See Us at The Salvation Army Halls Southsea This Saturday

We will have stalls at the Salvation Army Christmas Fayre this Saturday 23rd November 2019.

The Fayre is in the Lighthouse Community Rooms, Albert Road, Southsea.

From 10.30am to 12.30 pm.

There will be lots of stalls to visit and great ideas for Christmas presents.

And special guests too.

The Lighthouse cafe will be open for when you want a sit down and a cuppa.

Please do come over to see us at our stalls:

Little Gifts of Southsea

Teddy in a Bag

We'd love the chance to say hello! 🙋

This is our first Christmas Fayre for 2019 and we hope to make it a good one.

So, if you can, do join with us to celebrate the upcoming Christmas season and really get ready for Christmas!

And don't forget to check out our list of Christmas Fairs for 2019.
You can find the list here:

Our Christmas Fairs 2019

It would be great to see at one of our fairs! Or more! 😀

Introduction To Our Sister Site ESD Crafts

And A Look at a Great Papercraft Site Too

You may have noticed that Elephant Sun Dog has a sister site. It is called ESD Crafts (which of course is based upon the initials for Elephant Sun Dog 😀).

Whereas Elephant Sun Dog at the moment looks mainly at crochet, sewing and jewellery making, with links to useful CALS, patterns, and YouTube videos, plus offers free and paid patterns; ESD Crafts looks at these, but also looks at and writes about other crafts as we try them out.

Photo courtesy Estee Janssens on Unsplash

 Recently I have ventured into the world of Scrapbooking and Journaling, and was totally amazed at the creativity involved in these hobbies, and how useful they are to many crafters to use in their work.
So, I have written a full article here: called Scrapbooking, Journaling and Bullet Journaling.

The article is fairly long, because I wanted to cover many of the things I am discovering about these three overlapping crafts. And I think I've provided lots of information which will help you as well as me.

Here on Elephant Sun Dog, we like to keep you updated about our latest projects, craft makes, fairs and news of other's work too. But having ESD Crafts as our sister blog allows us to search and experiment with different crafts and to pass on what we find.

It also gives us the capability to upload larger files we want to share with you, like the Free Downloadable Tutorial On How To Line A Crochet Or Knitted Bag which we posted about here earlier this month.

So we think it's a win, win! 😀

You can see the ESD Crafts RSS feed in the sidebar on this site, so you can check out new posts you may be interested in.

Photo courtesy Victoria Bilsborough on unsplash

And if you are interested in finding out more about Scrapbooking and Journaling mentioned in the ESD Crafts post above, or about Papercrafts in general, I highly recommend you check out CraftStash.
Not only are they authorities on these crafts, but they have lots of special offers too, like this one:

Save On 1000s Of Arts & Crafts Supplies At CraftStash
Plus UK Customers also get:


With free delivery offers in Europe, Canada and the US too. So it's a offer which I think is well worth checking out!

~ Silvi

Crochet Coasters and Doilies For Sale and Free Patterns Too!

As September is almost here, the thoughts of the crafter turn to Christmas presents (sorry, but they do! 😀 ).
So, I've started quite early (because I know that I will slow down later 😊 ).

I love working with cotton yarn, and there are no better items to make in cotton than Coasters and Doilies!
So I've been busy making coaster sets and doily and coaster table sets for Our Etsy Shop.

There are some lovely patterns out there - so much to choose from!
And now I've made quite a few, I might just make a pattern of my own soon.

But in the meantime...

Brand new to our Etsy shop we have:

A lovely cotton Lace doily with 4 matching Flower Coasters

The colours are nice and clean pastel shades of pink, white and green, which are ideal for all year round.
I enjoyed taking the photos with coffee mugs and with glasses, but as well as being a great table setting, this little set would look fantastic on a dressing table too.
You can find the set here:
Cotton Lace doily with 4 matching Flower Coasters
There's more pictures to look at too.
I'm really pleased with these!

Crochet Cotton Lace Doily and 6 Matching Coasters in Beautiful Turquoise

I love turquoise and it looks great when made up with cotton yarn.
And in this lace doily and coaster set, the clean cotton yarn really sets off the lacy pattern nicely.The main photo for this set is 6 glasses and a nice bottle of wine (not for sale of course!).
I can just imagine this set at a party. It would be fun and pretty at the same time!
You can find this pretty turquoise lacy set here:
Crochet Cotton Lace Doily and 6 Matching Coasters Set in Beautiful Turquoise
Again, there are several more pictures to look at.
I hope you like it!

