How time flies...

As I mentioned before I haven't managed to get much made in the last few months, but here are some things I created a few months ago that I had forgotten to post! :)

I obviously had to make something special for Chris' 1st Father's Day.  Being obsessed with Pinterest at the moment I found the Dad photo ideas and decided to base Chris' first Father's Day gift on those.  Here's what I came up with...

It's not the best photo of it (how do you take photos of pictures with glass in front of them?), but you get the idea!  I took many, many, many photos to get some good ones where you could actually see the words and his face at the same time!

I also had another 1st birthday, this time for a little boy.  Again using Pinterest for inspiration I made a tie and a couple of tie vests.  There are various tutorials for these on the web, I'm not entirely sure which one I used now...

The tie vests ended up a little squint due to trying to persuade the material to go through the sewing machine without sewing through both sides of the vests, I still like them though.  The tie is quite cute too and it velcro's at the back, easy for dressing up a toddler.

Finally I made myself a birthday cake.  I was dairy free on my birthday (for Oliver's sake) and we're now dairy and gluten free to see if that helps Ollie, it does seem to be so we're sticking with it for a while, then I'll try giving him some dairy and gluten again.  Anyway, this meant I couldn't get a bought birthday cake, but I still wanted a proper one.

It went so well until I tried to cover the sponge with dairy free butter icing - it just isn't the same as normal butter icing and my sponges slid around everywhere and I had a rather wobbly, tilting cake.  it still tasted good though! :)

My niece needed a couple of things to brighten up her bedroom walls, so I made her a picture and some bunting.  Not my taste or colours, but she is a very girly 3 year old who loves pink!

And this is the little monkey who wants whatever anyone else is holding or taking photos of!  It's hard to keep things out of reach now he's on the move and cruising around furniture.

I can't believe Ollie will be 1 in three weeks!  That's my next project, his first birthday party/gathering!

J x

Procrastinating...

Hmmm, leaving craft projects to sit around looking at Pinterest or even worse do cleaning does seem like procrastination to me! I have a huge list of things to make or half finished items to complete. I have only just got round to framing Oliver's hand print that I made 4 months ago! 

 I have several things to make for Oliver's  birthday in September, not to mention the list of things to make for Christmas this year! 

 This is one of the things on my to do list... I found this cute little pull-along elephant in the charity shop, it has three wooden passengers, the fourth is missing. They each appear to be from a different country. Originally I was going to paint it and change it, but now I think I quite like it as it is, maybe I shall just clean it up? What do you think? 

It was my sister in-laws birthday last month and I managed to whip up a few presents for her, including this bunting for her classroom (she now has a permanent teaching job after covering various maternity leaves for the last few years).  I quite like the fabric as it looks like childish drawings and the black fabric remind's me of chalkboards - fortunately she loved it!

I also made her a little crocheted golden snitch as she's a Harry Potter fan.

This is Oliver's gift to his Aunty, it's sock rolled up in an egg box (he likes biting feet and loves watching colourful socks like his aunty's move around!).  I like the presentation idea of gifting presents in egg boxes.

I've also finally finished this doll carrier for my friends daughter, I had the fabric cut out for weeks, but only just finished it when we last saw them.  Her little girl is 16 months old and her mum sometimes carries her on her back, so the little girl now tries to put dolls on her back too!  I thought she might like this to copy her mummy.

We've recently been trying to rid our house of clutter by selling things on ebay and freegling other things.  As I've been putting several things on freegle I noticed that someone was getting rid of an Ikea play washing machine and cooker and was lucky enough to receive it.  It needed a bit of a clean and as the white colour had turned yellow'y' I decided to spray paint it yellow.  Not everyone's colour choice I know, but I love how bright it is! 

Ollie seems to like them!

Ok, maybe I haven't been procrastinating as much as I thought, but I still have huge to do lists to finish! Have a great week everyone!

J x

Hooking Away

I've been enjoying crocheting again, I keep taking little breaks from it, but then start making a new item, which usually takes no time at all! Admittedly I tend to only make small easy things, I don't have enough patience otherwise! Whilst on our holiday last week I made these slippers from this pattern on Ravelry.   Apologies for the little hand, no matter how far I put him away from me he managed to get back in time for the photo!!

 I love them! The buttons are from Skye Batiks, based in Portree, Skye. They make gorgeous batiks there and although we didn't buy any, we did buy a little handsewn midge, now named Morag, for Ollie. He loves her! :) 

 I also made this headband for myself, mainly to keep my hair out of my face on bad hair days!  Note the baby boy hand is back in the second photo!!

 I also brought wool on holiday to make this pretty leaf scarf I found on Ravelry, but unfortunately my printer only printed the last page of the pattern! So instead I made a couple of Amigurumi things from 'Amigurumi Two', which I had brought with me. This little bear... 

 And this apple container with baby worm inside (the worm isn't finished yet!)...

 I also bought this beautiful natural dyed wool from Shilasdair, based on Skye.  I couldn't resist!

 I haven't decided exactly what to make, I could only afford these two skeins. So maybe I shall make some fingerless gloves for myself, what do you think? 

I shall post some other makes from the last month soon!

 J x

A little holiday

It's been 2 months since I've written a post, I didn't realise I had been away from blog land for so long! I've been busy doing a little bat work, some crafting, looking after my ever changing boy (who is into everything now he's crawling) and we've just come back from a holiday on the west coast of Scotland. 

Glen Elg brochs

 The holiday was fab, I know I don't work as such, but being stuck in the same town the whole time is a bit dull after a while, so it was great to go somewhere different and see lots of new places. We spent most our time on Skye, although we were staying in a little village near Dornie. 

