Aladdin C2C Blanket – Part 1

Last week I saw Aladdin the stage production here in Sydney and it was amazing! I was so inspired by the visual fair that I decided to put together an Aladdin C2C blanket based on the colour scheme of the production.

Somehow, in person the colours seemed even brighter and more spectacular, and the voice of each of the actors was amazing. For me, as in the movie, the genie absolutely stole the show.

I chose the colours for this blanket from my stash, and even though the wool is 100% acrylic, it works up lovely and soft. I picked the wool up at Spotlight for smaller amigurumi projects but they’ve come in handy for this blanket.

Aladdin Blanket - Colour choices | MeaganMade.com

I’ve been seeing a lot of C2C (Corner to corner) blankets on a crochet group that I belong to on Facebook and thought it was about time that I give this technique a go. I was amazed at how quickly it started to come together, but had to stop because my wrist started to get sore. The colour order that I’m working on is:

  1. Red
  2. Purple
  3. Light blue
  4. Dark blue
  5. Yellow
  6. Light green
  7. Orange
  8. Magenta

Aladdin Blanket - Part 1 | MeaganMade.com

I’m partway through the yellow row at the moment and I need to sew in the ends, but I’m enjoying the process so far. Other than the order of colours, I didn’t do too much planning. I’d like to make the blanket a lap size for the lounge, so I’ll have to judge the size as I go, but think I’ll end up with a few repeats of the set of colours.

Aladdin Blanket - Part 1 | MeaganMade.comTake a look at Bella Coco’s tutorial on YouTube if you’d like to learn this technique! I always find her videos easy to follow, but this video is the simplest that I’ve found to date. If you can make Granny Squares you shouldn’t have any issues with the C2C technique.

I’ll keep you guys posted with my progress on this blanket, and will post updates to my Instagram account too, so make sure you’re following me!

Happy crocheting,
Meagan x

Lemon Bars

Since I’ve been spending a lot of time at home with my feet up, I’ve been spending even more time on Pinterest than normal! One of the many things I added to my boards was this delicious looking recipe for dairy free Lemon Bars. The original recipe was both Gluten Free and Dairy Free, so I’ve decided to make a few alterations and make it this week!

While the recipe does take a while from start to finish, most of the time is spent with the slice in the oven or the fridge. And it was well worth the time spent, and luckily it gave my ankle a bit of a break too! This recipe actually involved more interpretations than I’d planned since I was out of more ingredients than I had realised!

Lemon Bars | MeaganMade.com

For the shortbread layer, I had originally planned to substitute the Gluten Free flour mix for normal plain flour which I quickly realised had run out. Since I was out of plain flour, I substituted it for 1.5 cups of normal self raising flour and omitted the flour mix, gum and baking powder. I made the lemon layer as per the recipe, using the corn flour option and poured it over as soon as the shortbread layer was done.

When the slice came out of the fridge after the final baking, the layers remained distinct yet gooey, and was really delicious. It won the housemate seal of approval too, and I don’t think they’ll last too long!

Lemon Bars | MeaganMade.com

I hope that you’ll head on over to Sheena’s page and try this dairy free lemon bars recipe for yourself!

Happy baking,
Meagan x

Crochet Octopus

Sorry for the lack of post last week, I managed to break my ankle and have been a bit laid up with it. I am back this week with this super cute amigurumi crochet octopus toy! This pattern is by The Woolly Kraken, and is such fun to make.

I’d been following Nicole on Instagram and when I saw this little cutie pop up in her feed. It was love at first sight and I had to buy the pattern. After putting it to one side until I was able to find safety eyes in Australia, This week I was able to give it a go. The pattern calls for 4 ply wool, which I didn’t have, but I did have some lovely multi-colour chunky yarn that I’d picked up from Lincraft so decided I’d give it a go with that instead.

p9250948_wm

I am so happy with how he turned out, though I think I need to work on my smile sewing skills, lol! It’s hard to tell from this picture but he actually turned out quite a lot larger than the pattern intended because of the chunky yarn and 5mm hook. To give you a bit of perspective I took a few more pictures of me holding him!

Top view of Crochet Octopus | MeaganMade.com Crochet Octopus | MeaganMade.com

Even though he is a little larger than intended, I love him! Suitable for Beginner to Intermediate crocheters, this pattern is easy to follow. If you have some experience crocheting in the round or with amigurumi it will help you!

I hope you give this cute little guy (or girl) a go, let me know how you go. I’d also love you to follow me on my socials: Insta, FB, Pinterest and BlogLovin.

Happy crocheting,

Meagan  x

Brownie Bites

A nice and quick recipe for you this week! Often while I’m looking through Pinterest, I see bliss ball recipes, but they mostly contain dates. I don’t mind dates, but often find the raw food recipes containing them quite rich. This pin and recipe for Brownie Bites caught my eye – not only were they lactose and gluten free, they required no cooking and also had no dates.

This week has been one of those busy ones, filled with a few of my cheat dinners (of the sauce from a jar variety) and a bit of eating out. I did manage to bake up a double batch of the carrot cupcakes I posted about a few weeks ago (just as delicious as I remembered) and also managed to make another loaf of Banana Bread. I’m going to have to make this part of my regular rotation, as I finally calculated the savings each week!

At the end of the week, I was still craving something sweet and wanted something quick and easy to fill the void! This recipe by the Unconventional Baker did the trick. It comes together really quickly and easily – probably the longest part for me was actually rolling the balls and getting the coconut on the outside! The ingredients whiz together in the food processor in a minute or two, and it’s delicious.

