I’ve been playing around with some quick projects for Christmas this year. I came across a pattern by Miss T called Café – it’s the perfect little tea/coffee cozy.
I just adore this, and it’s a super simple and quick knitting pattern for beginners. It’s also a great way to use up some of those yarn scraps you have lying around.
I’ll definitely be whipping up more of these!
I started this baby blanket back in July during a mid-summer cold spell. The chilliness of the air inspired me to pick up a crochet hook – something I hadn’t done in over a year. I searched on ravelry for the easiest crocheted baby blanket I could find. I found the Marble Baby Throw, and given it’s easy rating, decided to start it on a whim, without checking to see if I had enough yarn to finish it.
When I started, I thought it wouldn’t be good enough to keep, so the thought of running out of yarn didn’t really cross my mind. I was surprised to find that as I progressed, it was looking okay. With a few trips to the store, and help from my crafty and kind sister-in-law, I was able to find a second skein of each colour.
I finished the edge with a simple border.
Finishing this blanket is a bittersweet moment for me. I’m happy to have finished my first crochet project, but more than that, I am so sad that I won’t be able to share this with my grandma, who passed away this summer. My grandma was very talented. She knit, crocheted, did needle point, among other things. My sisters and I have been blessed to inherit her crafting materials so that we can forever create with our grandma close to us.
When I started this blanket, my grandma was still with us, and I made the conscious decision to not tell her about it – I wanted to surprise her with it once I’d finished. She left us quickly and unexpectedly, and I never did get that chance. I hope that she is able to look down and see how she has inspired me with her talent.
I started this blanket on a whim, and that means that it doesn’t have a destination. When my grandma passed, I decided that I would keep it, at least until I find the perfect place that it was meant to be.
Remember this sweet little romper? Well, I love, love, love it. I just can’t get enough of it:
It’s a perfect little summer outfit!
Another friend of mine is welcoming her first baby this August. Julie and I met through my friend Meagan. I was so lucky to spend one of my coop terms in undergrad in Guelph, because I lived with them. To this day, I have been known to say, “I wish we were next door neighbours so life would be like it was when we lived together.” Honestly, these girls, the kind of friend every woman deserves. I don’t know what I’d do without them by my side.
We are silly together. These gals make me laugh. A lot.
We make a mean tray of nachos and we’re the self-proclaimed nacho champs. Meagan is a bit nacho bossy, but it works in our favour 😉
They are some of my biggest supporters – and are always by my side.
I love these girls. The only thing that sucks about being friends with them is that I can’t get enough of them.
In August, the third installation of the next generation will arrive. Madeleine, Abby, and another sweet little girl will be making mischief together.
We celebrated mama-to-be Jules this past weekend. In preparation of her shower, I decided to make Rae Hoekstra’s Basic Newborn Baby Pant, a free online tutorial. These are a great project for a new sewer, and I whipped them up in an evening. Maddy even had a hand in it, picking out the fabric.
We stood in an aisle at Len’s Mill, and I asked Maddy, “What fabric should we use to make the baby some pants?” And she pointed and exclaimed, “Monkey!” Maddy has also requested her own monkey outfit. I’m so glad I let Maddy pick the fabric, because I just adore the final product.
In just a few months we’ll have another little one that will fit into these itty bitty baby pants. I am so excited for her arrival!
I decided to whip up these multi-coloured crayons this afternoon for Maddy’s daycare class. Although they celebrate Valentine’s day, it’s a non-food item kinda celebration. I found this idea on pinterest and thought it was perfect. You can see the picture that inspired this here.
The only change I made was to keep them in the oven for 22 minutes (because they weren’t fully melted at 15 minutes). Don’t worry if when you pull them out of the oven this is what you see:
Because when you flip them over:
Ta-da! We made a whole stack, one for each toddler. It took a total of 128 crayons that I picked up at Dollarama for $5. I used a silicone heart-shaped muffin mould that I picked up last year at Bulk Barn.
Maddy was very intrigued as I was making these, constantly digging her hands in the bowl of broken crayons, looking at me with a grin on her face and saying, “Mine!” I think she’s going to like colouring with them too!
Last Thursday Eric and I celebrated our fourth anniversary. I surprised Eric with a mug full o’ kisses that evening.
I got the idea off of pinterest – you can see my inspiration here.
I decided to write the vows I said to Eric on our wedding day, so he can remember how much I love him every day when he has his morning coffee.
Eric surprised me with some lovely calla lilies (our wedding flower) and some chocolate.
It was a bit of a rough day with Maddy, but a nice evening with Eric. Four years under our belt and looking forward to what number five will bring us.
At the request of my older sister, Lindsay, I am posting one of my recent knitting projects. I have been knitting longer than I’ve been sewing, but I haven’t really explored it too much. My grammy taught me way back when I was 15. I learned it as a project in my grade ten Autonomous Learners class. It was this great course you could take up to three times – and you could design everything about your own project: what you would learn, how you would learn it, what your outcome would be, and how you would be graded on it. I did projects on tap dancing, oceanography, Lovebirds, and knitting, to name a few.
Since then, I pretty much stuck to making scarves and slippers. Just this past year I decided to start branching out. My motivation primarily came from all of the amazing things my sister-in-law Lyndsay was crocheting. In the last year I branched out and made some dishcloths, a cowl, and a couple of hats.
Maddy modelling the Santa hat I made for Evan
Our friends Gary and Lisa will soon be welcoming their first baby, so I decided to knit them a few things for baby’s arrival. We have been so lucky to have received a ton of knitted and crocheted items (many from my grandma, and Lyndsay – you can see some of them here, here, here, and here) for Maddykins. We have gotten a ton of use out of all of them (well, except for the sweaters and booties that will fit well next winter). Given how much we’ve used our gifts, I figured that Gary and Lisa would get some good use out of some knitted things too.
Here’s baby Benbow’s gift:
Newborn Booties
Newborn hat
I paired the hat and booties with a baby blanket, and a cute little onesie:
You can find tutorials to make each of these: booties, hat, blanket. They are all easy knitting patterns, so even less experience knitters can give them a try. I made a slight alteration to the hat pattern, just to add stripes and a folded edge.
As you can see, my skills aren’t as impressive as Lyndsay’s (or my grammy’s, even though you can’t see her stuff), but hopefully with practice one day I can make some of the beautiful things they can make.
Hope you all enjoyed a nice Easter weekend!
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