Mom at work

Möbius scarf

2011-01-30T22:02:00.003+01:00

The picture isn´t too great (made by myself with my iPhone), but I really want to share with you the great difficulty that I finally conquered in making this Möbius scarf. This is actually my third attempt. The other two were either too small or too big or just plain ugly.
I took this tutorial as the basis of my design. I did a ribbing pattern instead. Especially the cast on is very confusing for me and the first few rows are a big strain on your fingers and arms as everything is really tight in the beginning. Or maybe I am still doing something wrong.
I am not sure if I will try another one, I do like these Möbius rings though and it´s not just because I am a Mathematician...

I've been featured!

2010-12-18T21:22:00.004+01:00

That's quite a compliment being featured on the blog where my inspiration mainly comes from. It was her birthday and I was invited for a high-tea lunch with a crafting workshop included. Lucky me!
Because I knew she is not fond of knitting, I made this knitted Barbie dress for her girls. Lots and lots of patterns can be found here.
Of course, vlijtig has a much better picture of the dress with Barbie in it.
When I was making the dress I had to ask a friend if I could borrow her daughter's Barbie for a fitting. My little girl is not in to this Barbie girl (yet?).

For Philip

2010-10-29T16:43:00.004+02:00

My best friend just had her third child, after two girls, she has a son now! I used this pattern as a basis to make the baby booties. Most trouble was trying to get the buttons on the correct spot.
I used this pattern for the hat, which I had used before for my daughter. Unfortunately I made it a bit too tight and Philip's head is a lot bigger than I imagined it would be. I think his two sisters will be using the hat for their dollies.

Handbag for my sister

2010-08-30T11:44:00.004+02:00

This handbag really took me a lot of time to finish. The inner lining was my first project with a zipper. Luckily my machine has a zipper foot, but I still found it difficult getting all the edges nicely tucked in. The inner lining turned out smaller than I wanted and therefore I had to take out the crocheted handbag a bit to make it all fit. After all the hard work I am happy with the result, hope my sister is too.

Grocery and bath bag

2010-08-30T11:25:00.003+02:00

This week was the time for completing my unfinished projects which had been lying around quite some time. I had made the bath bag on the left a while ago. Both are made out of wrapping rope (you can find them in all different sorts of colors). The material is very usefull for storing all the wet bath toys. I had started the one on the right, but somehow never felt the need to finish. Last night I finally did and I am happy with the result. Now we can stop using the plastic bags for the apples we buy every week at the vegetable market.

My first little purse

2010-08-30T11:14:00.002+02:00

My little niece turns 2 this week and yesterday we celebrated her birthday. I had made this little purse for my own daughter once, but this one turned out to be even cuter. My inspiration came from the Starling handbags from futuregirl. I am so happy with the foundation single crochet stitch which I learned from her tutorial. My little purse (except for the pink lining of course) is made from one skein, the strap is connected in one piece. The butterfly tutorial is found here.

Ah summer...

2010-08-02T21:42:00.003+02:00

Spent a lovely two weeks in France: camping with the kids. Unfortunately tomorrow my lazy days are over and it's back to work. Just to stay in the mood a picture of the Britanny coast with my altered flip flops. There was something at the bottom of the straps bothering me so I needed to act. Luckily I came across this tutorial. The itchy problem was gone and I was very happy with the new look of my otherwise very boring flip flops.

Summer party

2010-06-14T11:18:00.004+02:00

Just found out this morning that they will be having the yearly summer party at school this Wednesday. I always think I am very organized, but this one seemed to have completely slipped my mind. When we got home, my daughter and I immediately got cracking on brownies and cupcakes which they can sell during the festivities.
I got this book for my birthday from my sister. I used the party cupcakes recipe and I think I will have the kids do the decorating themselves.

Birthday brooches

2010-05-26T21:30:00.004+02:00

Once a month at work we celebrate all the birthdays of that particular month. This month I'm one of the lucky ones to pay for the pie. The problem we always face when entering the narrow hallway - crowded by people eating pie - is that you don't recognize who you should congratulate with their birthday.
Well, I came up with these birthday brooches. Let's see if they will recognize us tomorrow!