Brownie Bites | MeaganMade.com

These bites of sweetness are perfect both straight after rolling and after refrigeration. The recipe includes an option for coconut cream which I didn’t use, but I think next time I’ll give it a go!

Brownie Bites | MeaganMade.com

Let me know if you give these a go, especially if you try it with the coconut cream.

Happy making,

Meagan x

Kindle Pouch Pattern

Have you been looking for a pouch for your Kindle, but not able to find quite what you were looking for? This week I decided to tackle this problem and designed my own Kindle pouch pattern.

I love reading, and with the amount of books that I get through in a week, I don’t have room for hard copies of all of my books so switched to a Kindle e-reader. Last year for Christmas I was lucky enough to get a Kindle Voyage. It has an adaptive side light so I can read it at night without it affecting my sleep, and it goes everywhere with me. I read it to wake up in the morning, on the bus to and from work, and at night to help me drift off to sleep!

With my job I do a bit of travel, and I have been worrying about breaking the screen of my trusty Kindle. While my old Kindle’s case does fit, the power button couldn’t be accessed and it slipped around a bit. I’d been keeping an eye out for new cases but the ones that I liked didn’t ship to Australia. I decided to design and make my own pouch to store my kindle while travelling.

Kindle Pouch | MeaganMade.com

For this pouch I’ve used some of the lovely Tula Pink fabric that I picked up at the Sydney Craft Fair, and since I couldn’t make my mind up between two of the prints, I decided to make the pouch reversible. I have also included a layer of wadding to cushion the Kindle from small impacts.

Kindle Pouch Option 2 | MeaganMade.com

These fabrics are called The Hypnotizer and The Wanderer from the Chipper line of Tula Pink fabrics in the Raspberry colour. Lovely to work with and these colours are perfect for me. I’ve included a list of materials and the instructions to make this pouch below. I have made this with smaller pieces incase you wanted to include different colour pieces for front and back, or if you’d like to quilt some of the pieces, though this would make it harder to turn inside out.

This pattern is designed to fit the Kindle Voyage size, but at the end of the pattern I will give instructions on how to customise it for your device.

Materials:

  • 1 fat quarter of extrernal fabric*  (A)
  • 1 fat quarter of internal fabric* (B)
  • 1/4 yard of cotton wadding
  • Cotton in a coordinating colour with fabric

* I only used about 1/4 of these fat quarter pieces, but if your fabric is directional you may need to place the pieces in different arrangements and use more of the fabric. You could purchase a quarter yard of fabric but this will only work of the pattern is non-directional or the pattern is oriented correctly.

Directions:

Cut the following sized pieces:

  • 7.5″ x 5.5″ main pouch pieces
    • 2 in fabric A
    • 2 in fabric B
    • 2 in wadding
  • 3″ x 5.5″ flap pieces
    • 1 in fabric A
    • 1 in fabric B
    • 1 in wadding

Kindle Pouch Piece Layout | MeaganMade.com

  1. Take the main pouch pieces in Fabric A and wadding and layer them in the following order from bottom to top:
    • Wadding
    • Fabric A face up
    • Fabric A face down
    • Wadding
  2. With these four layers now aligned, sew with a scant 1/4″ seam along the two side (long) edges and bottom edge.
  3. Trim corners and any excess wadding then turn inside out, turning the corners as you go.
  4. Take the main pouch pieces in fabric B and layer them so that the right sides of the fabric are facing each other.
  5. Sew with a scant 1/4″ seam along the two side edges and bottom edge, leaving a 1.5″ break in the middle of the bottom edge to allow for later turning.
  6. Insert exterior (fabric A) pocket into interior (fabric B) pocket, so that right sides are facing each other.
  7. Sew around top edges to join the layers with a scant 1/4″ seam.
  8. Pull exterior (A) fabric out through gap in the bottom seam of the interior (B) fabric.
  9. Top sew along the gap to close the opening. then push lining back inside of exterior fabric (A).
  10. Take the flap pieces and layer them in the following order:
    • Batting
    • Fabric A face up
    • Fabric B face down
  11. Mark a point on the bottom edge (5.5″ side) 1″ from each side. Draw a line to the corresponding top corner to give angled sides. Cut along this line (See red lines in diagram below).Template for flap | MeaganMade.com
  12. Sew a scant 1/4″ seam along all edges, leaving a 1.5″ gap for turning along top edge.
  13. Turn so that right sides of the fabric are facing out and top sew along top edge to close gap
  14. Pin flap piece onto back of the finished piece so that it is attached to Fabric A and the long edge is parallel to the top edge of the pouch, and sits 1/2″ in from edge of fabric (see earlier pictures of finished pouch for guidance).
  15. Attach flap to pouch by sewing along long edge the flap piece (Where you top sewed to close the gap earlier on the flap piece).
  16. When your Kindle is inserted, simply tuck the flap piece inside the pouch and your Kindle is nicely protected from scratches and bumps.

Kindle Pouch | MeaganMade.com

Instructions for adapting pouch to your size requirements.

My Kindle measures 6.4″ x 4.5″ x 0.30″ . I rounded up the height to 6.5″ then added a half inch to the height and width to give me the main pouch piece sizes. Mine fits quite tightly, so if your kindle is thicker than mine, you may need to add extra allowance to the width and height for this. I decided on the height of 3″ for the flap piece and this seemed proportional to the rest of the pouch, but you can change this as you wish.

If you need anything clarified let me know! 🙂

Happy sewing,

Meagan x