A BLUE BELT IN BALLET

 
Ballet lessons are just so popular with young ladies of 6 or 7 and for some reason seem to be held in the coldest, draughiest halls that can be found.

My grandaughter is one such young lady, who has recently attained a blue belt and now just can't wait for Tuesday's to come round, regardless of the sub-zero temperatures.  However her pretty, but thin, ballet wrap round cardigan is just not up to chilly halls, so I thought I would run her up a thicker version.

Now this is where it gets tricky, as there are only a few patterns that fit the bill and they all seem to have ties round the back.  Not a good idea when you have only just mastered bows at the front!  So armed with graph paper and a calculator I devised a pattern with a cross over that buttons and that can be adjusted for size - tada!!

All the boxes ticked -  warm, easy to get on and off and make a little larger when our 28aaa bust arrives and pink!  What more could a budding Darcy Bussle want?

 

The pattern I decided upon has a garterstitch button band and I have always found them to have a rather bobbly and unappealing edge, so I googled and found this edge which looks firm and smooth. 

 It really is so easy to do, you just purl the last stitch of the row at the edge of the border and then slip the first stitch through the back of the stitch on the way back and the result as you can see from the picture above is very pleasing.

This pattern is in double knitting wool, using size 4mm needles and fits a 26in chest.  If you would like a copy of the pattern, please e-mail me and I will see what I can do.  At the moment I only have the instructions for this one size, but if there is much interest I will try to adjust it to more sizes and put it on the blog.

But for now I shall be getting ready to whizz off and take my little prima ballerina to practice for her next belt. (do they have black belts in ballet?)

RUN, RUN AS FAST AS YOU CAN - YOU CAN'T CATCH ME I'M A GINGERBREAD MAN!

Following the phenomenal success with my knitted jelly babies for the Tiddlers, I thought I would have a go at some of the other toys in Jean Greenhowe's collection.  The obvious choice for Beth was a pink ballet dancer and I thought Ben would like Superman.  Well, the ballet dance was a definate hit, but although I made Superman with blue hair, as requested, Ben's first comment was "Is there a jelly baby for me?". 

 

So back to the drawing board and I thought for a change I would make Gingerbread men - jelly babies with a difference.

First I had to find the right colour wool.  Not as easy as I thought.  My first choice turned out to be more dough boy than gingerbread, according to my daughter.  So with the help of our very obliging local wool shop - "Is your gingerbread usually brown or more burnt?" - We found exactly the right colour and I cracked on.  After making brown jelly babies, I 'piped' round them in white using double crochet and added little buttons for sweeties, down the front.

 

With a certain amount of trepidation, I handed them to the Tiddlers together with my family of little 'egg cups' (so cute) for Easter and ......tada! 

  

 

Success! They have joined the ranks of the much loved - sorry Superman!

ONE, TWO, KNIT A FEW.......

Five and a half years ago, I started what can only be called a knitting marathon. Our first grandchild, Bethany, made her entrance into the world and so I started on the shawls.  Beth had a yellow and a pink one.

They turned out a little bigger than I expected, the yellow one being over five feet in diameter, but they really did look spectacular and have a 'secret' sewn into the middle of them (A little butterfly and a snail) 

Two years later, Ben arrived and I started all over again. He has white and blue, both of the five foot variety, with a 'secret' truck and plane.

The Tiddlers love their 'blankets' and take them everywhere ( a bit of a struggle for an overburdened mum, but Michelle rises to the occasion, bless her.) All of the shawls  have been used, loved and washed for at least 3 and a half years now, and as you can see have stood up very well to the test of time.

I've been so pleased with them, as I thought they would end up looking like rags after a few months hard labour, but they are still bright and springy and loved.  Isn't knitting wonderful!

SPRING HAS SPRUNGLED!

Well, Easter is on its way and the weather here at the moment is like mid summer. How wonderful is that!!  Over the past couple of weeks I've been knitting like crazy, getting jumpers made for the Tiddlers, knitted Jelly Baby dolls for our two new arrivals to the family, Summer and Talon, and an arun for me, because although the weather has been spectacular for this time of the year, I tend to err on the side of caution and keep my winter woolies handy - I've been caught out too many times before.  Also I've found, when taking the Tiddlers to school in the morning, it's still mighty parky. brrrrrrrrr.

 
But now the time has come to get the Easter goodies ready for the holidays.  I needed something cute for wrapping creme eggs and this little box is just the thing.  I made them in pink, yellow and blue and they are going down a storm.  They are so easy to make and the kids just love them

SOOOO CUTE!

BUNNIES BOTTOM

The only problem I have with these little darlings, is I have to rob my stash of creme eggs to fill them - doh! 

Hopefully someone will share with me at Easter. * wicked grin*

ALL WRAPPED UP

I've just started making matching gift cards and wrapping paper.  It was a little idea that surfaced and has turned out to be very well received.  

I was particularly pleased with this set I made for my friend Christine.

The card front was made with paper I designed with her name on it, then put through Ulead Photo Express to put the curl in the corner.  I then added a flower with a holographic backer, using papers I bought from Lily of the Valley.  I wrapped the parcel in the 'Happy Birthday Christine' paper I made and added a flower together with a wrapper matching the card wrapper, that was made using an x-cut butterfly punch and holographic paper.

I've had to use pieces of A4 paper, which is a bit of a bind when you have a biggish parcel but I hope to get an A3 printer shortly which will dig me out of that particular hole  :0)

The whole thing was then finished off with a matching envelope.  I must say I was very pleased with the overall result - modesty has never been my strong suit I hasten to add.

A LITTLE 'SPRING' IN THE AIR & A WINGE

I needed an eyecatching card for a friend of mine so I thought I would have a go at this design.  I love the decoupage black and white design and coupled with the bright pink and silver edging, it really makes a striking card which springs into life when taken out of the envelope.

Most of the cards I make are done with Word 2003.  It's amazing what you can do with the program, although I have been having great difficulty since I upgraded to Word 2010.  In the old program you can lasso objects and text boxes together using the mouse, but in the newer program this it would appear isn't available so you have to select items one by one. Honestly, when you have 40 or 50 items to select you almost lose the will to live!!

The thing that really bugs me though is you can do it in Excel 2010, which appears to have the same set up as word - go figure!!

Please, please, please if there's anyone out there who can whisper in Microsoft's ear, can you let them know there are a lot of very frustrated Word users out here waiting for someone to put them out of there misery and fix the problem.

Apparently they have told the millionth person complaining that there isn't the call for a fix  ;0)

Pink Paisley Card for Triplets

This Card is sooo cute and can be made in blue if you wanted it for baby boys - well, actually any colour you like.