A bit of crafting

Having lots of fun at the moment making things for me & my family. When you run a craft business from home it's so easy to end up spending all your time making for other people but August is often a slow month so I took the opportunity to chill out and do my own thing!

First off I taught myself to knit. I've always struggled with knitting as I knit far too tight so about 3 rows in I can't do anymore. A few years ago I decided to practice by making bootees for premature babies and a week later I had a pair of tiny bootees. I proudly showed my mum who then knit a pair in about 15 mins that turned our twice the size of mine. That was when I decided crochet was more my thing! Recently though someone mentioned they prefer circular needles. My mum refuses to knit on circulars because she "can't use them" I've avoided them, but now I have a growing stash of KnitPro Symphonies. My first project was the Oriental Lily dress by Georgie Hallam. It starts off flat, then you join it and knit the rest in the round. It's a fab pattern for learning to knit and I really enjoyed it. Here's it is before I added short sleeves:

I also managed to crochet a scarf for myself. The yarn for this was gifted to me in a craft swap and is handspun. It was called Pebble Beach.

Excuse the orientation of the picture. This was a lovely pattern to make, really quick. It would be perfect for last minute Christmas gifts. It's the Winter in London Scarf by Emily Turner. Using handspun I was slightly worried I might run our of yardage but I actually had some left so I crocheted them up into granny squares along with some leftovers from a baby hat & bootees set I've made for a friend.

I also made myself a hat with earflaps from the Happy Hooker book. My 4 year old loved it and wanted me to make her one so I adjusted the pattern a bit and made hers with the same yarn. Here's the 2 year old modelling it. The yarn is Dazzle DK from the . I still have to add buttons for the ear flaps.

I went the a quilt exhibition at the V&A a while ago, where I purchased 3 FQs of limited edition fabric. I was reminded I had this when a friend posted on facebook to say she'd been married a year. I'd bought the fabric on her weekend hen do in London. Given my recent knitting success I decided to make myself a project bag from two of the fat quarters and I love it.

This photo doesn't really do the colours justice. Both fabrics are bright modern prints and the bag is reversible. It holds lots too. I recently took it away with me for a week and it held my tumbling blocks patchwork pieces, needlecase, 200g of yarn, crochet hooks, pattern and some yarn scraps for granny squares.

My 4 year old is starting Reception this month and I decided to make her a PE bag. I let her choose her own fabric and after liking all the children's fabric I had she finally settled on my Cath Kidston fabric. What can I say, she has expensive taste ;-) . I was originally planning on lining it but decided the fabric was a bit thick and lining it would make it quite bulky so I made up an extra one for Erin's best friend. Each one has their initial appliqued on.