Learn To Knit

My Mom was an avid knitter and crocheter. She made all kinds of things from clothes to playful animals,Halloween costumes to blankets. She would give these items for gifts, donate them for church bazaars and even to the homeless. She and my Granny would sit in front of the television crocheting and knitting hardly looking down at what they were doing. My Mother and Granny were so good at it that they could have probably did it with their eyes closed.

My daughter was probably about 8 when she asked her Grandma to teach her. My Mom thought she was too young. Mom was also a left handed person so it was a bit awkward to teach my daughter too. Unfortunately by the time my daughter was old enough her Grandma had gone to heaven.

Sophia modeling her new hat and scarf

Years later my daughter still had the desire to learn to knit. So she went online to You Tube, watched allot of video's and taught herself.

Since then my daughter has made all kinds of scarves,hats, animals, bootie's and gave them for gifts. She even made a crocheted Mickey Mouse Costume which I will share in another posts. She has even donated hats and squares for various causes. I am very proud of her.

Here are some of the neat things she made in her early days of learning to knit. She was 16 years old last year when she taught herself to knit.   

Hat for baby my daughter made



A sweater my daughter made

Here are some learn to knit video's,you will learn to knit your first scarf. There are 6 video's in all. Don't get discouraged if you keep messing up everyone does. Take your time and enjoy!---

Barbie House

This craft is for the Mom's out there.

I know what it's like when you don't have money to buy things for your children. When my daughter was very young, I didn't have money to spend on expensive toys at Christmas or on birthday's. I barely made ends meet and the money went to bills and necessities.

Therefore, I had to come up with a way where I could still do nice things for my daughter. Things she would be proud of and treasure. Well, my daughter loved Barbie's and so I decided to take on a very large project and make her a Barbie Dollhouse.                                                                                       

I was very crafty and good with my hands. I went to Staples and collected heavy boxes (like the kind the put copy paper in). I then asked everyone who worked in an office to save me some boxes too.                         

When I had about 10 boxes and a few really big ones too I began taping and gluing the boxes together with duck tape. I made a huge house but you can make any size house you wish. You have to make sure the box is high enough for Barbie to fit in. This is very important.                                                                                 

The Barbie house I made was about about 4 and a half feet tall and 5 feet in length. It was big and it took up allot of space. It had a kitchen and a living room on the first floor. Two bedrooms and a bathroom on the second floor and a bedroom with a rooftop garden on the top floor and then I made a separate building, which was the stable. It even had lights. (I used Christmas lights. The small kind.)

This house was the talk of her friends. All the girls wanted to go to Francessca's house to play Barbie's because her house was fun and her Mom made neat things.

These are the Materials You Will Need:

·       Sturdy Boxes

·       Duck Tape

·       Glue Gun

·       Glue Sticks

·       Several yards of colored fabrics and also some remnants (I buy brick patterned fabric, furs, prints for each room to make it look unique.

·       Laces, ruffles, colored Mardi Gras beads

·       Accessories (little Barbie things you can use to accessorize your rooms, go to the dollar store and you can get a kitchen stove etc...Save little medicine cups, and things that you can use for a sink, tub etc...

Directions:

·       Begin securing boxes into place. Use allot of hot glue on the sides and tops. Once it is secure with glue then begin duck taping all sides, bottoms etc...Don't be afraid to use allot of tape as you want it to last forever and you want it to be secure.

·       After each box is taped and secured you can add doorways if you want. If you choose to cut doorways, you will need to tape them very good as well.

·       Now you are ready to begin covering each room in fabric.

·       Walls--Choose a design for each room. In my kitchen, I will use a fabric that looks like it can be a kitchen such as apples or roosters, gingham. You want to glue it on all three walls (sides and back wall).

·       Floors--I usually make the floor a solid color. Sometimes I will use felt, fabric or fur in some rooms. (You can brick and even wood style fabric at fabric shops.

·       Bedrooms--You can decorate with fur flooring. Get your child involved and let them help pick out the fabric.