Bobbing Along...

Thank you to all of you who left comments and encouraged me to make a seahorse family! For those new visitors (hello!) or anyone that missed the previous post, each creature has a little ribbon hook on the back, so that they can be hung on the wall...

...in any pattern you fancy! I'm quite pleased with them - my favourite baby is this little fella...
I like the understated colour and sparkly 'fin' (if that's what it's called!)
My son owns a book by Douglas Florian which contains some lovely funny poems - I thought I would leave you with one of them:

The Sea Horse

You have
No hooves.
You have no hair.
You don't eat oats.
You don't breathe air.
You hatch from eggs.
You cannot race.
(You have no legs with which to chase.)
You're not a colt
Nor mare
Nor filly.
You're called a horse.
I call that silly.

Happy weekend folks!

Pretty In Pink

Continuing with the Seahorse theme, I thought I would make a larger one (this one is 40cm tall). It's not intended as a toy, however, I thought how lovely they would look as a family on the wall - mum or dad with their young. I know that the father carries the babies, but I'm just offering a choice! Not wanting to reinforce sexual stereotypes at all, but we all know how much girls LOVE pink!

So I attached a loop of ribbon to the back....

I can just imagine some little baby ones drifting along behind....is this a bad idea? As naff as Hilda Ogden's flying ducks?! I really enjoyed making it actually. The lovely spotty fabric was an ebay find, and it's a really lightweight linen, so looks great and is nice to work with (turning the tail inside out would have been really fiddly with a thicker fabric).

Watch this space, I'll be sure to post a photo of the whole herd, wait, that sounds wrong, family! when I've finished.
Talking of pink, I found these fab bits of driftwood at the beach yesterday...

Lovely, distressed paint...the top white layer is flaking off to reveal a sort of salmon-coloured paint underneath.
Perfect for making boats - will be sure to show you them when they're made too. I'm going to be busy, aren't I?

Fabric Seahorse Mobile

Did you know that seahorses stay with the same mate for life? I have to confess I didn't, until a fellow blogger tipped me off on a previous post (cheers, Marion!) With this in mind, I thought I'd go for a slightly less conventional idea for Valentines Day and have come up with this fabric mobile, complete with hanging heart (well, had to get a more traditional 'love' symbol in there somewhere!) The circle is actually an embroidery hoop, which has been bound with fabric strips and vintage buttons. Though it is intended as a Valentines gift, I can also see it hanging in a nursery or child's bedroom. For that reason I feel that I need to make another with a touch of pink to make it more appealing to little girls.

It's not a great photo, but I love the shadows the creatures cast on the wall!
Have a great weekend folks!