Crochet Cotton Lace Doily and 6 Matching Coasters Set in Gorgeous Dark Heather

I love the colour dark heather. It's warm and elegant and (I think) classy too.
So, I really enjoyed making this Lacy Doily and Coaster Set in dark heather cotton yarn.
It is made from the same Lace doily and coasters patterns as the Turquoise set and the doily from the Flower set. It's such an enjoyable pattern to make, I just might make some more, not only for Etsy, but for Christmas presents for relatives (so any of my relatives reading this have been warned 😄 ).
You can find this elegant doily and coaster set here:
Crochet Cotton Lace Doily and 6 Matching Coasters Set in Gorgeous Dark Heather

And links to the Patterns: 

For those of you who like to make doilies and coasters yourself, I can highly recommend the lovely patterns I have used to make mine.
And here are the links to their pattern pages (all are free patterns):

The Lacy Doily and Lacy Coasters patterns are by Claire from Crochet Leaf
You can find the patterns here:
Lacy Crochet Coaster
Crochet Doily Pattern

And the Flower Coasters in the first set were made by slightly altering a pattern by Jennifer Martin and it's called Flower Potholders.
You can find a free download of the pattern on Ravelry here:
Flower Potholders Pattern

But if you get the time, do have a look at my doily and coaster sets on Etsy. I'm really proud of them and loved taking the different photos too!

And there will most likely be more coasters (and patterns) to come in our next post.

I'm off now to make some more coasters.... 😀

~ Silvi

Cot Blankets and Mandalas in Our Etsy Shop and More Free Patterns!

Here at Elephant Sun Dog, we craft handmade items of all sizes, from small to fairly large 😀
And I've just added three more handmade items to the Elephant Sun Dog Etsy Shop and these are all ready for the colder months to come.

There are two Baby Blankets:

A pretty 'sunshine' blanket for a cot or pram cover.

Sunshine Cot Blanket for sale on Etsy

This is a unique design using a pattern designed by talented Christine Bumgarner, called You Are My Sunshine.
I think I've done the pattern justice. It certainly was enjoyable.
If you would like to have a go at making this lovely pattern, you can find it here:
CAL Crochet Along You Are My Sunshine

And I would love it if you also went and had a look at more pictures and read about my version of this sweet cot blanket here:
Cot Blanket, Baby Blanket, Sunshine and Pale Turquoise Pretty Design for cot or pram, Baby gift

Then there is a lovely bright rainbow strips cot blanket.

Bright Rainbow Colours Cot Blanket for sale on Etsy

This is a nice, sizeable cot blanket which is large enough for a chid's bed as well as a cot.
I love working in bright rainbow colours, so this one was a real treat to make.
I used a pattern called Unicorn Stripes Baby Blanket designed by talented Megan Meyer.
You can find the pattern here on Ravelry:
Unicorn Strips Baby Blanket Pattern

And to see more of my Bright Rainbow version of this pattern, and read more about it, you can see it here:
Cot Blanket Bright Rainbow Stripes Soft Colourful Crochet Toddler or Baby Blanket Good Size

I have also added a large Mandala Table Cover to the Etsy shop.
This one is in multi colours and will definitely brighten up your living room!

Handmade Crochet Mandala Table Cover for sale on Etsy

Again, I used a pattern, this time designed by the very gifted Anna Nilson.
If you want to have a go yourself at making this lovely Mandala, do go and have a look at Anna's website where she hosted the CAL for this lovely pattern.
You can find all the links to various parts of the pattern here:
Unicorn Mandala CAL

And of course, I mustn't forget to add a link to the Mandala table cloth I made from this pattern (as shown in the picture above).
You can find it here:
Handmade Crochet Mandala Table Cover, Home Decoration, multicoloured circular tablecloth

So there you go.
Three more items added to our Etsy shop and links to some lovely crochet patterns (two of which are free, and the other has a free and paid version).

I hope you enjoy them.
And if not, I'm sure you know someone who would like to see the handmade items I have made from the patterns :)

~ Silvi

Beautiful Wall Hangings In Our Etsy Shop Now

Wall Hangings with Owls and Hearts and Stars Available


We are very pleased to announce that we have some lovely wall hangings in the Elephant Sun Dog Etsy Shop.

Crystal has been busy making a range of wall hangings. Some with cute owls and others with hearts and stars. And they all have little jingle bells .
The wall hangings vary in length from 10.5 inches (26.5cms) for the smallest to 35.5 inches (90.5cms) for the longest.

It will be difficult to decide which one you like best. 😀

There are two extremely cute owl wall hangings with three owls all on their own perches. These are ideal for a small room or a child's room. but they are so sweet that I'm sure you would like them yourself!

You can find them here: Owl Wall Hanging Hand Crafted with 3 cute plump owls in pretty light blue shades
And here: Owl Wall Hanging Hand Crafted with 3 cute plump owls in turquoise shades

Then there is a Longer Owl Wall Hanging, with 5 cute owls on perches and this is ideal for any room of any size.
(That is if one of us doesn't grab it first! :) )

You can find it here: Owl Wall Hanging Hand Crafted with 5 cute owls on their own perches

And to brighten up any room, Crystal has also made two long wall hangings in rainbow colours.
There is a Stars Wall Hanging and a Hearts Wall Hanging.

