Granny Sitting and Crochet

We have had a pretty uneventful week spent in my Mum and Dad's house looking after my Granny.  Granny was largely independent until March this year, Mother's Day to be exact, when she had a really nasty fall down the stair's in her own house.  Leaving her with a good few broken bones and plenty of bumps and bruises.  She went to stay with Mum for a while and has just never really gotten well enough to go home again, although to be honest it's a bit of a relief to all of us that she is there, at least we don't have to worry about her being on her own quite so much.  This past week Mum and Dad have been on holiday in Benidorm (lucky them) so I was volunteered to move in, along with all of my clan, to look after Granny.  I absolutely love my Granny to bit's, I spent a lot of my childhood with her and my Grandad, who passed away when I was nine, and I have the greatest of respect for her and the older generation in general.  They have gone through more in their live's than we ever could, we have it so easy now and we don't even realize it.  All that aside, it really was a long hard week, I think Granny get's frustrated that she can't do all the thing's she used to and she hate's relying on other people to do thing's for her, so it was very hard work at time's.  It was nice, however, to spend some time with Granny, in this crazy life we now all live in everything just gets a bit hectic and thing's like spending and hour just listening to Granny's old stories doesn't happen as often as you would like.

I did spend my time wisely though, between school run's, cooking, cleaning, playing, etc. I did manage a bit of crochet. I think lately I have been sidetracked from my main crafting passion, crochet.  I do enjoy sewing as well, but i think because i'm still learning it can be stressful at time's, so this week i needed to relax and that's exactly what i did.  Although, as anyone out there who crochet's will know, you are constantly learning new stitches and technique's, crochet is just so comfortable for me, it's like my safe place.  When life get's stress full i pick up a hook!!  I thought I would try and get a little bit of stock together for the Christmas Craft Fair and so I spent the week doing small thing's that I think people will like.

This is the second owl bag I have made and i'm really loving them, I have a real 'thing' for owl's at the moment, and woodland thing's in general.  This bag and the other one I made have already been claimed by my sister-in-law for Christmas present's, so i'll have to make some more for the fair.  I'm debating whether to line them with material or not, i'm really not sure what i should charge for them either, is £10 too much?  If I line them should I charge more?  That's the part i'm not looking forward to at all, pricing the product's.  I want to make it worth my while, but I don't want to over charge and not sell anything.

The phone sock's are perhaps my favorite product of the week.  Again, it's the woodland thing.  I came up with the pattern for the ladybird as I went along and I made the owl one after seeing something similar on pintrest, but thankfully I did write the pattern's down so I will be able to make more.  Which is just as well really, because I've decided to keep Mr Owl for myself.

                                            

I got the pattern for the rose corsage via pintrest, here, and added some pretty button's to the middle, tidied up the back with felt and added a broach pin.  I did have a lovely orange one as well, but my sister swiped it, ah well, that's what family's for, or so she tell's me anyway.

I did the same with the triple layer flower's, added a button, felted the back and added a pin, I really do like these because the color combination's are endless and I am a girl who like's her color.  I will be making more of these as well, you can find the pattern here.

The little hair clip's are really simple, I used Lucy's pattern for Teeny Tiny Flower's, again added a button (everything is made better with a button) and sewed them onto a hair clip.  I also had more of these, but they seem to have disappeared as well.

Lastly, I tried my hand at a bit of felt sewing and made some Christmas decoration's.  I thought I really should do some as it is a Christmas fair.  My sister is usually the one to do the felt thing's, but her stuff is just so lovely, she inspired me to have a go and this is what I came up with.  I'm quite pleased with them and may just have to do some for my own tree this year.

So that's my week in crochet and felt,  I hope you like my little makes, thank's for dropping in, see you again soon.

The little things!

I love that wee saying ' always remember the little things,  because one day you will look back and realize they were the big things'.  Forgive me if I haven't got that exactly right, but you know what I mean. Generally, everyday we take so much for granted,  my biggest problem is not taking the time to step back and look at what's going on around me.  Like being too busy tidying the toys to watch how the kids are playing. 

                           

Like when did my little man learn how to be a doctor, honestly the last time I looked he was building blocks and knocking them down again.  Now all of a sudden there he is playing pretend doctors with a teddy bear.  It was so cute I almost cried, he did it all himself.  Well, alright, i did help him with the blanket, but he was keeping a real close eye on me the whole time to make sure I did it right.

I really enjoyed watching him.  Another thing I love to watch is my boy's interacting, particularly with their daddy.  I firmly believe that little boy's have a very special bond with their daddy's, I suppose it's much the same as little girl's with their mummy, but I don't think i'll ever get to experience that.  They just want to be like him so much, my boy's just love to spend one-on-one time with their daddy, and thankfully their daddy is more than willing to spend time with them, most of the time anyway. 

This is our big boy baking with daddy, they made some lovely soda bread.  Speaking of which....

was absolutely delicious with my home-made sweet potato, carrot and coriander soup.  I got the recipe here, but I left out the ginger, because i'm not a big fan of ginger, it was really lovely.  I love soup at this time of year, it's just so warming and home-made soup is something I just took for granted as a child.  I usually make soup on a Friday, to make use of any left over vegetable's before they go bad and also so there is something in the fridge which is quick and easy to get to the table.  I'll be doing this one again, and i'll be convincing my husband to make the soda bread every week too.

