I’ve spent my afternoon getting re-acquainted with my dress-makers dummy. I love this thing – I honestly don’t know how I ever made clothes or cosplay without it! I’ve pinned, cut and re-cut my lining fabric for that dress, so I’m happy enough now to order the main fabric and see if I can make it look as good as it does in my head.

I did some crocheting too, for one of the many Christmas gifts I’m preparing (beware: if you know me, there’s a very good chance your Christmas gift is crochet this year). It’s something I’ve always wanted to learn and kinda danced around it for years, but a few years ago a friend gave me a kit to make Christmas owls and in January this year, I finally decided to give it a try.

I made several non-festive mushrooms in my first few attempts, but finally managed to produce something that looked like the picture on the box.

I made six and by the time I was done, I was hooked (pun absolutely intended). Since then I’ve learned a whole bunch of new techniques, made rather a lot of things, almost crippled my fingers and sworn never to make *insert name here* ever again. One of these was a Dalek.

I found the pattern online (link at end of post), if you ever fancy given this little bugger a go. It turned out brilliant and the person I made it for loved it, which is pretty much the point, but never, ever again. I think I unravelled it about six times due to my mistakes- my husband now swears never to attached to anything I’m part way through making, as I inevitably undo it at some point. I managed to make it inside out to start with, which would be fine on a basic piece, but the final look for this depends on it being done right. It took me two weeks, some swearing and sore hands, but I did it.

I do like it and the pattern is brilliant – it’s purely the maker’s fault for all the mistakes and frustration. Thankfully I’ve become a lot more patient with myself in recent years, when it comes to crafting, so I’ll stick at whatever I’m doing till it’s done and done properly. Being stubborn helps too.

If you want to give this a go too, you can find the pattern here and thanks to Lucy Ravenscar for making this available for free! http://lucyravenscar.blogspot.co.uk/2012/09/dalek-amigurumi-pattern-free.html