Christmas brought Crochet and other goodies

It is wonderful when your husband supports your hobby. This year was no different and I got some new cool stuff to work on for both my donations and my holiday project for my relatives baby girl.

First off was the annual Crochet 2018 Day-to-Day Calendar which I already completed a doll blanket from that I'll be posting about later this week. My one disappointment is they've reprinted items from previous calendars. I did get a new doll outfit from one of my favorite doll designers so that was a plus.


I love fairy tales sets and like to make the toys and send them with the corresponding book. I was thrilled with the Three Little Pigs Playset

I have some of Amy Gaines Christmas ornaments so when I saw she had fairy tale patterns Little Red Riding Hood made it to my Christmas list.

Cradle purses were not a great success for me, but I saw Annie's Bassinet Baby and thought this might be a cute addition to the doll donation that I could actually make work for me.

The baby doll donation dolls now can have some holiday outfits 15" Christmas Outfit and Valentine's Day

There is no longer a concern about what lovey to crochet for St. Patrick's Day as I also got the Leprechaun Lovey pattern, which I will be working on for the St. Patrick's day package.

In post Christmas shopping I found a gift for my niece's bday from Herrschnerrs and they had a great shipping deal if you met their minimum. They also had a set of my Bates Bamboo hooks B-N on sale at quite a good price. After finding they'd discontinued my Bates Bamboo thread hooks I decided having a complete back up set of the regular hooks to make shipping was not a bad idea.

I also went wild at Knit Picks 40% off book sale picking up several ami titles along with a dishcloth book. Again I am a sucker for free shipping.

Amigurumi Parent and Baby Animals: Crochet soft and snuggly moms and dads with the cutest babies!


Amigurumi Winter Wonderland: 15 Original Crochet Patterns

Baby's Buddy Amigurumi | Crochet | Leisure Arts (6853)


Cute Crocheted Animals: 10 Well-Dressed Friends to Make

Leisure Arts, Dishcloths

Edward's Crochet Doll Emporium: Flip the Mix-and-Match Patterns to Make and Dress Your Favourite People

I found this book after I'd made my Christmas wishlist so it seemed like a great time to pick it up during a great book sale. Literary Yarns: Crochet Projects Inspired by Classic Books

I'm hoping to make some great stuff with all these inspiring patterns.

The Easter Bunny Brought Crochet Patterns

I love that the Easter Bunny knows I crochet. It’s wonderful he knows about online patterns and downloading them to leave in my Easter basket. He even seems to know which patterns are on my wish list.

This year the Easter Bunny brought the Animal Amigurumi to Crochet and he is such an amazing bunny that he even printed the corrections and slid them inside the book.

Like Santa the Easter Bunny knows I love to make the AG/18" doll clothes so he swung by Maggie's crochet and picked up some doll's clothes and some toy patterns for me. I got Betty the Barbeque Chef and Winter Fun for the 18" dolls. I love the make your own snowman. I have been eyeing that pattern for a while now. I wonder who told the bunny.

While at Maggie's the bunny picked up some toy patterns. I got the new Cinderella Flip Doll pattern. I also got two activity sets: Cooking Katie and Handy Andy.

I send a big thank you to the Easter Bunny. He is keeping me plenty busy with projects for relatives and my Christmas donations.

More Birthday Patterns

My Mom and my husband's Aunt were kind enough to give me money for my birthday this year. When possible DH and I have treated birthday money as our "mad money" free to spend it or save it for some future treat. Since I have been on a pattern binge, I decided to pull off a few more patterns on my wish list. I decided to divide my list into pre and post Christmas items. There are items I want to make before Christmas and those that will make great presents for after Christmas. As I keep finding new patterns, the list keeps growing and it is hard to choose.

Shortly after I gave my husband my wish list, I got notice that Planet June had published her third set of dino's. So the first item on my list was of course Dinosaur Set 3. This is the dino set I have seen with an ankylosaurus. It is on my Christmas project list.

