one more candle on the cake of life

Birthdays! I've had one recently. Not a big one (that's next year) but still, it's always nice to have a cake, go out for dinner & be spoilt rotten by your nearest and dearest. This year I have been extremely lucky, especially with the presents. My lovely family and friends have really upped the game this year.

I recently did a post about books full of exciting knitting patterns. My knitting buddy (the lady I made the wedding cake for) got me this fabulous book;

Yes, that is a Princess Leia Buns hat :)
There were several minutes of fascinated silence mid-birthday-dinner as I couldn't resist flicking through this book. I will definitly be having a go at some of these. Patterns include;

- Tank Girl socks
- Hobbit Feel slippers
- A beaded bag inspired by Hermione Granger
- Cat Woman hat

Will the 12 knits of Chritmas ever get done at this rate? watch this space...

My parents always manage to find some weird & wonderful little things. This is a pom-pom maker. I remember making these in primary school and Brownies.

 

 

Back in those hazy days we used cardboard rings cut out from cereal packets.

These days, its bad enough that my house is full of bags of wool and needles, not to mention all the little scraps of wool that my cats run away with, without having bits of cardboard littered about the place. I hadn't seen these before and, let's be honest now, most scarves and hats could do with a pom-pom! They're also friendlier to the environment as they are reusable.

 

Finally, I have no idea where my parents found this, but this is a little set for making flowers for accessories.

 

It's a neat little set. It seems a little like French knitting (those lovely little bobbins from which you can make shoelaces). The idea is to weave your yarn into flowers - different shaped looms for different flowers.

I had a quick go this evening with some spare yarn that I got from a magazine.

 

 

 

Using simple geometrics, weave your yarn around the loom as directed in the (surprisingly complicated) instructions.

 

The finished article was rather aesthetically pleasing, if not actually a flower. Perhaps if I made 3 more I'd have a set of coasters? I think I'll have to devote some proper time to it to get to grips with all the different sizes and styles to make an actual flower. All useful skills!