Party preparations - party bags

After all the manic crafting to fill party bags with mostly homemade goodies I wanted to try and make my own bags to hold all of the stash. After a quick search on google I came across this tutorial for making newspaper gift bags and after tweaking it a little ended up with a stack of these brown kraft paper bags.

Now I stuck deciding whether to decorate these or not... any suggestions?

Special cushion - by JanJan Designs

My mum is having a very special Birthday today - happy 70th mum!

Because I wanted to give her something extra special to help mark the event I got in touch with Janet from JanJan Designs.

Janet makes the most beautiful cushions and by scanning in a photo which she prints on to special printable fabric she then creates one of a kind cushions. I managed to get hold of a photo of my mum back when she was still a toddler and Janet turned it into this beautiful cushion.

Because my mum loves green Janet decided to 'frame' the photo with some green satin ribbon, lace and mother of pearl buttons. The green and pink rose backing fabric is lovely too and I especially like the hot pink pipping around the edge.

Thanks for doing such a beautiful cushion Janet I'm sure my mum is going to love it!

Party preparations - spin balls

While planning party bags I hit the problem of what do I made for the little brothers & sisters who will also be turning up? Most of what I've made so far isn't particular suitable for under 1s so I thought I would give these cute 'spin balls' a try.

These are made from another great free pattern (only available as a Ravelry download though) written by Abigail Gonzalez. The spiralling effect gives a lovely even striping on the ball with no jumps in the colours and these are just the right size for little baby hands to hold.

Party preparations - zipper pouches

These little simple zipper pouches were the next item on my party bag to-do list. No pattern this time just a stack of lovely organic fabric (screen printed by Showpony) that I won two years ago.

Because this fabric seemed to fray quite easily I wanted to try out french seams in an effort to make a more durable pouch. I also gave putting in zips another go and after a bit more practice and the occasional curse I managed to get my sewing machine to sew in a zip on each pouch quite neatly.

For the girls I chose the pretty flower & butterfly print as well as a couple of summer tree pouches (my favourite design in my fabric bundle) and for the boys it had to be the insect soup - nasty pattern - I hope they like them!

Party preparations - paper books

For my next party bag filler I decided to make up some very simple blank books which I thought would be popular for doodling on the go.

The instructions I used were from glittergoods blog (mini book tutorial) and with the aid of a guillotine to chop up a stack of A4 sugar paper this was a very quick make. The trickiest part was making the holes in the spine before sewing the pages together.

These little books are pretty cute and would look even cuter with some sort of cover... however I'm now running short on time so I just kept them simple.

To the Batmobile!

This little crochet hero is ready to fly into action

Kazam!

Kapow!

My little Batman was made from another fabulous free pattern by Emjay Bailey which is available from her blog Nerdigurumi.

Will this superhero manage to save the day and help me get all my last minute crafting done in time? I really, really hope so!

Baby blue

Two years ago I made a little crochet dress (pattern by Marianne Cant in issue 9 of Inside Crochet) for my new niece and because I loved making it so much I've been desperate to make another. Thankfully I have lots of friends who are also mums so it was only a matter of time for one of those to have another baby, but it did take a while for a little girl to arrive.

While I adore the colours in the yarn I used for my niece's dress I wanted to make something that wasn't pink this time (possibly because I'm suffering from pink overload in the clothes for my own little girl) and choose the 'Skyway' colour way from the Wendy Happy yarn range. The yarn was a joy to work with again - so soft and smooth that it crocheted up really quickly. The colour changes in this colourway were much shorter though which gives a dappled effect and though it is also quite pretty I think I like the striping on my first dress better.

Making this dress up has been a lovely change from all the 'work' crochet I've been busy with. My crochet business "Pretty Crochet Things" is being a little neglected at the moment due to having so much to plan and prepare for right now. I do have lots to share with you including the new finished items, and once I get through an incredibly busy September I'll be sure to show you what I've been so busy with!

September's decoration: Felt Christmas pudding

Wow - look how early I've managed to get this month's Christmas decoration done!

Once you've recovered from your shock at seeing this month's Christmas decoration complete I'll have to admit that the reason I've made this so quickly is that I won the kit in a giveaway and just couldn't wait to get started on it.

I'm a huge fan of the paper-and-string blog and I love all the beautiful felt products that Sarah sells in her shop so I was delighted when she let me know that I had won one. She usually runs one giveaway each month but as she was bringing out a new range of Christmas goodies she decided to hold a whole week of giveaways.

My favourite out of her Christmas tree decorations (part of her 'sew your own' range) was this little cheerful Christmas pudding - simple and very, very cute. I'm tempted to raid my ribbon stash and have a go at making a few more as presents, but this little guy will definitely be added to my own Christmas tree decorations as I just can't bear to part with him.

Her kits contain everything you need to make your own decoration (apart from a needle and the thread) even the stuffing! The ribbons and button included are just adorable and make the finished item extra special :-)

Eggsterminate!

Hooray for the new series of Dr. Who!

To celebrate his return what could be more appropriate than a little crochet dalek?

As well as scaring the unsuspecting lunch time dinner he will also do a really good job of keeping your egg nice and cosy. Watch out that he doesn't take a liking for your salt and pepper pots and breed more little daleks though...

The pattern is fantastic and you can find it here as a google doc or through the Ravelry pattern page http://www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/dalek-egg-cosy. Quick and easy to make - who wouldn't want one of these?