The next item to make my list was a set of super heroes. This has a broad appeal across my gift list. This Set of 3 Hero has patterns for Superman, Spiderman, and Batman. I am looking forward to getting started on these.

The Pirates were actually on my birthday list and did not make the cut, so they were clearly going to make the list when I found I had extra money to spend. I love Craft Deb's items and cannot wait to get started on these.

Now I had to look more carefully at the money I had left and figure out which patterns would fit in to the money I had left.

Christmas Crochet Pattern Collection is a series of crochet Christmas characters and fits into my idea of making crochet Little People substitutes. Since they are Christmas characters having them before would make them more useful. Thus, they made the cut as well.

Last on the list was the Gnome Home. I love the idea of a crochet toy village for kids. The gnomes in this village seem to fit the Waldorf concept of creating play that is more imaginative. I am continuing to look for more village pieces and am considering changing the colors to try to make a Christmas themed child friendly village.

I am very grateful to Mom and my Aunt for letting me have these wonderful patterns to make items for family and friends. I am working on increasing my donations so this gives me more options to make toys as well.

Birthday Presents

We celebrated my birthday over the weekend. Since I have started crocheting my birthday lists I give to my husband have gotten more centralized, patterns, mostly e-patterns that I don't want to download myself. While he always finds ways to surprise me, he also likes a list. On birthdays, holidays, etc. he asks me for the list and then picks items off it to give me.

My birthday had a spectacular haul of wonderful patterns this year. I cannot wait to get started making them. I am sure my posts will include updates as I get them made.

If you read my blog, you will know my tastes run mostly to toys so you should not be surprised with the patterns I received.

From Planet June:

Dinosaur Set 1

Dinosaur Set 2

While I have purchased June's The Complete Idiot's Guide to Amigurumi these will be the first of her patterns I have received or purchased. I have a few younger relatives going through the dinosaur phase and currently only have Gourmet Crochet's Amigurumi Dinosaur patterns.

From Wolf Dreamer:

Dino Buddies

There is a theme here. I have been making the same dino patterns repeatedly and really wanted to see some other styles. I have followed Wolf Dreamer's blog and used some of her free patterns. This set has been on my list for a while. I am excited to try them.

From Crochet Village

Halloween Ghoulies

If you follow this blog, you know I make holiday packages to send out to the younger members of this family. I am currently working on the Halloween one. I saw this pattern and while I have some cute Frankenstein patterns, I really wanted to see this Mummy pattern. This is on my top list to start. My husband hit a free BOGO promotion when he was shopping so he got me a pattern that was not on my list but that I love because it gives me some new patterns for my Easter packages.

Eggheads

I love the hats on these. While they will be adorable for my Easter creations I can also see them having applications for Barbie and my other ami's.

Tobogganing Snowmen

I came across this pattern while searching on Etsy one day for holiday patterns. The author does not use a name but a handle bvoe688. Both sides of our family love snowmen so this pattern was necessary. My husband has already requested one for his office. After I finish the Halloween patterns, I will have to get to work on this pattern.

Crafty Deb:

Snap the Dragon

I have wanted to make a dragon for a while. This pattern looked like a good starting point. I have tried some of the free patterns and have not been happy with my outcomes. I suspect it has more to do with my talent then the patterns. This one looked like something I could manage and kid friendly when it was finished which was my goal.

Previous experience with Deb's patterns has made me feel that I can tackle this one.

The last pattern on my very generous birthday pile was from Lucy Ravenscar. I received her Star Wars patterns for Christmas and now that I have a young relative that loves the series, I am starting to work through them. However, her Witch/Wizard caught my eye not just for my Halloween project, but because it teaches one how to change the hair/clothing styles on the projects to create more toys. I usually end up working through this myself, so having some suggestions and new techniques is a welcome idea. I am looking for new little people to include in my packages. These may work.

Now I just need to get to work.