Christmas Craft Part 1: Potato Printed Wrapping Paper

Every year at Christmas time I feel the urge to get crafty and I dream up a long and unachievable list of handmade and DIY projects. Having kids makes the urge even greater as I attempt to relive happy kids craft memories with my daughter, who is not always as cooperative as I might like.

Last Christmas was memorable for its handmade failures. There was the gingerbread house that collapsed within 12 hours due to the humidity, the gingerbread men that suffered a similar fate and started shedding limbs, and salt dough decorations that took forever to dry out and then went soggy and fell from the tree (leaving their ribbons behind). The most memorable disaster occurred when we were gathered at the dinner table and started pulling the handmade crackers. We were expecting to find a candy cane and hand written joke in each so it was quite a surprise when a small army of sugar ants came flying out!

This year I had grand delusions of making all gifts handmade, but luckily remembered just in time that a mother of three kids under four might not have a load of time on her hands. So instead I'm going to try and keep it simple, tasteful, and ant-free!

Potato Printed Wrapping Paper
Equipment: potatoes, cookie cutters, sharp knife, roll of craft paper or brown paper (we used a roll of craft paper from Ikea), kid's acrylic paints, plastic lids.

Press potato haves down onto cookie cutter until the cutter is about 1cm deep, or as far as you can go before it cuts through the other side of the potato. With the cookie cutter still in the potato, use a sharp knife to cut away the centimentre outside the cutter.

We chose just two colors, warm yellow and red, and used plastic lids from baby formula tins (of which we have hundreds) as paint dishes.

Red stars. I was happy with how these turned out, and with the streaky effect I got as a result of doing it on the timber outdoor table.

I think the squirrels are my favourite even though it is not very Christmassy, especially here in the southern hemisphere.

The last time I tried potato printing was 2 years ago...Nina was 20 months old and more interested in covering her body with paint. I thought she would be better suited for the task this time around, but she preferred mixing all the paints together and using a paint brush to create a giant splodge on the paper. She lost interest in about 5 minutes, and I was left wondering why I bother. She is so creative and loves craft but I just can't get her to follow my instructions on tasks like this. Maybe I am expecting too much from a 3 year old, or maybe the designer in me is containing the artist in her? Anyone have any good tips for engaging toddlers in these kind of activities?

Stay tuned for Christmas Craft Part 2: Cotton Braid for Wrapping Gifts.

Twin Baby Kinas

I finally got a chance to download some photos from the camera so now is my chance to show off my first two Baby Kina cardigans (and my growing bubs). Olive and Eliza are now 7months old and were more interested in putting the cardigans in their mouths than cooperating for a photo shoot. I might try to photograph them again once they can sit up unassisted.

This pattern is a simple knit but my knitting of it was hampered by lack of sleep, teething twins and carpal tunnel (I had carpal tunnel after Nina was born and have it again now). I'm very happy with the outcome and absolutely love the yarn. I'm now a quarter of the way through a third Baby Kina for Nina but only seem to be able to manage 3 or 4 rows a night. Slow and steady...

Buttons for Baby Kina

As a mother of twins it is now impossible for me to go anywhere without encountering total strangers who feel compelled to offer advice. One thing people often say is "you mustn't dress them the same!". I'm a pretty easy going type of girl and don't really go in for must dos and don'ts. I also know that the twins have very different personalities and get treated as individuals regardless of what they are wearing. I often dress them in matching or coordinating clothes because (a) it requires less thought and makes my life easier, (b) if they are wearing the same I know that one won't be any hotter/cooler than the other, and (c) my mother-in-law always sends 2 of every outfit.

So at the moment I am knitting not one, not two, but three Baby Kina cardigans. I had always planned to knit one each for the twins using the Debbie Bliss Eco Baby cotton, but originally I thought I would knit Georgie Hallam's Acacia for Nina using the Cascade Ultra Pima. Once I started knitting the first Baby Kina Nina saw the pattern and told me that she wanted one too. I decided she would get more wear out of a light cardigan than a knitted singlet, so I am going to fudge the pattern using thicker yarn and bigger needles , and maybe a few extra stitches, and hopefully end up with something that will fit a 3.5 year old.