Another favorite from this time of year is chestnut's, or conker's as we call them here.  I have very fond memories of going out with my brothers and sister looking for chestnuts, the boy's used to take them home, screw a hole through the middle, string them on a rope and play 'conker's' with their friends.  Did anyone else play? or is it something from this part of the world?  They would take it in turn's to hit each other's conker's and the aim was to break the other one, the conker that ended the game intact won.  This is the first year we have taken our boy's out looking for chestnut's and they really enjoyed it.

We have yet to teach them how to play conker's, but i'm sure my husband will get round to it.

Lastly fitting in some time for some sewing, this time a small doll's quilt, I will show the doll next time.

This is the first quilt i have made,  i really enjoyed making it and it will not be my last.  I hope someday the when she is all grown up, the little girl who is getting this little quilt will look back on it with some big fond memories as well.

Thank's for stopping by today, hope to see you again soon xx.

My First Reveal!

I'm really excited to be doing my first reveal, and I really hope it is the first of many!  My 'Little Artist's bag' came about when i started to think of Christmas present's.  I usually start with the children in the family, you know nieces and nephew's, and i usually always try and make the children something handmade.  I think children in general get so much stuff at Christmas they hardly know what they have and i just like to give them something different, something unique, something they can keep and know that it was handmade by their Auntie Milly especially for them.  As a more obvious added benefit it's not as expensive as trying to keep up with the ever demanding and changing toy market.  Especially if, like me, most of your things are made from recycled and reused material.  I love it when you can give something a second life as something else, there is just something extremely satisfying in knowing that you have given something that was destined for the charity shop, or bin, a second chance and it will continue to be used for another few years at least.  The material used in this project was given to me by my sister when she was redecorating her two girls room's, isn't it ironic that they are now getting them back as Little Artist's bags.  

Anyway, back to the matter at hand.  While trawling through pinterest for inspiration and idea's i came across a few bags like this.  I particularly liked this one and this one.  So i decided to give it a go and make my own.  After a few failed attempts with incorrect measurement's and a lot of frustration I eventually got something I am really very proud of, so here goes.

My Little Artist's Bag

There is a little pocket on the outside.

The inside

Inside there is pocket to hold  an A3 size art pad and a pocket with individual section's for the colouring pencil's and another space for a ruler, which i haven't put in yet.  The only problem I have had is that when the colouring pencil's are put in it sort of pulls the edge up a bit.  I'm thinking that maybe i have made the pencil pocket's to tight a fit.  I will have to try and make them a little bigger next time.

Despite that little default, i am very proud of this little bag, and i just hope the girl's like them too!!!!  I'm hopefully going to do a tutorial on this, when i can get round it, and i'm thinking i might make an A4 sized one for my older niece   She is eight and the other's are 3 and 4, so i want her's to be little more grown up.  So watch this space.

Thanks for dropping in today, hope to see you again soon.

The Dreaded Dummy!!!!!

 

We had a bit of a hard time this weekend with our oldest boy and his beloved dummy.  He is four now and for about the past year and a half has taken his dummy just at bed time, he literally has it about 5mins and he is out like a light.  Lately we have been telling him how big he is getting and that he really doesn't need a dummy anymore, in the hope that he will decide of his own accord to leave it out for the dummy fairy's. 

We have tried once before to get rid of the dummy, I took it away while he was at nursery and told him the dummy fairy's had taken it to give to a little baby who didn't have a dummy.  WELL!!!!  The hysterics were unreal, and he ended up being so terrified of the dummy fairy's coming into his room he didn't sleep for 3 nights, even after I had given him a new dummy.  So we had to tell him that the fairy's will only come for his dummy when he is ready to give it up and leaves it out for them.  So, has anyone spotted my mistakes. 
Mistake number 1:  The fact that my four year old should even have a dummy!!!! I can practically hear all you mummy's out there screaming at me, and I'm not even going to try and make any excuses for it, because I don't have any.
Mistake number 2:  Giving him back his dummy after I had taken it away.  I know, I know, I should have persevered then and I wouldn't be going through this now!!  Again I have no excuses, other than to say four year olds really know how to make you feel bad.
Mistake no 3:  Putting the ball in his court (so to speak), by saying they won't take it until HE is ready, I have now given him the control, as he constantly reminds me by saying "I'm not ready to give my dummy away yet mummy".

Anyway, this weekend we thought we were having a bit of a breakthrough.  The boy's go for a 'sleepover' at my sister's house once a month, and then in turn I will take her girls once a month.  This weekend was the boys turn and when packing their bag's, we couldn't find dummy anywhere, and we looked everywhere.  I thought disaster, it's six o'clock on a Saturday evening, where am I going to get a dummy.  But, miraculously my big boy didn't seen too bothered by it!!!!  He just said he 'wouldn't need it'.  Brilliant thought I, let's go with this!!  So we all made such a big deal about it, he thought he was the best thing since sliced bread.  Slept all night, no problem's at all.  Again the next day we made such a big deal, even bought him some moshi monster's, which I usually think is such a rip off and refuse to buy, but this was a special occasion!!!  All was good.  Until......
Bedtime, my big boy walks straight into his room, open's the train station's door (obviously a toy one) and lift's out dummy looking far too smug.  He had obviously known it was there all along.

I tried and I tried to get him to give it up, but to no avail.  So many people, have told me to just take it off him and put up the crying, he will stop in a day or two, but I just feel so guilty.  So, long story, that I haven't made any attempt to shorten.  We have compromised and are going to leave it out for Santa this year in exchange for an extra present.  I'm feeling quite defeated about the whole thing, I really thought we were getting somewhere.  Anyone out there with any advice is more than welcome to share it!!!