defeat the doledrums dishcloth swap; second weekly topic

Weekly Topic: There are many people who ADORE receiving hand-knit or crochet items; but there are just as many who have no appreciation whatever of how much love, work, and time goes into a hand-made item. Share a story of a hand-made gift you gave to someone and how it worked out - good, bad, or ugly!

I have really only had good feedback... at Christmas I gave dishcloths to friends, teachers, my husbands boss etc. Most people said they wouldn't want to go back to using bought cloths - they liked how the knitted ones worked! :) I can only agree with them - I will never go back to bought now!

bicolour halflinen stitch dishcloth

A bit of a mouthful to say - but a really great looking pattern that's super easy to do!

Materials: 2 different balls of cotton yarn (1 dark, 1 light), I used blue (dk) and orange (lt) for my cloth.
Size 7 straight needles

Cast on 36 stitches with both yarns.

Note; 30 stitches make up the pattern, 6 stitches (3 stitches on each side) make up the border which is a plain knit border.

Row 1-3: Knit 3 rows with both yarns combined.

Row 4: Dark (blue), k 3, * k 1, wl.fwd, sl 1 purlwise, wl.bk * to last 3 stitches then k3.
Row 5: Dark (blue), k 3, p to last 3 stitches then k3.
Row 6: Light (orange), k 3, * wl.fwd, sl 1 purlwise, wl.bk, k 1 * to last 3 stitches then k3.
Row 7: Light (orange), k 3, p to last 3 stitches then k3.

Repeat Rows 4-7 12 times, then purl 3 rows with both yarns combined and cast off. Sew in ends.

even the wrong side looks cool!

bad guy in the red

The girls helped paint Bad Guy's body red!

a gathered skirt of my very own!

So I was thinking, I could use the measurement equation of the girl's gathered skirt instructions to make my own. I used some fabric I bought out of the remnant bin at Spotlight ($4). And here are the results:

The skirt is made out of light cotton, so fantastic for the heat-wave we are experiencing here. The skirt design makes it great for twirling in! Yes, I'm a kid at heart!!! :D


Note You may have noticed the "Bad Guy" painting in the background of the first photograph. My wonderful husband, Jonathan, painted it on our back wall. It's the beginning of a great mural that the kid's are going to join in on. With one week of school holidays to go, they needed something fun to take the edge off the end of the six week long break. Stay tuned for more updates on the wall project!

another dishcloth dress!

I wasn't gonna make another one of these but they are so quick and a little bit fun - so I found myself knitting one up with the leftover cotton from the petal cloth. Instead of using the 5mm needles I used 4mm ones and added 2 more stripes of pattern in the skirt.

2007 Favourite Things Albums; roundup

So here they all are - that was a bit of a mission, to get them all photographed and up on the blog! I underestimated the amount of time it would take...

2007 Favourite Things Albums; Album Nine

2007 Favourite Things Albums; Album Eight

2007 Favourite Things Albums; Album Seven

2007 Favourite Things Albums; Album Six

2007 Favourite Things Albums; Album Five

2007 Favourite Things Albums; Album Four

2007 Favourite Things Albums; Album Three

2007 Favourite Things Albums; Album Two

2007 Favourite Things Albums; Album One

2007 Favourite Things Albums

An explanation…
In late 2006, I began a project to complete little Scrapbooking albums of the girls. It became a larger project as I added family members to the list of who would like to receive one. Most of my family members live overseas, none live in our city, and so they hardly ever see the girls. It was a great way to show them off!

2006 album

I got the girls to tell me their favourite things about the year, which we put beside their picture and I ended up making nine albums, keeping three for each of the girls – who knows, they may want them when they’re older and laugh about liking Cabbage Patch Dolls etc.

I decided then and there that this should be a regular present for my family, it takes away a lot of the angst of what to get them for Christmas!

Well, 2007 zoomed by, and I started the albums at the beginning of December, hoping to get them out in time, but… well… things happened. First, I couldn’t find any nice photo’s of the girls, and then I had so many other presents to make, that it took a back seat to them. So finally, here we are at the end of January and they are completed!!! YAY! So they will go out to their recipients (Granny, Grandad, Nanny, Grampy & all the Aunt’s & Uncles) and we will keep three, which three I’m not sure about yet. I may get the girls to choose.

So here they are, all nine of them:

I will post them individually later on today!

petal dishcloth

This is a truely easy and beautiful (if a dishcloth can be beautiful!) cloth. I enjoyed knitting this in the car - the pattern is easy to memorise and interesting enough not to be boring. The pattern called for 12 points but I needed to do an extra one so that it would be flat.

Rachel's Knitting Room; First KAL

I am a newbie to KAL's (knit-alongs) and so I wasn't sure what to expect with it. I needn't have feared, it was a whole heap of fun and look at the result a new dishcloth!

I knitted the cloth in a bamboo/cotton variegated yarn that I got from Spotlight - it's so soft and lovely and would make a great facecloth!

If you want to join up to Rachel's group - just go here!

new baby monsta!

Here's a newbie to my house, made just last night!


Hope and Briahna were so excited to meet him, that they wore the shirt I cut him out of! - "Where's the baby?"

Gorgeous Harrison and his Mum!

No, I didn't say George Harrison!!! Hehehe!
Here is the cute recipient of my work last week, and his mother's work the week before! ;)
Look at that beautiful head of red hair, just like his Mum! :)

And, yes, I did get to have a wee hold!!! He is oh, so adorable! Makes you feel just a little clucky inside! :D Liz & Scott, what an extra special bundle of joy you have there! Well Done!

my cat; the picture hogger!

This couldn't really be a craft blog without a picture or two of a cat... LOL! I was taking photographs of Harrison's gift when the cat (Maisy) kept on turning up just at the moment of "click"!

It wasn't just Maisy who wanted in on the action - there's Eli just in the background there!