I'm sending to Darwin, I'm also popping in some doll knickers which I made ages ago using a pattern I found at crochetville. I'm not happy with them, they have ties but I'll pop them in the package none the less.

So I had a go at making my own Barbie doll knickers, they are 'boyleg hipsters' so very easy to make. They simply pull on and sit on the hips, which will be easier for my 4 year old niece to dress her doll.

My own pattern for Barbie doll 'boyleg hipsters'
1. ch 28, sl st to form ring, treble into ea ch (US dc), sl st, do not turn, 28 stitches
2. ch 2, treble into ea treble (US dc), sl st, do not turn, 28 stitches
3. ch 2, treble ea into next 5 treble, turn
4. sl st into next treble, ch 2, treble into next 2 treble, turn
5. ch 2, treble ea in next 2 treble, sl st into 3 trebles on opposite side of ring to form two leg holes
fasten off and turn inside out to hide the seam at the crotch.

Then I just had to make a simple pull on party dress, didn't I?
My own pattern for a pull-on dress for Barbie
* using 3.5mm hook, gauge depends on the yarn and how many stitches it takes to go around the chest, check every few rows to check fit.
1. ch enough ch to go around chest, sl st to form ring, pull on over hips up to chest to check fit, ch 2, trb in ea trb (US dc), sl st in 1st trb, 23 trb
2. ch 2, trb in ea trb, sl st in 1st trb, 23 trb
3 - 8 repeat row 2
9. ch 2, 2 trb in ea trb, sl st in 1st trb, 46 trb
10. ch 2, 2 trb in ea trb, sl st in 1st trb, 92 trb
11. ch 2, 1 trb in ea trb, sl st in 1st trb, 92 trb
12. in bottom of row 1 using contrast yarn, ch 1, dc (US sc)  in bottom of ea trb, sl st in 1st ch, fasten off

Summer Drinks "Frangipani" Coasters

This is the last coaster set I'll do for now. I guess if anyone else wants one, I'll just get some more cotton and make more! But next time I buy cotton, I'll get some red, pink and purple so I can get different colour combinations. Below is a photo of the colours I used for this gift giving season.

It's fun to think of a name, a scene or season to match the colours and vice versa. I have done this last set because these three colours to me say 'frangipani' and I had enough of these colours left over. When I lived in Darwin there were a lot of frangipani trees about. They would loose all their leaves in the dry season, which is the north Australian equivalent of winter, but it really doesn't get very cold at all. Then as the wet season approaches, the trees would become full of flowers and the smell was gorgeous. Most of them were the yellow and white variety, some had a light blush of pink. And very rarely, there was a deep red variety which didn't seem to grow as thick but had the rich fragrance of a rose and was very special. The blue in this set represents the clear blue skies of the Darwin dry season.

I do not recommended this coaster set for red wine drinkers, as it's mostly white and yellow. If you spill red wine on these, soak in cool water immediately. Here are some more tips on how to remove red wine stains from cotton.

Next, to make some Christmas decorations and practice baking some home-made treats to share as gifts!

Seasonal Drinks "Winter" & "Spring" Coasters

Here are two more sets for my Seasonal Drinks coasters collection, Winter and Spring.

I borrowed inspiration from google images of  winter colours and spring colours. I could have used other colours than I did of course, but I looked at what I had and went with that. These winter colours are not of a typical Australian winter, but include lots of white for snow. We do get snow in Australia, but only in certain parts and not where I have ever lived in my life! The winter set also has some green for the evergreen trees and royal blue, which represents the long hours of twilight.

Spring is bright and cheery with mostly yellow, and some light blue and green. The blue represents the clear blue skies we got here early this spring, with green to stand for new growth. Yellow is for the new spring flowers and sunlight starting to warm things up. Choose darker coloured coasters when drinking red wine.

I now have made seven sets of coasters, I might have enough to give as gifts to various people. But then again, I might make just one more set ...

Seasonal Drinks "Summer" & "Autumn" Coasters

These are the first two sets of my Seasonal Drinks coasters!

For these ones, I picked seasonal colours for 'traditional' seasons, just due to the ease of what to call them and the colours to choose. Both of these coaster sets have the added bonus of bringing good luck and prosperity to the home due to the circular golden motifs, which represents money and coins.

The colours in my summer set of coasters represent the cool blue of swimming pools, backyard green lawns and lots of orange juice! I found inspiration on google images for Summer colours.

