It's not very round, and it's probably made by breaking every felting rule there is, but it's bright and cheery and Ernest loves it.
This ball started out as a skein of luscious yarn, chunky and smelling divine of lanolin. There wasn't enough to do much with, so it lived in one of my treasure baskets that I use with the little ones.
After lots of play though it had become something of a tangled mess.

I decided to try and rescue it into something and after lots of squishing and squadging with hot soapy water, I shaped it into a ball, rolled it into a sock, tied the sock in a knot and shoved it into the washing machine on a hot wash with a load of laundry.
That gave me something resembling a ball, and I set about needle felting some bright colours onto it.
I had intended it to be a baby gift, but I broke three needles in it, and have only recovered two....yes I am being pretty wreckless with Ernest, but I've squished and squashed the ball so much looking for the wretched needle, that I think I can risk giving it to Ernest for supervised play. (needless to say it will get put somewhere safe while my mindee is here.)
So, anyway, here it is, my not very round ball.

India is sharing a stall at the local Teen Market this Sunday.
The stall will be selling jewellery made by her friend, portraits, cards and vintage style headscarves made by India.
Today we had a photoshoot at Talacre beach to promote the scarves and give some ideas on how to wear them.

Having been pregnant, breastfeeding or both for the best part of 16 plus years, there's no way I was going to spend all that time in some dodgy ill fitting non supportive nursing bra, and I'm sorry to say that if like me you are blessed in the boobage department, most nursing bras fall horribly short of being supportive enough, and certainly wouldn't win any prizes for their looks.
Ten years ago when Angus was born I realised, if I wanted to wear pretty bras and have nursing access I was going to have to do something about it myself. That's when I began experimenting and realised it was so very very easy to alter my regular bras into nursing bras.
I would say though, it's so important to start out with bras that actually fit. So many women wear the wrong size bra, and when you are nursing, the wrong size bra not only makes you look awful it can contribute to blocked ducts and in the worst cases mastitis. A good fitting, supportive bra can make you look 10lbs lighter. So get fitted by someone reputable. Most high street stores are terrible at fitting bras. I can highly recommend Bravissimo for the larger busted ladies out there. Even over the phone they give an excellent service. I've also had good experiences in John Lewis, and if you are lucky enough to have an old fashioned undies shop nearby, make use of them. In my experience they are the best. A good fitter will have no need at all for a tape measure!
I would also suggest that until your breastfeeding relationship and milk supply are well established you stick with the non wired well fitted nursing bras, those early weeks are too important to mess with. (my faves for big boobs are Royce, and Freya...believe me I've tried plenty, and nothing else comes close to these.
So, with your well fitting bra (in my experience full cups work better than balconette or half cups) all picked out, you now need a few supplies, some nursing clips (I salvage them from old bras, ask on freecycle etc. these days people save them for me!), some elastic; underwear elastic is nice and soft, but regular 8 cord elastic will suffice, and some matching thread.



Measure approx 5 cms up the bra strap from the front, and cut.





Thread the clip parts onto the cut straps. This is sometimes a bit tricky because the straps can be a little wide.



Stich the clips in place using a satin stitch or a wide closely spaced zig zag.






You now have a bra with drop cups, but if you used it like this, you would lose the top strap at each nursing.
This is why we add elastic. Thread the elastic through the top clip.




Stich in place, again using a satin stitch.
Now clip together the nursing clip and look to where you will attach the bottom end of the elastic. I usually attach it just past the side seam.



Stitch in place.



And you are done!

Thursday evening I stood in Hobbycraft staring blankly at the "Wedding Celebration" display trying to decide on the items I needed to make something for Florence's birthday. I knew what I needed, but somehow confronted with all those shelves and surrounded by other shoppers presumably not buying for their dead child, my mind went into a spin, I lost my nerve and very nearly the remnants of my composure.
This year I decided after seeing this on pinterest that I wanted to make Florence's birthday flower bouquet myself.
I'm not great with flowers, but dissapointed by recent bouquets from florists, I thought I could at least give it a try.
I filled my basket with supplies, choked back the tears, and tried not to imagine being several doors down in the toy shop....

Using flowers from the garden and some chosen at the supermarket, I set to work this morning. A knot in my stomach and with trembling hands, so scared I was going to mess this up.

But here it is, it's not perfect I know, but I'm pretty proud of my first ever flower arrangement.


The big girls were inspired and have made their own little arrangements too.

India and I headed off to a local meadow to take some photos this morning.

A slideshow to the whole Prom Dress saga....