Time out in London

2010-05-17T10:07:00.006+02:00

We have been doing some travelling with the kids. So no real craft time for me lately. I do want to leave you this handy book tip.
London is such a lovely city with all the wonderful museums and parks to visit. For kids there is plenty to do. One thing you should realise when travelling to such a big city with kids is that you should prepare yourself a bit. Better to look into things while still at home than trying to find out what the opening times are of a museum until you are actually there.
This book from Time out really came in handy. One example is the Backpack family trail we did in the Victoria & Albert museum. We read about it and then looked it up on the internet and realized we could only do the backpack trails on Saturday. Another great tip was the Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Playground in Kensington park. We saw that the playground would be closed except for Saturday. Well, that sums up the first day of our visit!
You can find another useful city guide here by babyccinokids.

Temporary case

2010-04-19T10:03:00.002+02:00

I have actually decided that I am going to just buy a real 'grown-up' case for my new iPhone. Still had some felt left over from easter, so for now this case will do. If you want a case which really closes, look here at my friend's tutorial.
Today, by coincidence, I also came across this one.

Happy easter!

2010-04-03T17:00:00.006+02:00

I am sooo ready for easter...
This week I made these very cool eggwarmers. The tutorial is quite clever and easy enough for a novice sewer like myself.
For the egg basket I had to raid my mom's plastic bag stash in search of enough yellow bags. The tutorial says to use 20-25 bags of the same color. I don't know how to acquire that amount of plastic bags of the same color, so mine turned out with a green bottom, a yellow side and a white top.

Child's apron

2010-03-22T11:07:00.003+01:00

I have been working on the 'outfit' of my eldest son for his school play. Don't have the pictures up yet, so I was thinking about the work I did for last year's play: making 5 aprons.

Here is a short explanation:
I took a dish towel 50x70 cm and folded the top two corners in (about 18cm). For the nek band I used a ribbon of 60 cm's. Put about 10 cm's of each side of the ribbon under the fold and pin down. Make sure what's left of the ribbon fits over the child's head (it really depends on how big the head is!). Then I used 2 times 30 cm of ribbon for the straps and pinned them down right beneath the fold (see my pics) about 5 cm's in.
Sew it all up. The slanted folds I sewed down twice for extra strength and at the top some extra stitches so the nek strap is really tight to the apron. For the side straps I sewed it on with a box shape. The end of the straps I folded down and stitched up so it looks nicer and you're all done!

Matching poncho

2010-03-15T11:43:00.002+01:00

The tutorial said it would be a weekend project. Perhaps because I am not a very quick knitter, it took me a bit longer. But she seems to be happy with the result.

Crochet hat

2010-03-15T11:09:00.005+01:00

I really like this pattern and so does my daughter. Unfortunately her former hat got lost and I had to make a new one. This time without a matching scarf. My daughter is an excellent model don't you think?

Easter eggs

2010-03-15T11:04:00.003+01:00

Due to a short Berlin holiday and the renovation of our kitchen, I am way behind on blogging my projects. Well, to get into the feeling of easter, this is a start.

Arm warmers

2010-02-15T12:03:00.005+01:00

Winter is still here and I need to keep my arms warm while knitting, typing, etc...
I found this really nice pattern for knitting arm warmers. It was my first experiment with round knitting with double pointed needles. This sure tastes like more! But first I have to finish my current project in progress (see picture).
I do get cold hands and arms while programming, I am not brave enough to take these to the office however.

2010-02-08T10:20:00.004+01:00

These rose barrettes are really cute. My daughter gave the first one to her cousin, so I made another (improved) one for her. I actually found the tutorial through my friends blog vlijtig. I get lots of inspiration from her site, so be sure to check it out!

New crochet scarf

2010-02-01T11:07:00.002+01:00

I really like this simple tutorial (sorry it is in Dutch) for making a warm woolen scarf. It did take me longer than expected, but I really love how the border comes out. Now on to my next project!

T-shirt experiment

2010-02-01T10:59:00.004+01:00

My kids were having fun with sharpening all their crayons. I thought it might be fun to do something with the left over shreds with all these nice colors instead of throwing them away. This is the result. Let's hope it does ok in the washing machine.

