Children's craft kits, sewing kits for children

Eagle-Eye and friends model Autumn/winter 2010

We have been working hard on our big project for autumn; the Buttonbag Knitting Kit. Mittens, hats, purses and bags are all included in the instructions, but someone thought it would be fun to use up all the left-over bits of wool making dolls clothes – afterall – that’s what we were doing 30 odd years ago. So  Sara’s Sindy and my Sasha and my sister’s Action Man were resecued from various attics and cajoled and poked into these fetching little knitted numbers. We were going to put them on the back page of the Knitting  Book but Dan the photographer was so disturbed by them – particularly Eagle-Eyes, whose posable rubber hands  have disintegrated into stumps (that’s why he’s standing like that! ) – and said they were far too scary for children!

What do you think? Is this just  too nightmarish ? We are writing the instructions during the next two weeks and your feedback would be greatly appreciated! Also – if you have any more tips for dolls clothes or pictures of your creations do let us know.

All of the above  based on knitting simple squares or rectangles using double knit yarn and size 5 needles. I’ll post the patterns later this week.

Action Man – Sleeveless Jumper

Make two squares:

Cast on 18 stitches

Row 1 & 2: Knit

Row 3:  Knit

Row 4:  Purl

Row 5 -18: Repeat rows 3 & 4 in different colours to make narrow stripes.

Cast Off

Sew the shoulders closed with a few stitches. Sew the bottom two centimetres of the side seams.

Hat

Cast on 22 stitches

Rows  1 & 2: knit

R0w 3 Knit 2 together, knit to last two stitches, knit 2 together

Row 4: Purl 2 togther, purl to last 2 stitches, purl 2 together

Row 5&6: repeat rows 3&4

Row 7 change to other colour knit 2 together

Row 8 Purl

Without casting off, cut40 cm yarn off,  slide stitches off needle and thread yarn end through the needles. Pull tight and sew up the side seams.

Craft in Hackney

Have you noticed how many new funky craft, sewing and knitting shops are opening up? Loop in Islington has long been a top destination  for wool and Fabrications on Broadway Market – a stone’s throw across the park  from Buttonbag HQ –  specialises incontemporary textiles and  really beautiful handmade crafts and  runs fantastic sewing and quilting courses too.

Our Patterned Hand, 49 Broadway Market, E8

However  my new  favourite is Our Patterned Hand which opened a few weeks ago at 49 Broadway Market. Now I spent most of teens and twenties in my own couture creations (some of which should have never left the drawing board) -  but bringing up children and running Buttonbag has left me ferreting round the High Street like most other mums. But the divine fabrics in Leanne Finn-Davis’ new shop  saw me dust down my Dad’s  old Singer this week.

Leanne and Sara

I lost my heart to a modern Liberty Print of  red, orange and green chairs on a black background. I would have bought dozens of Leanne’s other fabrics – she has sourced some really unusual hand-printed cottons and batiks, gorgeous Italian silks as well as Liberty Prints, but I’m going to try and finish one thing before buying any more.  The plan is to make a summer skirt I can cycle in.  When I’ve worked out how I’m going to do it, I’ll post the pattern.  Hopefully, I’ll finish it before it gets too cold. In the meantime, do let us know about your favourite craft and fabric shops

Sarah x

Sarah's summer skirt project

sewing the pockets on our new advent calendar

We’ve been putting the finishing touches to our new advent calendar kit this week ready for a photoshoot on Tuesday. We’re getting quite excited about Christmas – even though its seven months away and we’re off camping in the lovely sunshine this weekend.

Different colours, fabrics and sizes look great - even in a small garden

I used to be very anti-bunting. It was just too twee, just a bit too try-too-hard. That was until we decided to finally tackle the enormous boxes of left-over material piled up in the corner of the studio. And that was when we realised that making your own Bunting is a brilliant way  of using up all those scraps of fabric that are too good to throw away but too small to really know what to do with. And, unlike patchwork  – which is the other great thing to do with lots of small bits of material bunting is really, REALLY quick and really, REALLY easy to make – look what we knocked up one afternoon! WE were actually meant to be tidying up the studio but we got distracted by all the boxes of scrap fabric and decided the Big Sort-Out could wait until another day.

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