I have a few items that I make as gifts or to sell, I have almost no crafty skills, poor eyesight, very little spare money, very little spare time & almost no patience. Everything I make has do be doable in an evening, 2 at the most.
Rag Wreath.
Take a wire coathanger, bend it to form a circle, cut scraps of fabric, approx10cms/4 ins long & 4cms/1.5 inc wide. They don't have to be equal, even or neat.. Tie these onto the coathanger in whatever order you find pleasing, I did mine in groups of 5 or 6 of each colour. This cost me nothing apart from some time as I have a huge stash of fabric.
The Bootees
Cast on 26 stitches, knit 12 rows in garter stitch.
Next row, cast off 10 stitches, knit to end of row.
Next row, cast off 10 stitches,
Knit remaining stitches for 22 rows
Cast off leaving a long tail of yarn to use for sewing bootee together.
You should have a T shape like this. Fold A onto C so that the short ends line up, fold B on top of A, so that all 3 short edges are lined up.
Sew across short edge, this is the toe, sew up both sides. Repeat for 2nd bootee.
I've juggled about with various size needles & yarn & found they chunky wool with a 5mm needle worked best for baby bootees. but have made a pair using 2 strands of aran & size 1 needles made an adult size.
Stargazy Hens
You will need a rectangular piece of fabric that is twice as long as it is deep & a few scraps of felt & 2 buttons.
I found the written instructions for these almost unintelligible so the best advice I can give you is that you get hold of a pyramid teabag & copy it. Cut a triangle of felt for the beak and another piece to form the wattle & sew them into the seams used to sew the hen together, position them either side of the top point of the triangle, once they are in position sew the buttons on for eyes. These can be stuffed with cat litter if they are big enough to use as door stops or fibrefill if they are small ones. I save my old pillows & duvets to use for filling.
Herb Pillows
These are made with oddments of fabric & trimmings.
I start with 2 squares of cotton wadding or old blanket, I sew scraps of fabric on to one piece of blanket, then place the 2 pieces of blanket together, get another square of fabric that is large enough to fold over & cover all the edges, sew round 3 sides, fill with fibrefill & add a few drops of essential oil or herbs or lavender. Sew up remaining edge, I make these by hand, not on the machine. I always wash & dry them before I fill with herbs as I thing it gives them an aged look.
Sock toys
There a lots of instructions, if you search online that are much clearer than any I could write.Button Bracelets
These can be made using shirring elastic but I used some stretch magic as I had some left from another project, these are only cheap to make if, like me, you have a celebrations tub full of buttons!