The perfect snackbag

2010-01-25T11:47:00.003+01:00

After 4 tries, I think I finally developed a snackbag with the perfect size and shape to hold two cut apple pieces and to fit into the boys´ lunchbox. Notice the name tags, I never thought it would be so difficult to get these labels at exactly the right spot.

Reusable sandwich wrap

2010-01-25T11:25:00.003+01:00

I am trying to find ways of cutting back on throw away plastic bags. This a cool tutorial for this idea, the only thing is I can't seem to find this PUL fabric they talk about. First I tried another set of fused plastic bags for the inner lining with a fabric on the outside, it didn't turn out the way I wanted. Second try was by using a plastic (disposable) table cloth (two layers fused together). It turned out ok. Only thing is, my sewing machine is about to die: I can't seem to get the tension of the lower thread right. I am not satisfied by the ugly loops in my lower threads. Let's see tomorrow at work how my sandwich holds.

Drumsticks holder

2010-01-18T10:33:00.003+01:00

This project is actually a secret, it is for my brother in law's birthday coming up next month. I think I can be pretty sure, however, that he won't be visiting this blog in the near future.
I had already made one of these for my husband to hang on his electronic drums. We were a bit tired of his sticks lying on the floor, so this is my invention of a drumsticks holder, made from fused plastic bags.

Nice detail of this version is that the recycled bag is from the Sam Ash music store. My husband and I were in New York last May and we payed a visit this store to buy new cymbals for his acoustic drums.

Tortell de Reis

2010-01-11T11:25:00.004+01:00

This post is almost a week overdue, but I have been laying sick in bed almost all of last week. Luckily my husband was feeling healthy enough to keep things going around the house.
Good planning now came to use. On Monday I was still feeling ok and baked the cake with the king figure in it. The kids had to wait until Wednesday to start eating it. By this time I was too ill for almost anything. My 5 year old was complaining on Monday why he couldn't just have one little piece, it must be hard on him having a mother like me.

The picture of the tortell is actually of the one I made last year. It totally turned out bad (tasted like cardboard). I used this recipe, if you feel confident to give it a try. This year I played it safe and made a normal chocolate and vanilla swirl cake and reused the same figure of last year. I heard it was a succes and my daughter was the lucky one to have the king figure in her piece.

Bye bye christmas

2010-01-04T12:58:00.003+01:00

Just a few signs of Christmas left in the house. I always enjoy the smell and feel of the Christmas tree in the living room, but am also very happy once it has left. I had some time off from work and hoped to do some more crafting and work some more on my blog. Unfortunately, a week is very limited with three kids and and husband also in need of my (undivided) attention.

Finished just in time

2009-11-30T11:41:00.003+01:00

Whipup inspired me with their long list of advent calendar ideas. I thought this year it would be beter to make my own instead of the bought ones. Another advantage is: no chocolate in here!
Moreover I am so happy I managed to finish in time for december...

Guilty feelings

2009-11-23T10:54:00.003+01:00

Sinterklaas finally made it to our town this Saturday. For some reason he always comes a week later than in the rest of our country. The kids were very happy to see him.
I keep wondering, am I the only mother having guilty feelings? I know it is all for the good cause, but I don´t enjoy lying to my kids about this man...

Where is the snackbag??

2009-11-17T22:47:00.002+01:00

Tried another tutorial last week and this was the result: a reusable ricewaffle-bag. My daughter alwas wants a ricewaffle during her brother's swimming class. I'm getting tired of all those plastic sandwich bags, so I made a reusable one. The innerlining, by the way, is made up of recycled and fused plastic bags.
For the snack bag tutorial go here. And for fusing plastic bags go here.

Luckily I made pictures, because my hubby took the bag with him to soccer practice last Wednesday and we haven't been able to recover it since. I guess I should start a new one...

Welcome Sinterklaas

2009-11-16T13:47:00.003+01:00

I love crafting with the kids, but why is it always me to be the last one leaving the crafting table with the final cutting, glueing and sticking and cleaning up?

Work in progress...

2009-11-09T14:06:00.001+01:00