Basketweave Knitting Stitch

Before my daughter was born, I used to knit more frequently.  Mainly scarves and baby blankets for friends.  My daughter is now 12 and it's been about that long since I last knit.  For the last month, I have been trying to reteach myself with the help of a knitting book and some youtube videos.  After casting on, knitting has been a little like riding a bike.  My fingers just knew what to do.

I had to spend quite a bit of time working on making that first stitch and casting on. This was one of the videos I watched to help myself remember.  I made a few small scarves for stuffed animals as practice.



After practicing casting on, binding off, and combining different stitches by making a blanket for a Littlest Pet Shop and three scarves for Build-a-Bears I decided to work on more advanced stitches.

This is where the basketweave stitch comes in.  You can see part of my project above.  I had some leftover pink yarn that I used and it turned out great. 

To create a Basketweave:
Cast on 43 Stitches.
Row 1: Purl
Row 2: k3, *p5, k3; repeat after *
Row 3: p3, *k5, p3; repeat after *
Row 4: repeat Row 2
Row 5: Purl
Row 6: p4, *k3, p5; repeat after * but end last repeat p4
Row 7: k4, *p3, k5; repeat after * but end last repeat k4
Row 8: repeat Row 6

Repeat rows 1 through 8 (as many times as you want.  If you repeat the rows 7 times you will have a square piece.  You could repeat more for a scarf)
Knit row 1 - 4 and bind off on the Purl row, purling all stitches as you bind off.

Taking the Goats for a walk

Willie is leading the pack as I take some of the goats out to where my neighbor delivered some hay.  Willie is one of my favorite goats!  When he was little I spent a lot of time with him because I had to bottle feed him.  Now that he is grown he is so affectionate.  He always comes to greet me and follows me everywhere.

Here is a little video I took today:

Alex Acres: Lemongrass Sugar Scrub

Alex Acres: Lemongrass Sugar Scrub: Like I mentioned in an earlier post, Lemongrass is my favorite scent right now.  I can't get enough of it!

I LOVE this scrub!  It is made with a few ingredients which makes it quick and easy to make.  As somone with dry skin, especially this time of year, the coconut oil used in this scrub leaves my skin soft when I get out of the shower.

I posted the recipe on my other blog:  Alexacres.blogspot.com.  Try it out!  I'm sure you will love it!

finger puppets

After looking at library books about making finger puppets, I decided to come up with my own, kid-friendly way to make them.  The books I found involved sewing and/or using a sewing machine.  I wanted it to be simple and easy, so here goes:

materials needed:
felt pieces- any color- I used brown, black, pink, orange
scissors
glue gun
feathers, fur, tiny pom poms or any other items to decorate the finger puppets

The first step was cutting out the body.  The top pictures is a simple template.  I folded the bottom straight edge over and used the glue gun to glue it down.  Then I glued the sides together, forming the body of the finger puppet.

On this puppet, I left the top open and put some white fur felt in the top.  I meant to make a bunny, but it really turned out to be more like a monster.  If you wanted you could put feathers or pipe cleaners in the top too.  After putting in the fur, I glued the top together.

Then I used other felt colors to make the eyes, nose, bow tie, ears, etc. 

mosaic using air-dry clay

We have been thinking of different ways we can use up our air dry clay.  Since we have a bunch of beads we thought we would try a mosaic.

The first step was to use a rolling pin to roll out a piece of air-dry clay.  My daughter used the ruler to make straight edges.

Then she used her beads and pressed them into the clay.  FYI-- I thought we rolled our air-dry clay a little thin.  If it were thicker, my daughter could press the beads into the clay a little deeper, therefore preventing the beads from falling off after the clay dries.

This is her very own creation (before the clay dried), a little kitty with a lot of stars in the sky.  :)

Weaving with construction paper

Since we have been in a construction paper crafty mood, I decided to show my daughter how to weave using construction paper.  I saw an art teacher doing this with some of her students and thought this might be pretty easy for my first grade daughter to do.  I showed her how to cut lines down the length of the paper and then cut strips from a different color piece of construction paper.  She weaved them in and out, alternating the starting point.  She had a little trouble with this, which I helped her with.

Snowman

My daughter and I have been using up some of our construction paper.  Here is a cute little snowman my daughter made.  It was really easy for her to do on her own.  I made one first and showed her what to do and then she did it on her own.