Oliver at Glen Elg

 I love Skye, it's such a gorgeous island and although we didn't manage to go up any of the Cuillins this year we did enjoy a few shorter walks with Oliver. My in-law's invited us to stay in their self catering cottage that they had rented so the cost was pretty low. 

Seals in Lochalsh

 It was also nice to have someone else to look after Oliver while we could sit down and relax for a while! I managed to get a few things crocheted while we were there. 

Slightly grumpy Ollie after we stopped him trying to eat the coral...

 I shall post again soon (and I mean soon, not weeks!) with some photos of my latest makes! 

 J x

Busy Bee!

I've been busy, busy, busy recently.  Trying to balance looking after Oliver (and convincing him to nap) with making more birthday gifts, cake and working a few evenings this month.

As a few of you will know, I am an Ecologist, at least I was until I resigned in March to become a full time mum.  Although I resigned from my main job I am still working as a bat worker part-time ( a couple of nights a month) and also doing a little self-employed work where I am analysing some bat calls each month for a company in Glasgow.  At least we have a little extra money coming in from this.  Anyway, this month I completed my first couple of bat visits for over a year and a half.  Unfortunately I didn't see any bats (just as well on the first visit as I had forgotten my bat detector!), probably because of this cold spring we've been having - the bats aren't back in their summer roosts yet.  Looking forward to a visit when I actually have something to watch whilst standing outside in the dark!  Fortunately Oliver was pretty good for daddy and didn't wake up until a short while before I got home.

It was also our local bat group AGM recently, so I decided to finally make use of the bat shaped cookie cutter I had and make some bat biscuits for the social afterward.

As it's the bat season now I'm really hoping Oliver will manage to sleep longer, he still wakes up at around 10pm for a feed, it would be great if he could manage a bit longer until 12 - 1 (especially when dusk is later in the next month or two!).  He used to wake twice a night at around 1 and 5, but since 4 months he has been up a lot more.  I've been reading up on baby sleep habits and I'm now trying to lengthen his naps to help him sleep better at night, but it's hard work!  Seems to be working though, getting one nap a day of at least an hour and another of 30 - 40 mins.  I'm not too worried though, he'll sleep through one day!

I want it!!  This applies to anything shiny and especially to cameras!

Two more 1 year old birthday parties this month.  One for a little boy who has had some medical problems, but is now on the mend and another for a little girl I know from toddlers.  

For the little boy I made a crochet zebra from this pattern, I really enjoy amigurumi and the pattern was so easy to follow.  The boy's mother once told me that she loved zebras (after noticing one on Oliver's t-shirt), so I hope the gift was well received.

For the little girl I made these cute bean bags (using fabric scraps I already owned), pattern/tutorial from Chez Beeper Bebe.  The girl's mother quite likes educational things and these will be great for bean bag games, counting, learning colours, matching, subtracting and adding.  Just now she can just throw them around and stack them.  Oliver kept trying to grab the finished beanbags off me, so perhaps I should make a set for him too.

It was Chris' birthday recently too and I decided to make him a themed cake for a change.  I normally just create a simple victoria sponge, but this year I have made him a tree stump cake (he's a forester).  It also gave me a chance to play with fondant icing, though I need more practice for what I'd like to make for Oliver's birthday cake!

Now I have to make a dress for my niece's birthday at the end of the month!  I hope I manage to make it in time!

J x

Snail Trail!

The lovely Laura Clempson of Cupcakes for Clara is launching a new range of products.  Cupcakes for Clara currently features Clara, a grumpy little girl, who Laura created as a paper doll.  The new range of products features not only Clara, but a fantastic new addition to the range - Colin and of course lots of snails.  As part of the run-up to the new products being released, Laura has created a snail'y' trail to find lots of free goodies.

Aren't Colin and his snails cute?!

As this is a Snail trail, I thought I would give you a few exciting facts about snails;

1.  A snail can glide over a razor blade without being hurt, this is because the snail's mucus trail protects it from sharp objects underneath.

2.  A snail can have 430 babies in a year!

3.  The largest snail is the African land snail which can measure up to 18 cm long and 9 cm tall.

4.  In dry weather a snail will retreat into it's shell and seal the entrance with mucus to prevent drying out.

5.  Snails are hermaphrodites, they have both male and female reproductive organs, so they can produce their own eggs, although they still tend to mate with a partner.

6.  A garden snail takes around 2 years to get to adult size.

7.  Baby snails are born with tiny transparent shells.

8.  Any eggs that don't hatch are eaten by the other baby snails, this helps give them more calcium to grow their own shells nice and strong.

Right, now for the snail trail to some free Cupcakes for Clara goodies...

Somewhere on my blog page you will find a little snail button and if you click the button you will be taken to one of these free goodies created by Cupcakes for Clara.  Visit her blog or facebook page to find lots more free goodies!

Visit the Cupcakes for Clara blog and shop here and facebook page here.

Have a great weekend!

J x

And the winner is...

Not much crafting here recently, got a few things to do/finish this week though.  However, I was lucky enough to win a flower embellishment kit from Paper and String last week, looking forward to making them and adding to gifts.

Oliver has chosen the winner of the Easter tablecloth, well actually he tried picking them all up together to shove in his mouth, but eventually narrowed it down to one!

And the winner is.....................

Moonstruck Creations.

Congratulations! Please e-mail your address and I'll get it sent out to you.

Have a great week everyone!

J x