Naughty Play Food

At some point during this post you are going to decide either that this post is a prank born of a wild, filthy imagination, or that I should put down the crochet hook and back away, slowly.

I was inspired by this pattern and the incessant clattering of plastic food in the play kitchen to try my hand at crocheted play food. To understand what I’m talking about when I say “incessant clattering,” grab an empty trash bag and fill it with plastic cups. Now dump them on the floor. Do this 45 times an hour, and you’re with me.

Now, since this is an experiment and I unfortunately recently decided I didn’t have room to keep a “stash” that was not waiting for a specific project, off to the thrift store I went for whatever random yarn could be had for $.35 or less. I found a nice peach and a lemony yellow and thought, “I can work with that.”

So I began modifying the orange pattern to make a peach. I was having a great time. I made it to the part where you stuff your object with no trouble. Then I began to “close the deal,” so to speak and found myself with:

Well. If I’d photographed it with the yellow “stem hollow” I added on the rounded top side, you’d see why the mamas at the Joy Troupe Crafty Mamas afternoon were howling with laughter and joking that the children wouldn’t be allowed to touch their own toys. Nevertheless, I KNEW something could be made from this lovely peach yarn that looked edible so I had another go. (Can you identify where in this decision making process I keep going wrong? Thought so.)

This time I used the (yes. I did go there.) carrot pattern and got:

Now, I’m not above the occasional moment of naughty knitting. It’s fun. It’s silly. It’s harmless. But I swear to you, this is completely unintentional. So now we are brandishing my carrot in conjunction with my peach and, well…

Fortunately there was a subsequent Crafty Mamas event where I turned them into:



Now we have a respectable, if a bit blond, turnip and a parsnip, although Ian swears it’s a carrot. Or did before he grabbed the dangling yarn end and pulled. So we’ll be having another try on that. And, unlike what happened the day these items were born, there was no yelling.

Next I’m going to see if I can continue spinning straw into gold by having a go at corn on the cob… Stay Tuned.

"MY Mommy."

“NO, Penguin, that’s MY Mommy.”

“My hair. Your hair. My hair. Your hair.”

“No, I want YOUR cheese, Mommy.”

That’s right, the little dude has sorted out his first and second person pronouns. He had been using “mine” and “your” pretty interchangeably, but he is on target now!

Unfortunately, after yesterday’s hailstorm at his friend Sophie’s house, he also has got the idea that Sophie keeps thunder at her house. (“I wanna go Sophie’s house, see thunder. Mommy, where my thunder go?”) Chalk that one up next to, “Santa ships UPS.”

What else was good about today?

Check out Ian loving on this handmade, wooden train! I’m always so excited when handmade toys constructed of natural materials win out over the plastic, battery powered ones. This one even beat out a talking Thomas, so you know it is some good dope! He played with it pretty solidly for about an hour.

Where can you get one? So glad you asked.

Brian Farnsworth
2015 Antares Drive
Bastrop, LA 71220
Tel: 318.283.0709
cmfarny@aol.com

Merry Christmas to the Wise and Wonderful Betty Gray

 

 

 

This is the “shawlette” I made for my Grandma after they lost hers in the laundry at the nursing home. (It’s a wonderful facility, btw.) I did not make any notes because I have no intention of making another, but I held two strands of acrylic (wouldn’t want the institutional laundry to boil a nice wool, now) together to make it work up faster… one novelty and one worsted. The second skein of green turned out to exist only in my head, which is why you see it switch to pink…The body of the piece is worked in 2 & 2 rib and bordered on the neck side with moss stitch. I shaped everything with short rows and by increasing/decreasing to add/remove ribs as needed. And the flower? Well, now… that’s just what we do when there’s a spectacular decrease error right at the shoulder.

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Oh yes, I so went there…


Because if you can’t dress your son up like his sock monkey, who can you dress him as? The sock monkey is sporting a sock-monkey size version of one of my Last Minute Hats– Ian delightedly wore the Baby size all day after Santa delivered it. Who knew Santa was busy looking up patterns on Ravelry? I personally am impressed.

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Boo! Hat

And today we have an example of a failed project that turned into a success…

Viola- merely embroider a pair of eyes over the world’s ugliest attempt at a raised heart on a knitted garment, and you have a charming, Halloween Hat.

And yes, that’s right- Ian had a chocolate chip cookie for breakfast today, because Mommy is AWESOME.

Ian’s New Word

is “no, no, no!” Not even 9 months old, and already oppositional. He shakes his head and says “no, no, no!” It’s cute now, but wait…

I created a knitted shamrock doorknob hanger based on Mary Thomas’s picot flowers, but with one thing and another didn’t get the pattern written in time for St. Pat’s. Oh, well, it will come around again next year, I suppose!

Spring has definitely sprung around here… We’ve got crocuses, forsythia, periwinkle, and I’m sure soon there will be azaleas. The wildlife is active, too. We heard a fox shrieking in the night last night. If you’ve never heard this, it sounds like a human in unearthly distress… we checked on the baby just to be sure it was the local fauna and not a new kind of baby illness and then went back to bed.

Here’s Ian enjoying the sunshine with that faraway look in his eye. Our march for babies team has raised more that $500 so far! We had another team training walk on Monday, and then all the babies got to play in the sun. Look for photos soon. Thank you so much to all our sponsors!

The latest fundraising development for the March is that 10% of each purchase from our Zazzle Shop will be donated to the March for Babies until 4/20/08.

Heh

So, I know what you are thinking. “Hooray, another blog! I was worried we would run out! We’re SAVED!” Well, time will tell whether you enjoy my adventures in yarn and babies.

Today, Ian and I saw our first daffodils of the year. His first ever. I was far more impressed than he. I tried to show him crocuses and periwinkles yesterday, and he wasn’t impressed with those, either.

Our current “big” project is that Ian and I are training for a 3 mile walk in support of the March of Dimes, which is called March for Babies. So far this week, we have logged five training miles, aided and abetted by our beautiful weather.

That covers the baby, and as far as the yarn is concerned, I’m currently exploring the hopsac stitch and some cotton/acrylic yarn. More on this later. I’m also working on a knitted burp cloth, experimenting in no-slip bootie bottoms, and designing cats for color pattern knitting. For some reason I’ve been very unfocused this week, so hopefully I can pull myself together and see these documents through to the posting stage. Join my yahoo group to be notified when new patterns are available.