Sorry to gush but how cute is Petite Purls?

I think it’s very exciting!

Congratulations Brandy and Allegra - you’ve done great.

After about three weeks of going backwards, FB has started to get real control over his movement.

I get to be the proud mum he crawls towards. I feel so lucky.

Long before FB was born, W decided he wanted to get him Froebel’s Gifts.

No wait - that’s not true. He wanted to make him Froebel’s Gifts. But the first gift was made of yarn and so it was mine to make.

To be honest, they were a great ‘I want to knit but I have a small baby and not alot of time’ pattern, so it wasn’t a hardship. They are garter stitch short row balls that take next to no yarn, and the hardest part is the garter stitch grafting, which takes a little thought and care BUT…

You could easily seam them instead. No one would know.

:)

If you’d like to make them the pattern is here: froeballs_pattern_oxfordkitchenyarns.pdf (right click and save), and the ravelry info is here.

I need to get on with the secondary set…

I picked the gooseberries yesterday morning during our regular trip to the allotment to hunt for strawberries.

A week ago there were about twice as many on the bush, but we’ve ended up sharing our crop with the birds (again.) W tells me that they took to landing on the netting, which lowered it enough for them to get the fruit.

I admit to being impressed. :)

There were just enough here to make a fool, which was delicious.

As I mentioned a couple of days ago, my recent crafting time has been taken up sewing the Expandable Pack It In Tote by U-Handbag.

It’s been a relatively large sewing project - I’ve probably spent about 5 evenings in total making it. I’ve learned a lot of techniques I haven’t used before - things like putting in magnetic clasps and how to put in a lined letterbox pocket like the one on the front. To be honest it’s all been a bit daunting, but I’m really pleased with the results.

I’m also really pleased that the fabric all came from my stash.

The outer is Munki Munki - which I bought back in 2004 I think - and the inner is Kaffe Fassett (even though it is the most unlikely Kaffe Fassett I’ve ever seen!) which I bought from Liberty’s a couple of months ago, and which I used for the cuffs of FB’s blue trousers.

The rest of the things I needed came from UHandbag, and arrived amazingly quickly, (like overnight quick! Which was great because once I knew what I wanted to do, I wanted to get started right away.)