You can find them here: Wall Hanging hand crafted with Rainbow Stars and Jingle Bells

 
And here: Wall Hanging Hand Crafted with Rainbow Hearts and Jingle Bells

These would look lovely anywhere, including in the window with the little bells jingling in the breeze.

So please do take a look at our Etsy Shop.
There is only one of each wall hanging, so once they are gone that's it for now.

And if you know anyone who would love a house warming gift, a birthday gift, or to save for a Christmas gift, I'm sure they would love to see more about these lovely wall hangings.

See Us Saturday At The Stacey Community Centre Christmas Fayre

🎄We each have a stall at the Stacey Community Christmas Fayre this Saturday.🎄

Crystal will be there with Little Gifts of Southsea, with so many different small gifts for Christmas you just have to come and have a look!
But for example, on Crystal's stall, you will find Christmas Tree Decorations galore! Plus jewellery for all ages and tastes, keyrings of many shapes and sizes, earrings, necklaces, bracelets, neck cords, etc.

Silvi's stall is Teddy in a Bag, and there you will find crochet and cotton bags in all shapes and sizes, and all with a teddy inside! Plus little baskets with teddies inside for the Christmas tree, moses baskets for teddies and other soft toys, swinging cradles, and bags for adults too!

The Fayre is this Saturday, 1st December, from 11:00-15:00

At The Stacey Community Centre
Walsall Road, Copnor, PO3 6DN Portsmouth

There will be lots of stalls, and Christmas fun for all ages and of course mince pies too!😀

🎄🤶So please do come along this Saturday if you are in the Portsmouth area and join everyone for Christmas fun and mince pies!🎄🎅

See Us at Love Baffins This Coming Saturday!

Love Baffins is one of the great Portsmouth markets of the Christmas season, with lots of stalls, great local bands and performers, and many great things to entertain the children too, including Father Christmas of course!

And we are delighted to say that we will be there with our handmade goods ready for Christmas!

The Love Baffins Christmas Market is from 11am to 3pm on Saturday 24th November 2018.

We will be inside the City Life Church in Tangiers Road, with lots of other Christmas stalls, so do please come in and visit us.

You will find our Little Gifts of Southsea and Teddy in a Bag tables filled with Christmas Decorations, Jewellery, Keyrings, Gifts for Children and Adults, Lots of Teddies in Bags, and much more! So we really will have lots for you to look at.!

So, don't forget to come along to the Love Baffins Christmas Market this Saturday.
It's a day the whole family will enjoy and a great part of the Christmas season!

See Us In Southsea This Coming Saturday!

See us at The Salvation Army Christmas Fayre in Southsea on Saturday 17th November, 2018.

The Salvation Army Christmas Fayre is from 10.20pm to 12.30pm, in the Lighthouse Community Rooms, Albert Road, Southsea, this coming saturday 17th November.

There will be lots of stalls, with Christmas gifts and more!

The lighthouse cafe is open and the Fayre will be opened by The Ugly Sisters, who are appearing in Cinderella at the Groundlings Theatre.

🤶🎅🎄Please come along and make a great start to Christmas this year. 🎄🎅🤶

And don't forget to stop by at the Little Gifts of Southsea and Teddy in a Bag stalls, to see all the nice gifts we have there. 😀

Lovely New Christmas Tree Decorations!

Some of my new Christmas Decorations for sale this Christmas
 

Handmade Christmas decorations.

 I haven't been posting here much lately, because I've been so busy making Christmas Tree Decorations ready for Christmas Fairs and Markets. We will be doing markets all around the Portsmouth and Southsea, UK area, so there is still loads to do!

But I really want to share a few of the handmade tree ornaments I have made so far (and I've made a lot! 😀 ).

Polar Bears and Reindeers

 This year, there are penguins, reindeers, snowmen, polar bears, bells, and robins and they are all new.

Penguins

I will be selling these little decorations at all the Christmas fairs and markets I attend with my stall 'Little Gifts of Southsea'.

As well as these little gifts, I will have many handmade items of jewellery, necklaces, rings, earrings, bracelets, charms, key rings, badges, house gifts and more.

Polar Bears peeking 😀

 If you come along to one of our fairs, you will find these little tree decorations for sale at £2.00 each, or 3 for £5.00.

Reindeers

So, not only will you get some lovely, quality handmade decorations which you can keep from year to year, but they are a very reasonable price too!
 

See us all and more at Christmas Fairs

I will soon post the list of Christmas fairs we are doing. It would be great to see you there! 💖

~ Crystal