Autumn also had to have some orange, with a little bit of golden and green. Again, I found inspiration on google images, this time for Autumn colours. As often found in collections of Autumn colours, these represent the turning of the leaves from green to golden, to then dull and fall upon the ground, loosing the bright colour as winter approaches ...

Coming next - Seasonal Coasters "Winter" & "Spring"

Summer Drinks "Sandy Beach" & "River Boat" Coasters

Here are the second and third sets I've made for this Summer Drinks coaster collection, I call these colour combos "Sandy Beach" & "River Boat".

Sandy Beach is mostly light blue, for the shallow ocean. Sand is the second colour for the beach and white is for the waves. Or maybe it is white for the seagulls and shells?

A simple thing is choosing 3 colours to make a set of coasters, but these have an extra thought and meaning, to help transport the imagination on those hot summer days!

Navy and white are common sailor stripe colours and is the theme of the upholstery on our "River Boat", and of course it has timber decking!

Washing instructions are ‘Hand wash, do not bleach, dry flat in shade’. Choose the darker coloured coasters when drinking red wine.

Enjoy!

Summer Drinks "Deep Sea" Coasters

Here is the first set of six coasters I am making to give as Christmas gifts. I hope the recipients don't think they are too silly!

I'm thinking each set will have 3 colours, a major, a minor and a highlight, which tells the story of a scene or season. This first one is called "Deep Sea". The major colour is dark blue for the deepest part of the ocean, the minor colour of light blue is for the shallows, with a little white highlight for the tips of the waves. No two coasters are the same, neither are any two coasters a negative image of each other. The even number of coasters with random patterns reflecting both order and chaos in natural landscapes.

After trying out a couple of different patterns, this one is my favourite coaster pattern from Crochetspot. I used a 4.5mm hook for this, and thick 5 ply  COTON-A made by Sullivans, which is a 60% cotton blend with acrylic. Washing instructions are 'Hand wash, do not bleach, dry flat in shade'. I would say to avoid putting red wine or coffee mugs on very light colours like the white.

Making these were a lot of fun to do. Oh no! I think I'm going to make a few more ...

Pretty Irish Rose for a Sunhat

I had a go at adding a flower to the child's sun-hat I made the other day, using a tradition Irish Rose pattern. I think the end result is very cute, if I do say so myself!

I wasn't sure how the colour changes would go, but it worked out fine. I changed colour after doing the back posts and chain foundations for the next row. I made a 6th petal, although the pattern I followed had 5, as I prefer it this way. A couple of buttons added to the centre provided just the right amount of embellishment. I'm glad a couple more of my homeless buttons have found a new home. This flower is not removable like my other flowers I make for hats, I just sewed it right on securing it tightly.

I wonder if my 4 year old niece would like this hat? I don't know anyone else this would fit, and it would be a shame if no one wore it, it's just too nice!

Three Small Things - soap saver, dishcloth, square motif

<<< I don't really understand why I woke one morning thinking I needed to make a soap saver for the laundry soap, but I did! I don't usually use these things, but the soap I have in the laundry at the moment was a gift and really needed one as it was making a mess. I didn't follow a pattern as it's a pretty basic shape, but I did look at crochetspot and google for some inspiration, and used my thick cotton and a 4mm hook. I got the idea of continuing the first round all the way round the bottom of the first row from the free pattern at crochetspot, there are also pictures and patterns of other soap savers there. I've tested it out, so far so good. The plan is, when you get the little shards of soap left over at the end you keep them in the bag so you don't waste them. Very thrifty, I like it!

>>> I have been working on a spiral dishcloth using the same aqua cotton as my first cotton dishcloth, but I'm not happy with it so it's currently in my pile of unfinished projects. I bought some 'amalfi' yarn from Lincraft for $4, which is 100% cotton. I think the choice of colours look 'dishclothy', if there is such a thing, so chose the aqua greenish one. This time I made a bigger version of the basketweave dishcloth, as David asked for a bigger one. This used most of the 50g ball, there isn't enough left to make another one this size. Consolation is that this cloth can be washed and reused for quite a while, so I can get my money and effort's worth out of it. This didn't take long to do, I used a new bamboo 3.5mm I thought to try for fun. I found working with the bamboo hook that it stuck a little, and is not as smooth as using a metal one. The final product measures 22cm x 18cm.

<<< I tried this square motif, I'm thinking of using it to make some baby play cubes. This coaster pattern is at crochetspot.

My Piano, November 2010 Update

I need to keep a record of what's been happening with my piano, as every time someone comes to look at it, I forget what work has been done!

