A Little Amigurumi

You have probably seen amigurumi everywhere. The word means knitted stuff toy and it comes from Japan. Now of course there are little crochet toys as well as knitted and they are always cute.

I took up crochet this year and decided to try an make amigurumi toys.  Not only do I have a cute and cute-loving daughter but I work at a children's after school club and I wanted to make some little toys for the prize box.

If you look towards the top of this page you will see some tabs.  One new one is  Useful Links.  I am going to be adding links to sites and sellers where you can get patterns.  So if you know of any then please let me know.  I am particularly after very small toys.

Here are a few amigurumi that I have made recently.

This is the latest one. It is a tiny whale and the pattern is by June Gilbank of PlanetJune. I love this one as not only is it tiny but it is also made in one piece. (I hate sewing up!).

The next one is from  a pullout called 'Christmas Toys' in 'Let's Knit' magazine October 2010 edition.
Lots of parts to sew up (sniff!)

 And here is the finished penguin.  It is not perfect and the eyes are a bit too big and too high but he has been well-loved byt the child who received him.

And I think that is something lovely at making toys for children - how much they love them.

Wordless Wednesday

My New Little Sewing Machine

I was walking to work the other day and I thought I would pop a Charity shop and see if they still had the vintage dress. Of course they didn't. My rule should be 'If you Like It - Buy It' because other people will.

Anyway I saw something interesting in the window. It was a teeny sewing machine.
The lovely shop lady got it for me and I had a play. But it didn't have a bobbin and I know from previous experience of having a Singer with a shuttle bobbin that these things are hard to replace. So I said I would think about it. And so I wrote the manufacturer's name in my notebook and off I went to work.

That evening I did look online and found out that it did not have a bobbin as it never had one. It only did chain stitch and thus was bobbinless.

The next day was Saturday and I have my daughter home and knew that the walk was too long for her little legs and the bus service to that place appalling. So I went round my mum's, abandoned my daughter, and walked to the shop. Oh yes I phoned first and reserved it.

And there the dear little thing was! I popped it into a carrier and went home (having collected daughter and had a cup of tea at my mum's).

I worked out how to thread it eventually, it needs adjusting but works well.

I am happy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok so I now own 4 sewing machines - from 1915, 1968, 1996 and now this one from the 1950s.

There is a bit missing from this story about my asking my sister's advice but since she was not much help apart from saying 'buy it or I will'..I will miss her part out.

The sewing machine is made by Grain in the 1950s, and made in the UK.

And I found this lovely site Sewing Machine Collector. Here are some photos from the site. And here is a wonderful report about a Toy Test carried out on machines in the 1950s.

I have been told to add, by my very demanding daughter, that Mary took the first photo.