Travel Size Playscapes

I have been on a major destash mission lately. I searched ravelry for small projects that would help me use up some of my scrap yarn.  In my searches I stumbled across the cutest project to make for my son. It is a travel size playscape.

Can you guess what's in the bag?

Keep Guessing...

Quack Quack. Two little ducks swimming in the pond. But these aren't any ordinary ducks. They are little finger puppets.

This is such a fun toy. My son is really having a great time playing with his ducks. I plan to use this little playscape for story telling. It will be perfect for telling the story of the Ugly Duckling.
The pattern is called Duck Pond Playset and can be found here.

The following day I was inspired to modify this pattern to make a portable racetrack for my son's cars. I had seen a pattern for a racetrack rug on ravelry but thought that this would be more manageable. So here is my creative juice baby lol.

It came out just how I had imagined. I do wish the track was a bit wider though.
I used stash gray yarn for the track and white for the drawstring.
My changes from the original Duck Pond Playset pattern are as follows:
Follow pattern up to round 10 substituting green for blue and black or gray for green.
Round 10: Ch 1. *2 sc in nest st. sc in next 8 sts. Repeat from * sl st. at end of round to connect round. 60 st. total
Round 11: Same as original pattern's round 10
Round 12: Ch. 1. sc in each stitch around.
Round 13: Change to green yarn. Chain 2. Dc in each st. around. sl st in first st in round. Finish off.

Drawstring done in white: ch 80. Add a matchbox car.

This week I am linking up with Craft-o-maniac.com's Monday Link Party Frontier Dreams' KCCO, CrunchyCatholicMomma's Stash Bash, and NaturalSuburbia's Creative Friday.

Our Autumn Nature Table

I absolutely love our autumn nature table.  Every time I walk past it I just want to smile.  It is an area of peace and order in my sometimes chaotic home.  I have it set up on a short bookcase in our upstairs hallway across from BB's playroom.

Since Eid is this month, I wanted to incorporate some Eid decorations. On the left I put a centerpiece with a picture of a mosque that says "Happy Eid" in Arabic. 
On the right I have a wooden tree stacker and a glass squirrel.

What is autumn with out some apples and pumpkins.  I needle felted these last year.  I just love how they came out. 

BB and I wet felted these acorns last year. I am missing a lot and hope to make some more this year.  That fluffy stuff there is a milkweed seed pod that we found on one of our nature walks.

.

Felt Pumpkin Tutorial

This is a tutorial for a needle felted pumpkin perfect for your autumn nature table.

You will need:
barbed felting needle
orange or white wool roving for pumpkin
green or brown wool roving for stem
orange thread
sewing needle
felting pad

1) Take some orange roving and roll it up like a jelly roll.

2) Take your needle and felt slightly just to hold it together. Pull the sides up slightly and felt them to the top to form more of a ball shape.

3) Start Felting.  Poke the wool with your needle until it is relatively firm and round.

4) Optional: I like to add a second layer of roving just to make the finished product look smoother.  Roll ball of wool in a thin layer of roving.

5) Repeat steps 1-3.

6) Thread a sewing needle with orange thread. Insert it into the center of the pumpkin from top to bottom.

7) Bring thread around and insert needle into the same place on the bottom.  Pull slightly.  Repeat all around.

See how it makes a ridged look.

8) Tie and cut remaining thread.

9)Take a small amount of green roving for the stem.  Roll it like a jelly roll and felt the top and sides while leaving the bottom of the stem unfelted.

10) Place stem on the center of the pumpkin.  Attach the stem by felting the bottom of the stem (the part that was left unfelted) to the pumpkin.  Felt until it seems securely connected.

I forgot to get a picture of the stem till is was almost attached to the pumpkin but, you can kind of see the unfelted part here.

11) Optional: Needle felt slightly along the thread to make the ridges more defined.

Tah-Dah! A beautiful felted pumpkin!

Needle felted pumpkin and gnome. 

I am donating the pumpkin from this tutorial and this little needle felted gnome for my local  Attachment Parenting International chapter's fall fundraiser this weekend.