On Monday we went on a little expedition to the local haberdashery shop to buy buttons for all three. I took a skein of each yarn and came back with two options for each. Now I just need to decide which ones to use.

Here's what I'm thinking...

• Small shell buttons on the mauve

• Square peach buttons on the peach

• Large round pink shell buttons on the pink (these were actually Nina's choice and I think it was a stroke of genius. On it's own I thought the pink was too dark for the yarn, but held against it the sheen of the shell and the cotton complement each other perfectly!)

Or should I use the shell buttons on the peach to match the mauve cardigan?

Spring Knitting

After finishing my Watershed a couple of weeks back the weather turned from mild winter to hot spring days and a woollen cardi in dark was the last thing I wanted to wear (there is always next winter!). The last thing I wanted to do was finish seeing in the ends of my second stripey baby blanket. For several nights I watched TV without knitting, and as nice as it was to have some snuggle time with my husband I was at serious risk of losing my knitting mojo!

Luckily a few days later a package arrived in the mail from Jimmy Beans Wool with just the soft and pretty cottony goodness I needed to get myself back on track. 2 skeins each of Debbie Bliss Eco Baby in mauve and peach and Cascade Ultra Pima in primrose. These will become little cardigans for my growing girls.

This was my first order from Jimmy Beans and I was very happy with the service and the prices (the Australian dollar was worth more than the US dollar when I placed the order - yippee!). It took about 14 days for the yarn to arrive via standard post. I'll definitely be ordering from them again.

FO: Watershed

I can't quite remember where I first saw Amy Swenson's Watershed, but I liked it the instant I saw it and wanted to knit one for myself. That was back in July 2010. It stayed at the top of my Ravelry queue for over a year until I finally cast on in early August this year.

As much as I love the design I have to admit that I struggled with the pattern. It could have just been my baby brain but I found it hard to follow at first and had to rip it out and start from scratch twice. I also followed the advice of many other revelry users and made several mods to compensate for a few design flaws. I'm the kind of knitter that likes to stick to the pattern so it bugged me that I had to do this. Anyway, for the full rant check out my project page.

I didn't make things any easier for myself by substituting the recommended worsted weight yarn with DK weight Bendigo Woollen Mills Classic 8ply. To compensate for this I knit the size 42 which is two sizes up from what I normally would wear. I could be because of this that it sits a little funny in front of the arm holes, like the raglan shaping starts too high. Or maybe its the design. I will have to knit it again one day and let you know.

Saturday Morning

With the twins a little under the weather and the weather a little windy, we decided it might be best to spend the day at home. Junior Chef and I whipped up a batch of raspberry muffins for morning tea and I got a chance to play around with my new camera.

We used this basic recipe, replacing the blueberries for frozen raspberries and adding some lemon zest. It's a good recipe to make with a toddler as it gets you to rub the butter and flour together, and what 3 yr old doesn't love getting their hands in the bowl. They might not have been the moistest of muffins but they were quite tasty and went down well with a coffee.

Stripey Baby Blanket #1

I was planning on waiting until both baby blankets had been completed before posting about this but, seeing as the second blanket is languishing in the ends-need-to-sewn-in phase, I don't think I can wait that long. And hopefully showing #1 off will help inspire me to finish #2.

So here it is....Stripey Mitred Baby Blanket

I used this pattern and included the picot hem. I'm a sucker for a picot hem and I think it really makes the blanket. It's knit in the round, which means nice short rounds to begin with and long, slow rounds as you get to the outside. After a good strong blocking it turned into the lovely square it was supposed to and the yarn relaxed nicely. The result is a lovely floppy baby blanket that is the perfect size for the cot or the pram. For more details, see my ravelry project page.

The yarn is Bendigo Woollen Mills Classic 8ply, an affordable and reliable choice for a blanket like this. It is warm, wears well and is machine washable.

Without sounding too proud, I have to say that this has to be one of the projects that I am most happy with. Usually I pick fault with everything I make but every time I see or touch this simple blanket it makes me happy. Maybe it's because it was made with love? Who knows.

The twins love it but will have to share it for the time being.