Orca

The July birthday box started the journey to its new home last Friday. The Orca was the last ami to make it into the box.

The Orca pattern comes from Bathtime Buddies. I used Schachenmayr Catania sport cotton with a C hook to make this a smaller ami. I chose felt for the accents.

This was a fun project and I kept finding more projects I'd like to make at some point. However, it was time to mail this project off and get started with my fall birthday box and Halloween.

I know many of you are thinking but we just finished July 4th. I'm not looking to rush celebrating Halloween but I have 2 boxes to finish before October as well finishing off the doll donations by end of November. These are summer projects to be enjoyed in the fall and winter months. That doesn't even include the Thanksgiving box and the Christmas boxes. You can expect to see some fall decorations creeping into the blog in the not to distant future.

Narwhal

One of my goals when working on this ocean/sea themed project was to add some characters that aren't always found in traditional ocean/sea sets. The Narwhal was a good fit for that goal. I even included I'm a Narwhal to provide a little more age appropriate info about the Narwhal.

There are so many more patterns I'd love to add to this set but my time is winding down. I have one more ami to finish and then I have to wrap, pack and put the birthday box in the mail in order for the box to arrive on time.

The Narwhal pattern comes from Bathtime Buddies and I chose to make it in Schachenmayr Catania sport cotton with a C hook. I also chose to use felt instead of terry for the white features. This was a much better choice than what I did with the swordfish.

Hermit Crab

I love to combine children's books and toys in gift packages. Sometimes I look for books that fit the theme and other times I look for patterns to fit books that I want to gift.

In this case when I thought about doing an ocean/sea themed package I thought of both Eric Carle's House for Hermit Crab and Bill Peet's Kermit the Hermit.

One of my disapointments recently with Eric Carle's books is that book sites are only selling altered versions of his original picture books. The hardcover versions and picture books are not the tradtional children's book formats many fondly remember of Eric Carle's books. Most of the paper versions have been converted to "leveled" readers. While many publishers have added board book offerings the current hardcover offerings are not what you expect when you buy a hardcover book.

I've been searching through homeschool sites and other book sites for new copies of the traditional sized picture books and I am pleased to say the Hermit Crab will be heading out with traditional sized copies of both Eric Carle and Bill Peet's books.

If you are interested in the traditional picture book sized copies of Eric Carle's books I suggest you check the book measurements. While one expects a smaller version of the book when ordering a board book, I know I have certain expectations when I order a hardcover picture book that used to be a full sized book.

Some of the newer hard cover publications of Carle's books are closer in size to a Beatrix Potter book than a traditional hardcover picture book. If you want the larger sized books try homeschool sites and other book sellers. Some still have the regular picture book sized books in stock.

The pattern for the Hermit Crab comes from How to Crochet Animals: Ocean.

I didn't have the appropriate sport cotton colors and the lighter acrylic I had didn't hold the shape. Thus I went with wosted acrylic yarn and a D hook to have some control over the size of the crab. I used beads for the eyes that I'd recently purchased for Barbie clothes.

Seahorse

I wanted a seahorse to send along with Eric Carle's Mister Seahorse for July's birthday box. I chose the pattern from How to Crochet Animals: Ocean and I found the pattern to be easy to make. I used worsted yarn and a D hook. I'm thinking about making a second one with sport yarn and a c hook to fit with the size of the rest of the ocean animals.