Fantastic Mr. Fox

Today is my lovely husband's Birthday - his 30th no less, so I wanted to make him something extra special, foxy special.

If you are a fan of the Simpsons then you too may have seen the episode with the lemon tree and remember Homer shouting at one point that he was "Cunning, like a fox!" Well for some reason everything is ..... like a fox! for my husband (he has been "sleepy, like a fox" and "hungry, like a fox" even "Ferocious, like a fox") so I've been toying with the idea of making him a fox for some time.

Then I came across the fantastic blog tiny owl knits by Anja who makes the most perfect Amigurumi that I've ever seen and I fell in love with her tiny fox. Unfortunately she was at that point no longer selling copies of the pattern for her fox and so in desperation I sent her a message asking if she minded my trying to make my own fox based on her photos. She then very kindly sent me a copy of her pattern for free and I was able to make up this fox from the great instructions in that.

If you too would like to make yourself one of these exceptionally cute foxes then you will be happy to know that she is now selling the pattern again as a Ravelry download so head over there now and buy yourself a copy of it.

Friday book review

"Finishing techniques for crochet" by Betty Barnden
ISBN: 978-1844484348

This lovely new (published this year) crochet book has just arrived in our local Library and I was very lucky to be the first person to snatch it up. After being a crocheter for so many years it still surprises me that there is still so much left for me to learn about it, and this book has some fantastic tips and tricks to share that will be of help to new and experienced crocheters alike.

Even though this title is aimed at those who already crochet to help them achieve a more professional finish with their work there is a really good section at the back with all the crochet basics that you would need as a beginner which includes clear photos of the steps in the stitches and even close ups for showing where to insert the hook when working into the foundation chain.

Within this book there are answers to all the technical questions that other crochet books don't answer or gloss over like: Just how do you join your crochet item together? (there are tips on weaving in the loose ends, four different ways of sewing different types of seams as well as working different crochet seams), and how do you go about blocking your work at the end? How do I work a button hole? and how do I put in a zip?

This book touches on a large number of different crochet techniques from filet crochet, working with beads, doing surface crochet, changing colours to produce pictures, felting crochet and adding embroidery to crochet all of which should give you lots of ideas for taking your work further and producing more individual pieces. There is a section in the book with patterns for different crochet edgings, as well as another section which has trims and other motif patterns.

Then you come to the final section, a small set of simple patterns for some basic crochet items like bags, hats and jumpers which each include notes on how you can modify the patterns to create unique items to suit your own taste. There is a rather sweet little child's sweater in here that I'm keen to make for my own little one so I'll let you know how I get on with that if I get around to it.

This is a nicely presented and well thought out book and probably contains information that would be useful for crocheters of any level. I've added it to my wishlist and I look forward to having it on hand to refer to in the crafty years to come.

Happy Halloween!

Yet again Halloween has managed to surprise me... before I knew what was happening it was only a week away and I had some last minute crafting to get done. Thankfully there is a fantastic pattern freely available on the Planetjune blog for these cute little pumpkins so after a bit of frantic crocheting I had these 3 finished and ready to start the Halloween celebrations.

Photo thanks go to my lovely husband who has spent some time fiddling with his new SLR camera to capture these pumpkins in the middle of lighting candles.

Seeing as the pumpkins really took very little time to make at all I also had time to make some very quick Halloween cards to go with them... just a few sheets of black sugar paper, some plain white printer paper and a silver pen and Bob's your uncle I had made some cards.

Now I should just go and dust off the old witches hat, find my broomstick and maybe carve a real pumpkin or two... perhaps I'll even go and do a bit of trick-or-treating too :-)

Happy Halloween everybody!

New arrivals

Just a quick post to show off a couple of crochet bits that are on their way to yet another new baby (for some reason there seems to have been a baby explosion recently so keep an eye out in case it starts raining babies too).

Orinoco is here again to show off my handiwork, you can see him wearing a deep ribbed crochet hat and some cuffed booties both patterns from the "Crocheted gifts in a weekend" book by Nola Theiss.

The pattern for the hat was meant for an older child but after substituting the chunky yarn for a much finer yarn and using a smaller hook the hat should hopefully fit a newborn okay. The ribbing on this hat is lovely and adds a real thickness and warmth to the hat - this will definitely be a pattern that I try again in the future.

Sadly the bootie pattern wasn't nearly as good. The cuffs were supposed to be knitted so the whole pattern was designed around that and required lots of sewing up of separate pieces. They have also turned out to be a little bit flat looking - not nearly as cute as they did in the book.