My 15 year old Alex Steinbach piano got it's first tuning in about 4 or 5 years this week, which is a bit sad. I had left it to wallow for that time while I had other things on my mind, like sorting out my life! For the record, I bought my piano new in 1994 or 1995 for $3995, and it was shipped to Darwin from Tasmania. While in Darwin I looked after it pretty well, getting it tuned every year, sometimes twice due to the monsoonal humidity. After I separated from my husband, the piano sat at my friend Nikki's house for a year or so, from there the piano was trucked to Brisbane around 2005 for the cost of $880.

While living on the north-side of Brisbane I got it tuned once, and I vaguely remember that tuner saying something about silverfish and a broken string, he left some insect repellents in there which was removed this time around. I started looking for a south-side piano tuner about 12 months ago and it's taken me this long to get up the courage to get someone in. I narrowed my search to tuners registered at the APTTA site for Queensland. I really wanted to get it done before I was 20 weeks pregnant, because that's when the baby can hear in the womb, but I am 28 weeks now so I have left it a bit late.

So last week the piano tuner I had decided upon, a local musician called Martin Holmes, comes in and says it's not worth tuning because all the felts on the keys have been eaten, probably by silverfish, and need to be replaced first. This of course tripled the price and really threw me at the time, although in hindsight it shouldn't have surprised me that much. It has been sitting idle for a long time, afterall.  I was very nervous that this man unknown to me was taking out all my keys, to take away and refit some new felts, which apparently is a very fine and detailed job to do, and would take more than the weekend to complete. I had to utilise several anti-worry techniques that I've been taught this year  by my counsellor to get through the week, lol!

So this time around, the key bushes have been re-felted by hand. A string has broken and will need to be replaced when the part arrives in a week or two. There is a spare broken string wound up in the bottom of the piano which might have been the original of another string which had been replaced at some earlier date. The piano has been vacuumed out, so next time we can see any new dust. Thankfully, the piano is sounding very nice again, I think Martin has done a good job, and I can't wait to get stuck back into my playing.

Now it's finally done, and I can start with my planned repertoire of children's songs, a basic piano course and some improvisation. As long as I don't need that bottom A with the broken string too much over the next fortnight, I should be right!

Child's Cotton Sunhat

Because I had to cancel going to craft group today due to the piano repairs, I went to Lincraft yesterday instead. While there, I picked up a pattern book and some cotton for some new projects, including this child's sunhat, which I finished just this morning.

This is the last of 25 patterns in a book I picked up from Lincraft called 'cute clothes for kids' by Sue Whiting. The book looked pretty comprehensive, and I didn't think it was too expensive, so I grabbed it. Flicking through it, I was reminded how I didn't make any hats for my sister's children as they were going back to Darwin and had no need for woollen beanies up there. My sister had suggested I make my niece a sunhat, so now I have given it a go using this pattern. I found some cotton blend at Lincraft, not 100% cotton unfortunately, its a 50% cotton 50% arcylic blend, but I'm very happy with the colours and how they go together.  I chose white, pink, purple and a light brown colour. For this I used a 4mm hook, and I think it took me about 3 hours, it really wasn't hard to do. The pattern says it fits a 2 to 4 year old.

Now I'm trying to decide if I want to add a big floppy flower to it, or is it better as it is? Luckily, I have some of the cotton left so I can make a flower, or perhaps a matching bag as suggested in the book.

Round Blue Baby Rug

This round blue baby rug seemed to take ages! I'm so happy I've finally finished it, although it's ended up a bit smaller than I thought it would be at 56cm across.

I got the idea for this one from crochetspot, they were saying round is a good shape for baby rugs. I didn't follow a pattern, I just looked at the photo for inspiration. I had already gotten a fair way into it when I realised I had 13 segements instead of 12. I couldn't believe it (wait a minute - I know how to count)! I figured it would be ok and just kept going. Maybe 13 is a lucky number in this case, well that's what I've decided anyway. This is the same pattern I used for the simple spiral white doily I finished last week, except for this rug I edged it with 5 trbl scallops. The reason it took so long is because, yet again, I used a 3mm hook and fine baby wool. Really, when I make a rug I should use a big hook and thick wool, then it won't take so very long. I must have been working on this for a month or two, using nearly 3 x 50g balls of the blue 100% Australian merino wool I got on special from Lincraft.

This year I've really gotten 'hooked' on completing projects. I don't like how I start something and have incomplete projects around, although of course I do have some of those! I just felt a need to finish this one so I can get some Chrissie presents done - now I just have to figure what I could make as gifts that will be practical and nice, that they might like and not hate!