Friday book review

"The Glass painting book" by Jane Dunsterville
ISBN: 978-0715304280

&

"Glass painting projects" by Jane & John Dunsterville
ISBN: 978-0715308332

Because of my crazy plans to try and craft most of the gifts that I will be giving away for Christmas this year I've gone and spent a lot of money on candles and new glass paint and now find myself slightly short on inspiration of what to paint... which is where Jane Dunsterville comes in with her lovely glass painting books.

Back in 1996 when "The glass painting book" was originally published I was lucky enough to meet Jane Dunsterville at a craft show where she had a stand selling her then new book as well as her own range of glass paints. After spending quite some time gazing at the stall wishfully my mum offered to buy me a copy of the book with a starter kit of paints and that purchase started my love of glass painting.

"The glass painting book" is aimed at beginners and starts out with advice about materials and then the first chapter contains some basic projects which introduce new techniques to help guide you gradually through starting off painting. There is a chapter with projects that focus on using colour, a chapter for more advanced projects which introduces 'special' techniques and a final project chapter about painting on plastic. All the way through the book there are 'design directory' pages which have outlines that you can use to make all the projects listed as well as some variations to try. If you are starting out in glass painting and need some guidance about how to start as well as plenty of inspiration for things to make then this would be a fantastic book for you.

"Glass painting projects: Decorative glass for beautiful interiors" is a more advanced glass painting book and geared towards doing large projects that will be on display in your home. There is much more detail about different techniques including guidance on using adhesive lead on glass panels, applying coloured adhesive (for projects that need to be more weather proof) and guidance on glass etching. The projects range from some lovely projects for painting panels on interior and exterior doors, lamps, some very beautiful painted mirrors and a whole host of other household glass surfaces that could do with making more glamorous. Most of the projects also seem to have a design style period and there are some lovely Art Deco and Rennie Mackintosh projects that I would love to try my hand at. This is a really beautiful book and the projects in here are awe inspiring, if you are thinking of taking your glass painting to the next level then this would be a great book for you to read.

Friday book review

"Crocheted gifts in a weekend" by Nola Theiss
ISBN: 978-0806909714
US crochet terms

When I first learnt to crochet I was given this book as a Birthday present and struggling through the sometimes erratic patterns has taught me a lot about crochet over the years. One of the first things that I made were two of the sweet little ducklings from the duck family pattern and these little guys with their wings that look like floats (as shown in the photo on the right) were so well received that I ended up sticking with crochet instead of doing more knitting. Frank the duck was made much later on, for my husband who for some reason fell in love with the idea of having a crocheted duck.

This book is aimed at both beginners and more experienced crocheters so it has a large range of projects with different levels of difficulty. There is the usual short glossary of stitches at the beginning of the book which also has some very clear black and white diagrams. The projects include patterns for scarves, hats, baby and young children clothes, some rather odd 'for the home items' as well as some lovely crochet toys. There are still projects in this book that I mean to get around to making one day, and even though this book is getting a little dated now (it was originally published in 1995) most of the patterns still seem appealing.

The booties that I always seem to be making are also from this book and are pretty quick and easy to do. After having made a large number of pairs I now find the pattern easy to follow, but some guidance about where to place stitch markers would have been useful first time round.

All in all this crochet book will always stay a firm favourite with me, but before you rush out to find a copy for yourself remember that this isn't necessarily the best written book out there and I have found a number of errors in some of the patterns that I have had a go at.

If anyone else has a copy of this I would love to know what you think and perhaps see some photos of what you've made - I seem to be the only person on Ravelry who has photos up of what I've made from it!

Ribbit!

I've recently returned from a lovely 5 day break at a nearby Center Parcs which is the first holiday I've had since becoming a mum. I'm now refreshed and ready to start knuckling down to my Christmas crafting, but before I got started on any of the things I have planned to make as presents I got side tracked by the frog hat pattern in issue 3 of Inside Crochet.

This is a lovely pattern by Jane Bibby with simple instructions that you can use to make a variety of sizes (I'm very tempted to make a large hat for my husband but I don't think he would wear it). My little boy has been out a couple of times today wearing this hat and lots of people have stopped to admire him in it. Now I've made him a hat I should probably do him some matching booties as well though I may have to come up with my own pattern for them as there do not seem to be any that I like online.

During my holiday I did try to get some crafting done in the one evening I had free so I had a go at silk painting, unfortunately it didn't work out quite how I had hoped... I found the outliner hard to apply and was unsure about how much was needed to stop the paint from leaking out of the outline. I also found that I can't draw butterflies freehand so next time I think I'll just stick to tracing someone else's artwork.

The red smear at the bottom is my attempts at ladybirds, also not my best work. I'm hopeful though that I will do better next time with a little more preparation and thought - I may even be able to make a few more Christmas presents from my labours.